Hyderabad’s water emergency is being presented as a supply problem with a scheduled infrastructure solution: the Hyderabad Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewerage Board (HMWSSB) says Godavari Phases II and III will add 320 million gallons per day by the end of 2027, with the aim of making the city tanker-free by the end of 2028. But the board’s own responses to residents show that the challenge is broader. New water will have to move through an ageing and expanding network, reach peripheral colonies, support a rapidly growing high-rise city, and be matched by sewerage, groundwater and wastewater systems.
The proposed augmentation is therefore not simply a question of how much water Hyderabad can bring into the city. It is also a question of whether the institutions responsible for storage, distribution, sewage treatment, local regulation and building permissions can coordinate well enough to convert additional source water into reliable household supply.
HMWSSB currently maintains a piped network of about 15,000 kilometres, with pipelines ranging from two to 50 years old. The board says it is carrying out inspections, repairs, maintenance and network improvements to reduce transmission and distribution losses. It has also identified peripheral and rapidly developing areas where population growth has increased demand, including Kollur, Gachibowli, Kokapet and Neopolis.
These areas illustrate the difference between citywide water availability and household-level reliability. A source augmentation can increase the volume available to the system, but residents will experience the benefit only if transmission capacity, local storage, pumping infrastructure and distribution networks are adequate. HMWSSB has said it plans to complete a ring main connecting all water sources by the time Godavari Phases II and III are completed. It is also preparing a master plan for additional storage facilities in different localities, with Tata Consultancy Services engaged to prepare a longer-term plan for the CURE area.
The board’s explanation for uneven supply is similarly infrastructural. Localities may receive water daily or once every three or four days depending on source availability, elevation, network configuration, storage capacity and local demand. HMWSSB has said that most urban local bodies were merged with it only recently and that it is reviewing the distribution system to ensure technically equitable allocation of available water.
That qualification is important. Equitable distribution is not necessarily the same as identical supply frequency. A technically equitable system must account for the physical differences between established neighbourhoods, elevated areas and newly urbanising colonies. However, the board’s target of daily or uninterrupted supply across the CURE area after the Godavari projects are commissioned will ultimately be judged at the level of individual households, not only at the level of bulk infrastructure.
The present gap is visible in Hyderabad’s tanker economy. HMWSSB says 96 filling stations and about 1,500 water tankers are operating in the CURE area. Fifteen additional filling stations are proposed for the summer, along with the registration of more than 300 additional tankers. The board also says it is regulating illegal extraction of groundwater for non-domestic use and will take action against violations.
This creates a difficult transition. Tankers provide an immediate response where the formal network is inadequate, but unauthorised groundwater extraction can deepen the same water insecurity that tankers are meant to address. HMWSSB has said its Chief Vigilance Officer and team inspect tanker operations and act against operators misusing the board’s name, logo or identity. Penalties of Rs 5,000 to Rs 20,000 may be imposed after field inspections, and repeat offenders’ tankers may be seized. Citizens can report such cases through the PAANI app or the toll-free number 155313.
The distinction between authorised supply, private tanker operations and illegal groundwater extraction will become increasingly important if Hyderabad is to reduce dependence on private tankers. A tanker-free target cannot be achieved only by adding vehicles or filling stations; those measures address immediate access, not the underlying reliability of the municipal network.
The same systems problem appears in the board’s response on rainwater harvesting. Installation of rainwater harvesting systems is already part of existing regulations, but HMWSSB acknowledges that regulations alone are insufficient. The board surveyed approximately 34,000 premises and registered details of 24,892 structures on the JSJB 2.0 platform linked to the Jal Shakti Abhiyan. It has also begun converting unused borewells into injection wells for groundwater recharge, with 268 works completed and 143 in progress.
These figures establish the scale of administrative activity, but they do not by themselves establish how many systems are functional, how much water they recharge or how consistently they are maintained. HMWSSB itself says that ensuring existing recharge pits remain functional is as important as requiring them in the first place. The implementation question is especially significant in a city where new construction is expanding rapidly and groundwater stress is linked to both household demand and private tanker supply.
