Union Minister of Jal Shakti, Shri Gajendra Singh Shekhawat held discussion with Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Shri Yogi Adityanath regarding implementation of Jal Jeevan Mission in the State through video conferencing today. It’s the endeavour of Government of India to provide assured basic services to the people living in rural areas of the country with focus on improving their living standards. Potable water in adequate quantity and of prescribed quality to be provided to every rural household on regular and long-term basis, for which the flagship programme Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM) is under implementation. The objective of the Mission is universal coverage i.e. every family in the village gets tap water connection in their household.

Uttar Pradesh is planning 100% coverage by 2022 to accomplish the ambitious target of providing tap connection to every rural household of the State. In this context, the central Minister had a detailed discussion on the progress of the mission in the State with the CM. The CM assured expeditious implementation of the mission in the State so as to achieve the target of providing household tap connections in rural areas in a time-bound manner. The CM mentioned the plan of the State to provide safe drinking water on priority in Vindhya - Bundelkhand region, 38 districts affected with JE/ AES as well as Arsenic and Fluoride affected districts.

Emphasizing the importance of the mission to improve the lives of rural people, central Minister stressed on retrofitting and augmentation of existing water supply schemes and urged to start this work in campaign mode to provide household tap connections from existing public stand-posts. The CM was urged to develop IoT based sensor system for monitoring of water service delivery. It was emphasized to commence the water supply works in every village so as to provide employment to returnee migrants.

Minister Shri Shekhawat reiterated the commitment of Union Government to provide all assistance to the State to achieve this goal. For Jal Jeevan Mission, funds are provided by Government of India based on the output in terms of tap connections provided and the utilization of available central and matching state share. Minister of Jal Shakti assured Uttar Pradesh CM of full support of Union Government to make the State a ‘100% FHTCs’ State by 2022.

Out of 2.63 Crore rural households in the State of Uttar Pradesh, only 10.23 lakh are provided with tap connections so far. Uttar Pradesh plans to provide tap connections in 1.02 Crore households during 2020-21. 

In 2020-21, ₹2,550.94 Crore have been allocated and including State share there is assured availability of ₹6,966.26 Crore. State is eligible for additional allocation based on physical and financial performance. Since Uttar Pradesh has been allocated ₹ 9,752 Crore under 15th Finance Commission Grants to PRIs and 50% of it is to be used for water supply and sanitation, Central minister requested the CM to plan for utilizing this fund for rural water supply, grey-water treatment and reuse and most importantly for ensuring long-term operation and maintenance of water supply schemes.

Union Minister further emphasized on preparation of Village Action Plans as well as constitution of village water and sanitation committee/ Paani Samiti as a sub-committee of Gram Panchayat with minimum 50% of women members, responsible for planning, designing, implementing and operating & maintaining of in-village water supply infrastructure. All villages have to prepare Village Action Plan (VAP) which essentially will comprise of development/ augmentation of drinking water sources, water supply, grey-water management and operation and maintenance component. In all villages, IEC campaign along with community mobilization needs to be taken up to make Jal Jeevan Mission truly a people’s movement. 

It’s the efforts of the Government to provide tap connections in rural households on priority during prevailing CoVid-19 situation, so that rural people don’t have to go to public stand-posts for fetching water.

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APS/PK