Union Minister of Jal Shakti, Gajendra Singh Shekhawat today held a virtual conference with Chief Ministers, Lieutenant Governors and representatives of States and Union Territories to review the progress of implementation of Jal Jeevan Mission across the country.
This Conference was organised to discuss various issues i.e., planning, implementation and progress made so far as well as the way forward so that the remaining households in villages get tap water connections at earliest.
Advisor to Lieutenant Governor of J&K, Rajeev Rai Bhatnagar along with Chief Engineer Jal Shakti (PHE) and other concerned officials participated in the meeting on behalf of J&K government.
Speaking on the occasion, the Union Minister of Jal Shakti complemented States/ UTs for the exemplary work carried out by them during the lockdown period in the wake of COVID-19 pandemic to provide tap connections to rural households.
Sri Gajendra Shekhawat expressed hope that all States/ UTs will make all out efforts to ensure ‘HarGhar Jal’ and discussed threadbare the planning, progress and roadmap to be followed by the States/UTs for the implementation of Jal Jeevan Mission with speed, scale and skill urged States/ UTs to speed up the implementation.
National Jal Jeevan Mission presented the progress in all States/ UTs and urged them to speed up the implementation to accomplish the goal of the Mission in a time-bound manner so that every rural household gets tap water connection in rural homes.
The Union Minister added that the mission was launched by Prime Minster Shri Narendra Modi with the aim of ensuring ‘ease of living’ in the lives of people living in rural areas and improving their quality of lives especially the lives of women of every household who endure the most for getting water for homes from a distance. Providing good quality of water to Households will lead to improvement in the health indices. The Mission not only aims to provide safe water to all but also creates employment opportunity for local people in rural areas. Skilled manpower in every village i.e. plumbing, masonry, electrical, pump operator, etc. are required, for which training is being imparted.
The Minister also highlighted that under the vision and guidance of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi to make provision for piped water supply in schools, Anganwadi centres and ashramshalas (residential schools in tribal areas), a ‘100-days’ campaign has been launched on 2nd October, 2020 to ensure safe water to children for better health and holistic development.
Speaking on the occasion, Advisor to Lieutenant Governor, Rajeev Rai Bhatnagar presented the progress report of Jammu and Kashmir before the minister and assured him that efforts are being made to implement Jal Jeevan mission on time in J&K.
The Advisor informed the union minister that out of the total 18.17 lakh households, 7.35 lakh households have been provided FHTC’s and the rest of the target will be covered in three phases.
Giving details on the future course of action plan, Advisor Bhatnagar informed the minister that under phase I, four districts will be covered till March 2021, nine districts will be covered in phase II upto December 2021 while seven districts will be covered in phase III till December 2022.
The Advisor further informed the minister that the process of getting testing labs accredited from National Accreditation Board for Testing and Calibration Laboratories (NABL) has been expedited and within a short period of time the accreditation will be granted to the testing labs of Jammu and Kashmir besides the mechanism for mobile testing labs will also be put in place in due time.
Giving details on the 100 days campaign, Advisor Bhatnagar informed the minister that J&K Administration has covered maximum schools and Anganwadi Centres (AWCs) till now and the efforts to cover all schools and AWCs has been expedited and only 3318 schools out of 23113 and 6000 AWCs out of 28061 are left which will be covered till December 2020.
The Advisor also informed the minister that four habitations falling under quality affected area will be covered by December 2020.
The Union Minister complimented the J&K government for better progress in implementing the Jal Jeevan Mission and asked them to focus on Information Education and Communication (IEC) activities, skilling of manpower and Water Quality Management system.