Algae and Rusted Taps Found at Varanasi Cantt, Lohta and Sarnath Drinking Points

Rusted taps, algae-stained drinking points and coolers that were not cooling — that is what a Thursday field check found at Varanasi Cantt after Comptroller and Auditor General remarks flagged water shortages at Varanasi Junction.

The Friday account, timed around 16:05 IST on 21 August 2026, said the checks covered Cantt, Lohta and Sarnath on Thursday. At Cantt, platforms cited included 1, 5, 6, 8 and 9. Taps and pipes looked rusted. Algae sat at drinking spots. Coolers gave no cold water. The station handles more than one lakh passengers a day, the field notes said. Those are platform observations, not a laboratory certificate.

Lohta’s booth tops on platforms 1 to 3 carried algae too, the same investigation said. At Sarnath, taps on platforms 1 and 2 gave no water at all, and heavy algae was visible around the points. Two passengers — Pulpati Devi of Mau and Ankit of Ghazipur — said the taps were dry when they tried them.

Banaras station, under North Eastern Railway, had a separate Monday visit by DRM Ashish Jain. A water sample was taken there; the report was still awaited. That Monday sampling is related background. It does not stand in for Thursday’s checks at Cantt, Lohta and Sarnath.

Additional Divisional Railway Manager (Northern Railway) B.K. Yadav answered on record. He said information about the CAG report had come in, that water testing would be got done afresh at Varanasi and other stations, and that sanitation staff had been told to keep watch on the points. In English translation of his Hindi remarks: “We have received information about the CAG report. Water testing will again be got done afresh at Varanasi and other stations.”

CAG’s published remarks that triggered the spot checks had focused on shortages at Varanasi Junction — drinking water, coolers, signboards. Looking at Cantt’s rusted fittings, Lohta’s green booth tops and Sarnath’s dry taps widens the civic picture. No illness linked to the taps was reported in the Friday account.

Pilgrim months pack these platforms with short-haul and long-distance travellers. A rusted tap or an algae-stained booth is the detail passengers notice before any lab file arrives. Published re-test results, cleaned or replaced fittings, and coolers that actually cool will show whether Thursday’s findings were a one-day complaint. Jain’s Banaras sample remains pending in the cited copy. Yadav’s Friday line puts Varanasi and other stations under a renewed testing push and sanitation monitoring.

Thursday’s walkthrough at Cantt, Lohta and Sarnath, and Yadav’s on-record promise of fresh tests, are what Friday put on the public record. Earlier Banaras DRM water-test reporting sits nearby on the diary; it does not swallow this multi-station field check.