Bhubaneswar, July 14: The East Coast Railways (ECoR) has decided to install water vending machines (WVM) at Bhubaneswar railway station by the end of this month to provide purified drinking water to passengers at low cost in collaboration with The Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), a subsidiary of the ministry of railways. It will put up around 100 WVMs at big stations of the railway zone spread over Odisha and portions of Andhra Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.
Kushal Chatterjee, IRCTC regional manager said that they will be installing three machines at Bhubaneswar railway station. This will facilitate the passengers to get purified drinking water starting at a cost of Re 1 only. More machines will be put up in phases keeping the crowd and demand in mind, he added.
A passenger can get 300ml of water for Rs. 1 (Rs. 2 with container), water through reverse osmosis at Rs. 3 for 500ml (Rs. 5 with container), Rs. 5 for one litre (Rs. 8 with container), Rs. 8 for two litres (Rs. 12 with container), and Rs. 20 for five litres (Rs. 25 with container). An IRCTC officer informed that the drinking water will be purified based on the standards prescribed by the World Health Organization (WHO).
Chatterjee said that they have already installed around 30 machines at several big stations in the zone. In Odisha, IRCTC has put up four machines each at Sambalpur and Rayagada and two in Puri and Titilagarh stations. Visakhapatnam, Vizianagaram, Duvvada and Simhachalam stations have WVMs. After Bhubaneswar, these machines will be installed at Khurda Road, Cuttack, Bhadrak, Jajpur Road and Berhampur in phases with 63 machines to be installed in Khurda Division.
