Parched Gurugram’s DLF Phase 3 residents regret move to ‘posh’ sector

Shweta Singh, 45, a homemaker who shifted to DLF Phase 3 after her wedding in 2004, still waits for the monsoon so she can utilise rainwater to deep clean her house. She says she has regretted the move almost from the day she started living here.

“I have to wake up as early as 4am to store water, clean utensils, wash clothes, and cook, because that is the only time we get water supply. I am sleep-deprived and the water shortage has ruined my daily routine,” she says.

Singh is not the only peeved resident of DLF Phase 3, which is at the tail-end of the Gurugram Metropolitan Development Authority (GMDA) supply line and is one of the colonies suffering from the worst of the water crisis. For over a decade, in fact, several residents of White Town Houses, Pink Town Houses (PTH) and Block 5 of DLF Phase 3 have been complaining about the lack of water supply.

According to Alka Goyal, 52, another resident of PTH, there have been times her family has had to wipe soap off themselves with a towel because the tank went dry in the middle of their bath. “There is no underground tank so the only storage is the overhead tank. Relatives avoid coming to our place. Friends and relatives even send us water as a” she says.

Residents say the water crisis in the area is a perennial issue, whatever the season. The situation has worsened with most people working from home since the pandemic.

Achal Malhotra, 70, a retired Indian foreign service (IFS) officer who resides in Block 5 of DLF Phase 3 and is president of V Residents Empowerment and Welfare Society, says the colony depends on water tankers due to the shortage of water. He adds residents have tried to raise the issue with the agencies but to no avail. “The GMDA hired a private consultant to resolve the issue. He was supposed to survey of the area and submit a report on the infrastructure deficiency and bottlenecks in water distribution. No one knows what happened to the report and what the outcome was, as we are still reeling under water shortage and shelling out money to water tankers every month,” he said.

Malhotra says most households in the area receive water twice a day—but only for about four days a week. They end up paying ₹800 per day for water from private tankers, not to mention paying for cans of drinking water.

Residents say they have to buy mineral water to even wash vegetables and cook—a situation that hasn’t changed over a decade—while domestic help are hassled by the restriction on the amount of water they can use.

Kamaldeep Sharma, 48, a resident of PTH, says they struggle to find domestic help as all of them refuse to work due to the shortage of water. “We are struggling to get one for the last seven years. Anyone who comes to work for us leaves after a few days. Maids do not want to wash utensils with stored water, they want running tap water. How do we tell them it’s as good as gold because we spend huge amounts on tankers?” he says.

Malti Singh, 32, a domestic help from Malda in Bihar, lives in DLF Phase 3 and works in five houses. She says that even if she is paid double the going rate, she does not work in Block 5. “It takes over an hour to clean and wash utensils. The families ask me not to waste water and provide an insufficient amount,” she says.

Rajeev Mohan, another resident of Block 5, says that authorities seem apathetic to their concerns. “I have lived here for over 12 years and the water situation seems to be worsening with each year. On good days, we get water twice a day for 30-45 minutes. But in summer, which began in April this year, the supply is cut down to hardly 10-12 minutes. The population density in our block is increasing as new multi-storey buildings come up—but there is no increase in water supply in the area. We are living hand-to-mouth and any hiccup in the water supply from the Basai or Sector 16 pumping stations on account of power outage or broken pipes sets us back for days because adequate water does not reach us since we are at the tail-end of the GMDA supply,” he said.

Residents blamed civic agencies for the poor distribution as many lanes do not receive a single drop of water for several days.

When asked, GMDA officials said that some private licensed colonies had witnessed a rapid population growth and they were scrambling to keep up with the infrastructure demand. “There is a need to upgrade the pipelines in these colonies to augment water supply. Either the developer or the maintenance agency will have to upgrade the internal pipeline infrastructure for augmenting water supply,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.

A spokesperson of DLF, the developer, meanwhile said, “The DLF team is continuously monitoring the situation with regards to the deficient GMDA water supply in DLF City phases. Our teams are constantly working in synergy with the city administration and bureaucracy to ensure our residents face minimum inconvenience due to the ongoing water crisis in Haryana.”