The motor had been singing since 5:30am. I heard the neighbour before I heard the overflow: a steel bucket banging, then a shout that water was in their baithak. I ran to the roof. The overhead tank was a fountain. The overflow pipe, bent toward their wall in last year’s jugaad, was drawing a dark map down the plaster. In a tight Lucknow or Jaipur plot that map becomes a lawyer’s photo if you keep the motor on “just two more minutes.”
A stuck ball cock, a tied float, a dead sensor, or a timer that does not know the tank is full will dump hundreds of litres onto someone else’s house. The water is yours after the meter. The damage is theirs. Stop first. Argue later. Repair the valve the same morning. Paint and plaster wait for the wall to dry, but the overflow must die today.
Home checks on the roof
Kill the starter. Close the gate valve to the overhead if you have one. Look at the ball cock. If the ball is underwater and the valve is still open, the cock is finished. If the ball is tied with a wire because “it used to shut too early,” you tied the flood. Cut the wire.
See where the overflow pipe points. It should drop into a visible drain on your side, not onto a shared wall, not into their window, not onto exposed electric fittings. A pipe that “always dripped a little” is how stains start in monsoon.
Check the tank lid. A missing lid lets the float jam on a stick or a plastic bag. Check the mosquito net. Check whether two motors fill the same tank, house and boring, and both ran.
Look at your own walls too. Overflow that wet the neighbour often wet your shaft first. Damp near a meter board is an electrician’s job the same day, not next week.
If the tank itself is cracked, the flood may be a split seam, not only the overflow. Empty to a safe level and call a tank welder or a mason, depending on plastic or cement.
Photos to take without turning it into a circus
Photograph your tank, the stuck float, the overflow pipe direction, and the wet wall from your roof. Photograph their stain only from a place you are allowed to stand. Do not enter their house to make a movie. They will photograph the inside. You photograph the source.
Photograph the motor switch in the off position after you stopped it. Time-stamp matters if they later say you kept flooding for hours.
If a society or a landlord is involved, send the photos the same morning. Delay looks like denial.
Keep a civil tone in the message. “Motor stopped, plumber called, overflow pipe will be turned to our drain” is a path. A paragraph about their old drain is a fight.
Neighbour timing and how the lane takes sides
Overflow at 5:30am is public. Everyone hears the motor. If you run long every day, they already counted your minutes. After a flood, they will remember those minutes. Shorten the run. Fit a working float. Tell them the hour you will repair.
If they want cash the same morning for a sofa, do not haggle on the stairs with a running leak. Stop the water, then talk numbers with dry floors. If the society has a clause on overflow, read it. Many registered societies treat repeated overflow as a nuisance you must fix, and they can fine.
A tenant in your house who leaves the motor on must be told in one sentence: no motor without a working ball cock. Put it in the house rules if you need to.
Do not retaliate by blocking their overflow next month. Two wet walls do not make a wise gali.
Complaint and repair path
Repair is a plumber: ball cock, float, overflow reroute, maybe a overflow alarm. Electrical safety is an electrician if water reached a board. The neighbour’s plaster is a mason after drying. If you have household insurance, ask them before you commit to a cash figure; many policies argue about gradual seepage versus a sudden overflow. The paper decides, not the stairs.
If the neighbour files a police or a consumer complaint, your photos of the immediate stop and the same-day plumber bill are your seriousness. If you ignored three warnings, the file looks different.
Society path: written complaint from them, written reply from you with the repair bill. Keep copies. A managing committee that only shouts in the park is not a record.
Municipal path is rarely the first door for a private tank overflow, unless water is falling on a public road and making it dangerous. Then the ward can notice you. Fix it before that notice.
If the float failed because sand from a boring jammed it, fix the sand problem too or the new cock will die. That loops to the well, which still needs legal standing if you deepen or redrill.
Approximate INR rates that vary by ward
A standard ball cock for a small overhead tank is often Rs 150 to Rs 600. A plumber’s morning visit in a dense ward may be Rs 300 to Rs 1,000, higher in a gated society where they charge entry and parking as attitude. Rerouting an overflow with a bit of PVC can be Rs 400 to Rs 2,000. A plastic tank replacement, if the body cracked, runs in a wide band, Rs 3,000 to Rs 12,000 for common household sizes, plus hoisting. Cement tank crack repair is mason work, Rs 1,500 to Rs 8,000 depending on how much plaster they redo. A simple float switch on the motor can be Rs 400 to Rs 2,000 fitted. Neighbour wall paint after drying might be Rs 1,000 to Rs 8,000 for a patch, and more if the baithak needs full colour matching. Ward labour in an old city is one market. A new sector on the edge of Jaipur is another. Get a written plumber chit. Cash on the roof with no bill helps nobody if the wall debate continues.
Do not underpay the neighbour in a way that looks like an insult, and do not sign a blank “full settlement” if you have not seen the inside damage. See, then settle.
FAQ
I stopped the motor. Do I still have to pay for their wall?
Stopping limits the damage. It does not rewind the stain that already happened. Talk with photos and a mason’s estimate. A stuck float is on the tank owner in almost every lane argument.
Can I run the motor if I stand on the roof and watch?
Watching is better than a tied float. A working ball cock plus a overflow that lands on your drain is better than watching. People go downstairs for tea. The tank does not wait.
The overflow pipe was always toward their side. Is that custom?
Custom is not a right to wet their room. Turn the pipe. Shared walls need a dry deal, not a historic drip.
Should I switch the motor off at the MCB every day?
If the float is broken, yes, until it is fixed. An MCB is not a float. It will not see a full tank. It will only see a short.
Short note
Paani Atka is not a jal board and not a court. We tell you to stop the motor and fix the cock. Any money for the wall is between you, the neighbour, and if needed a formal desk. The official office is final for civic notices. A new boring to “fill faster so you run the motor less” still needs a local permit. Do not drill to escape a float valve.