Sewerage capacity is the other half of the water-supply question. HMWSSB says it has installed sewage treatment plants along the Musi and near other water bodies, while expanding and upgrading the sewerage network so that sewage is intercepted and conveyed to treatment plants. Sewerage diversion mains are being developed by HMWSSB, the Lakes Division and HYDRAA, with water bodies and lakes falling under the jurisdiction of the relevant urban local bodies. HYDRAA, the Telangana Pollution Control Board and other enforcement agencies are involved in identifying and acting against unauthorised discharges.
The institutional arrangement is therefore distributed across multiple agencies. Water supply, sewerage, lakes, pollution control and local administration are connected on the ground but not concentrated within a single authority. That division can allow specialised responsibilities, but it also makes implementation dependent on coordination. A treated-water plant cannot solve pollution if sewage is not intercepted, and a lake cannot be protected if enforcement against unauthorised discharge is inconsistent.
HMWSSB’s proposed wastewater reuse infrastructure signals a shift from treating sewage only as a disposal problem to treating it as a supplementary resource. The board has proposed conveyance and distribution infrastructure for secondary-treated wastewater from selected sewage treatment plants. The proposed users include data centres operated by Microsoft, Amazon and CtrlS, along with manufacturing units such as Welspun in the Hyderabad Metropolitan Region. The planned routes include Attapur STP to Chandanvelly and Nagole STPs to Future City, with ultimate demand estimated at 500 MLD. The project is proposed to begin from the following month, according to the board’s response.
If implemented, this system could reduce the use of potable water for industrial and other high-demand non-potable purposes. The board has also said that treated sewage should be used for gardening, landscaping, fountains and other non-potable uses, subject to availability. This principle is particularly relevant in places where residents report receiving water only once every five days while potable water is used for non-essential purposes.
The pressure on the system is not limited to existing residents. HMWSSB says it assesses water-supply feasibility and infrastructure requirements for high-rise buildings and large residential projects based on proposed population, dwelling units, occupancy and applicable water-demand norms. It also considers existing network availability, hydraulic capacity, nearby reservoirs and pumping infrastructure. Developers are required to make arrangements for sewage treatment, treated-wastewater reuse and rainwater harvesting under applicable statutory requirements.
The board says it is coordinating with HMDA, GHMC and other departments so that water availability and wastewater management are considered while granting permissions for new developments. For large projects, an assured water source, supply-infrastructure feasibility and sewage-treatment arrangements are described as important considerations. This places high-rise approvals within the wider water-governance system rather than treating them as isolated construction permissions.
The practical test will be whether these conditions are assessed before projects add demand to already stressed local networks. A building may comply with a rainwater-harvesting or sewage-treatment requirement on paper, but the city-wide outcome depends on whether those systems are built, maintained and connected to a functioning management framework. The board’s own emphasis on enforcement and maintenance suggests that compliance at approval stage is only one part of the process.
Hyderabad’s water plan also includes contingency arrangements for variations in availability, particularly during summer and periods of reduced rainfall. Godavari water is lifted from the Yellampalli reservoir and treated at the Mallaram water treatment plant before being supplied to the twin cities. HMWSSB says it continuously monitors water quality and is reviewing alternative sources and existing systems to optimise available resources.
At the demand end, the board’s current campaign asks residents to reduce consumption by 20 percent through daily-use practices. At the supply and recharge end, it is relying on rainwater-harvesting pits, recharge borewells, rooftop injection borewells and additional water from the Godavari and Krishna rivers. Traditional structures such as stepwells and open wells are also recognised as relevant to groundwater recharge, although their restoration requires coordination among municipal authorities, HMDA, the Revenue Department, the Archaeology Department and other agencies. HMWSSB says CSR funds, non-governmental organisations and resident welfare associations may also be involved.
The evidence supplied by the water board confirms a large infrastructure response, but it also shows why the 2028 tanker-free goal will be difficult to measure through source augmentation alone. The relevant indicators will include supply frequency by locality, network losses, functioning storage, illegal groundwater extraction, the operational status of recharge systems, sewage interception, treated-water reuse and the water conditions attached to new development.
Godavari Phases II and III could give Hyderabad the additional volume it needs. The larger urban question is whether the city’s institutions can distribute that volume equitably, protect the sources that support it and prevent new demand from outpacing new capacity. The next milestones are the proposed Godavari commissioning by the end of 2027, completion of the ring main, expansion of the sewerage and wastewater-reuse systems, and the board’s target of a tanker-free CURE area by the end of 2028.
