Although the tanks have long vanished, the city of

Bombay Mumbai (, ; also known as Bombay — the official name until 1995) is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra and the ''de facto'' financial centre of India. According to the United Nations, as of 2018, Mumbai is the second-m ...

(now Mumbai) once had many

water tank A water tank is a container for storing water. Water tanks are used to provide storage of water for use in many applications, drinking water, irrigation agriculture, fire suppression, agricultural farming, both for plants and livestock, chemi ...

s within its city limits. They were once the only source of water to the city. The only testimony to their existence is the names of the roads in their vicinity, which befuddles many citizens as to the original location to these mystifying relics of the past. The oldest tank was the Cowasjee Patel Tank built in 1775. A total of ten tanks were built between the eighteenth and nineteenth century. The tanks were named after philanthropic citizens who donated money to fund the building of these tanks so that the citizens of the city would get a fresh source of drinking water. The tanks were: # Cowasji Rustamji Patel Tank ( CP Tank) #

Gowalia Tank Gowalia Tank Maidan, officially renamed August Kranti Maidan, is a park in Grant Road West, in South Mumbai, in which Mahatma Gandhi issued the Quit India speech on 8 August 1942. It decreed that unless the British left India immediately, ...

# Khara Tank # Two Tanks # Babula Tank # Nawab Tank # Framjee Cowasji Tank # Mumbadevi Tank #

Banganga Tank The Banganga Tank is a temple tank which is part of the Hindu Walkeshwar Temple complex in the Malabar Hill area of the city of Mumbai, India. History The tank was built in AD 1127 by Lakshman Prabhu, a minister in the court of Silhara dynas ...

# Bandra Tank Out of the list only the Banganga Tank and the Bandra Tank are still in existence today.

Locations

The CP Tank was built by Cowasji Rustamjee Patel in the

Girgaon Girgaon, or Girgaum, is an area in southern Mumbai in Maharashtra, India. It is near the coast. A section of Marine Drive is located here. See also *Girgaum Chowpatti *Tanks of Bombay Although the tanks have long vanished, the city of Bom ...

vicinity in 1775. The Framji Cowasji Tank bordered Esplanade was built by Framji Cowasji in 1831. All that remains of the tank is a plaque on a wall opposite Metro Cinema in

South Mumbai South Mumbai, colloquially SoBo from South Bombay in Anglo-Indian English, administratively the Mumbai City District, is the city centre and the southernmost precinct of Greater Bombay. It extends from Colaba to Mahim and Sion neighbour ...

. The Babula Tank was built near

Grant Medical College The Grant Government Medical College, Mumbai, is a public medical college, affiliated to the Maharashtra University of Health Sciences. Founded in 1845, it is one of the oldest institutions teaching medicine in South Asia. Its clinical affil ...

and the Mumbadevi Tank was constructed by a pious woman named Putlibai. The

has been present since ancient times, said to be from the time of

Rama Rama (; ), Ram, Raman or Ramar, also known as Ramachandra (; , ), is a major deity in Hinduism. He is the seventh and one of the most popular '' avatars'' of Vishnu. In Rama-centric traditions of Hinduism, he is considered the Supreme Bein ...

, and is fed by a natural spring although it is only a few

decametre A decametre ( International spelling as used by the International Bureau of Weights and Measures and by most English speaking countries, United States spelling dekameter or decameter,), symbol dam ("da" for the SI prefix deca-, "m" for the SI ...

s from the seashore. The Bandra Tank was built by a rich Kokni Muslim of Village Navpada, and was in use for watering cattle and washing clothes.

History

The tanks were mostly constructed in the crowded areas and were prone to pollution. The scarcity of water was acute at that time and was left to the mercy of the

monsoon A monsoon () is traditionally a seasonal reversing wind accompanied by corresponding changes in precipitation but is now used to describe seasonal changes in atmospheric circulation and precipitation associated with annual latitudinal osci ...

rains. According to the ''Bombay City Gazetteer'' published in 1909, these tanks were often very low and had to be replenished by sinking new wells. In 1846, the city faced an acute

water shortage Water scarcity (closely related to water stress or water crisis) is the lack of fresh water resources to meet the standard water demand. There are two types of water scarcity: physical or economic water scarcity. Physical water scarcity is wher ...

following which Framji Cowasji sank three wells in its gardens to provide water by steam machinery. Later in 1856, the city faced a severe

drought A drought is defined as drier than normal conditions.Douville, H., K. Raghavan, J. Renwick, R.P. Allan, P.A. Arias, M. Barlow, R. Cerezo-Mota, A. Cherchi, T.Y. Gan, J. Gergis, D. Jiang, A. Khan, W. Pokam Mba, D. Rosenfeld, J. Tierney, an ...

, and an edict was set out relocating all

cattle Cattle (''Bos taurus'') are large, domesticated, cloven-hooved, herbivores. They are a prominent modern member of the subfamily Bovinae and the most widespread species of the genus ''Bos''. Adult females are referred to as cows and adult ma ...

to Mahim, which was the periphery of the city at that time. Thousands would gather daily around the tank at Esplanade to collect water, while the government brought thousands of water drums from far off distances to empty into wells at

Bori Bunder Bori Bunder (also known as Bori Bandar) is an area along the Eastern shore line of Mumbai, India. Background This place was used as a storehouse for goods imported and exported from Mumbai. In the local language, 'Bori' mean sack and 'Bandar' ...

, Chinch Bunder, and

Dongri Dongri is a port city in the Mira-Bhayandar municipality of Thane district, situated just north of Gorai, Mumbai. The word ' Dungaree' (worker's overalls worn in Britain) has its origin in Dongri due to this genre of garment monolithically bei ...

. After a regular water supply to the city was established from the Vihar and

Tulsi ''Ocimum tenuiflorum'', commonly known as holy basil, ''tulsi'' or ''tulasi'', is an aromatic perennial plant in the family Lamiaceae. It is native to the Indian subcontinent and widespread as a cultivated plant throughout the Southeast Asian ...

lakes, the tanks were declared redundant. They soon became a breeding ground for

mosquito Mosquitoes (or mosquitos) are members of a group of almost 3,600 species of small flies within the family Culicidae (from the Latin ''culex'' meaning " gnat"). The word "mosquito" (formed by ''mosca'' and diminutive ''-ito'') is Spanish for "li ...

es and consequently were filled in. The famous Gowalia Tank Maidan is on top of the original tank. {{DEFAULTSORT:Tanks Of Bombay History of Mumbai Buildings and structures in Mumbai Water supply infrastructure in India 1775 establishments in British India