Centre pushes for Jal Jeevan Mission amid Covid pandemic

Sees an opportunity to provide employment to migrant workers

 

New Delhi (Agencies) : In a bid to convert Covid pandemic and the lockdown adversity, which has led to loss of jobs of teeming workers, into an opportunity to achieve national goal of piped-water connection to every rural household in the country by 2024, the Union Jal Shakti Ministry has asked the states and the UTs to give a push to the Jal Jeevan Mission.

The states and UTs, including Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh among north and north-western states and UTs, recently committed to the ministry to cover all their areas under the Jal Jeevan Mission in between March and December 2022, much ahead of the national deadline.

The commitments were made during presentations to the National Jal Jeevan Mission for seeking approval for the Jal Jeevan Mission related Annual Action Plan (2020-21).

Sources said in a follow up, the ministry has now communicated to states and UTs, "during this trying times of the pandemic" the effort, including of the National Jal Jeevan Mission, was to commence works relating to potable water through tap connection to every household.

"The piped water connection will avoid crowding at public stand-posts to fetch water," said the ministry.

Also, it would provide employments, especially to the returnee migrant workers, skilled and semi-skilled.

This would ensure sufficient ground water availability as also water availability for agriculture, besides helping in providing drinking water to every household. The rural economy will get a push.

The objective of the Jal Jeevan Mission is to provide Functional Household Tap Connection (FHTC) to each rural household of the country.

During presentation to the National Jal Jeevan Mission, Haryana Government informed that out of 28.94 lakh rural households in the state, 18.83 lakh already had tap connections.

There was a plan to provide seven lakh connections in 2020-21 and remaining 3.11 lakh by March 22, it added.

In Punjab, out of 35.07 lakh rural households, 17.48 lakh already have tap connections. The plan is to provide 7.60 lakh connections out of remaining 17.59 lakh households in 2020-21. About 10 lakh of them will be provided with the connections by March 2022.

As many as 9.21 lakh rural households out of a total of 17.4 lakh in Himachal Pradesh already have connections. The remaining 7.83 lakh will be provided by March 2022.

In Jammu and Kashmir, out of the total of 18.37 lakh households, 7.82 lakh have already tap connections. The UT plans to provide remaining 10.35 lakh tap connections by March 2022.

In Ladakh, out of 44,000 households, only 2,000 have tap connections. The UT plans to cover remaining households by March 2022 in the high altitude areas and hostile terrain.

Assured fund of Rs 428 crore is available with the UT during 2020-21 for the Jal Jeevan Mission.

With an outlay of Rs 3.60 lakh crore for Jal Jeevan Mission, the Centre's share is 2.08 lakh crore and the remaining Rs 1.52 crore is to be borne by states.

During 2020-21, Rs 23,500 crore budgetary provision has been made for implementation of the Jal Jeevan Mission. As much as Rs 10,000 crore was allocated in 2019-20.

Strengthening of the drinking water sources is being ensured through convergence of various programmes, including MGNREGS, SBM-G, 15th Finance Commission Grants to PRIs, District Mineral Development Fund, CAMPA, CSR Fund, and Local Area Development Fund.