HARARE - While Bulawayo residents may frown at being asked to simultaneously flush their toilets at 7.30pm to beat water shortages and resultant choked sewers, New Dehli is following suit.

Now infamously called the flush mobs, little do Bulawayo residents know that they are inspiring a world 18 000km away.

An Indian minister has called on residents in the heavily-populated New Dehli city to follow Bulawayo’s example after suffering severe water shortages which have resulted in blocked sewers.

Speaking on India’s national television yesterday, Jairam Ramesh, India’s drinking water and sanitation minister, appealed to Delhi’s 16 million plus residents to follow the example set by Bulawayo.

Bulawayo’s council has asked its more than one million residents to flush their toilets simultaneously at 7:30pm when water supplies are restored.

Bulawayo officials say “synchronised flushing” helps clear waste that would have accumulated in sanitary facilities following days of water shortages.

Ramesh said the Zimbabwean example was proof that it was possible to execute the plan.
 
He said it was especially critical for Indians to follow suit as the toilet situation in the country was “pitiful”

“The solution to our water woes lies in Zimbabwe’s second-largest city’s legislation called synchronised toilet flushing.

“If we flush our toilets simultaneously as they are doing in Bulawayo, we take pressure off our poor sewer systems,” Ramesh said during the official launch of a water facility in New Dehli.

Despite an economic boom, lack of water supply has plagued Indian cities for decades prompting citizens to make creative use of their unused toilet spaces. Uses of toilet space have ranged from makeshift office and study rooms to pantries, aquariums and kitchen herb gardens.

In New Delhi, middle-class people are reduced to foraging for water.