Amma water plant capacity to be increased to two lakh litres a day

The low-cost bottled mineral water sale was launched by the late Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa in 2013 to provide hygienic and sterile drinking water to the poor and working-class people at a price of Rs 10 per litre at government bus stops and other public places.

Amma Drinking Water Plant has been established by the State Express Transport Corporation (SETC) at the Institute of Road Transport (IRT), Heavy Vehicle Driver Training Wing campus, Gummudipoondi, Thiruvallur District in an extent of 2.47 acres. The existing plant can produce 1.5 lakh bottles per day. However, over the years, the production has fallen to 30,000 litres a day, resulting in the huge demand-supply gap.

Last year, the IRT has invited bids for installing machinery to manufacture and supply of purified packaged drinking water bottle in a plastic PET bottle of 1000 ml and glass PET bottle of 750 ml at Gummudipoondi for a contract period of five years. “The bottling plant should produce a minimum of two lakh bottles per day and maximum according to the demand fixed by the SETC,” an official of the transport department said. He added that the plant would treat the borewell water to produce purified drinking water which would be filled in the bottles and transported through the transport corporation buses.

A senior transport department official said that with the bus services remaining suspended in the wake of the Covid-19 pandemic, the drinking water production in the plant also affected. “The works are underway to replace the existing plant with a modern at a cost of Rs 12 crore. When the modernisation works are completed, the plant will produce two lakh litres of drinking water a day,” the official added.