Call for community ownership of water supply infrastructure

Officers from 8 States, 3 UTs attend regional conference on Jal Jeevan Mission

Emphasis was laid at a regional conference on Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM) here on Friday on evolving the community ownership of water supply infrastructure and service delivery to ensure its long-term sustainability. The rural communities should be engaged in the water supply schemes from the planning stage, instead of their “retrospective involvement”, said the participants.

The Ministers and officers from eight States and three Union Territories attended the conference held here to review the progress achieved and determine the way forward under the JJM and Swachh Bharat Mission-Grameen. Union Jal Shakti Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat presided.

The JJM envisages supply of safe and adequate drinking water through tap connections to all households in the rural areas of the country by 2024. A target has been set for supplying 55 litres of water per person per day to every household in the villages, where the people have been facing scarcity of water.

Mr. Shekhawat urged State governments to treat the JJM as a “one-time opportunity” to address the issue of water scarcity and speed up the scheme’s implementation to meet the challenges. He said the sustainability of service delivery should be ensured in terms of adequate quantity, prescribed quality and regularity.

The Union Minister said only 16.75% of rural households had access to tap water connections in 2019 when the JJM was launched. “Despite disruptions caused by the pandemic in the last two years, we have managed to provide more than 6.16 crore tap water connections. Over 9.40 crore or 49% of households in the villages are benefiting from clean drinking water,” he said.

₹32,608 crore has been allocated as the Central grant under JJM and ₹2,167 under the SBM-G to eight participating States and three UTs in 2022-23. Besides, ₹7,632 crore was allocated as the tied grant under the 15th Finance Commission for drinking water and sanitation in 2022-23 for the eight States.

Representatives of Rajasthan, Gujarat, Haryana, Goa, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Maharashtra, Uttarakhand, Dardra and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu, Jammu & Kashmir and Lakadh attended the day-long conference. Two of the UTs have already achieved 100% of the target, while Punjab is at 99% and Himachal Pradesh at 93%.