Know about Jal Jeevan Mission
The Jal Jeevan mission, which will provide safe and adequate drinking water to all households in rural India by 2024, envisages connecting each household with a single tap connection. The motto of the Jal Jeevan Mission is ‘no one is left out’, thus ensuring every household irrespective of its socio-economic status, gets tap water supply. A community based approach to water is the basic component of the mission, with an emphasis on information, education and communication. The programme shall include, as a compulsory component, measures for the sustainability of water sources such as recharging and reutilising by means of grey water management, conservation or rain harvesting. JJM aims to build a Jan Andolan for water, thus placing it at the disposal of everyone. It comes under Jal Shakti Ministry.
Paani Samitis plan the establishment, maintenance and operation of village water supply systems. They are composed of 10 to 15 members, with at least 50% women members and other members from Self Help Groups, Social and Health Accredited Workers, Anganwadi Teachers, etc. A onetime village action plan will be prepared by the committees, merging all available village resources. The plan shall be endorsed in a Grama Sabha prior to its implementation.
The Objectives of Jal Jeevan Mission (Urban):
To secure water and sewer connections. The water bodies are being restored. The creation of a circular water economy.
The mission of the Jal Jeevan Mission is to assist, empower and facilitate:
States UTs are planning a participatory rural water supply strategy to ensure potable water security on a long term basis for all rural households and public institutions, i.e. GP building, School, Anganwadi centre, Health centre, wellness centres, etc.
Member States and territories to create strong institutions that focus on service delivery and financial sustainability of the industry by promoting a utility approach to improve quality of life by building the capacity of stakeholders and raising awareness in the community about water’s importance.
States/ UTs for creation of water supply infrastructure so that every rural household has Functional Tap Connection (FHTC) by 2024 and water in adequate quantity of prescribed quality is made available on regular basis.
States and territories to plan for the security of drinking water GPs/ rural communities to plan, implement, manage, own, operate and maintain their own in-village water supply systems.
Funding pattern for the mission:
For Himalayan and NorthEastern States, the share of money between Centre and State shall be 90:10, with 50:50 for others; 100 % for Union Territories.
Under the JJM, these components are supported,
- Efforts should be made to source funds from different sources/ programmes and convergence is the key Development of infrastructure providing potable water to all rural households by means of an in village piping system
- To ensure that the water supply system can remain sustainable in the long term, it is necessary to develop safe drinking water resources and or expand current sources.
- The retrofitting of completed and ongoing systems to provide the FHTC at a minimum 55 lpcd service level;
- Greywater management
- Support activities, i. e. IEC, HRD, training and development of infrastructure, water quality laboratories,water quality testing & monitoring, R&D, knowledge center, capacity building in the community etc.
Highlights of the mission:
Preventing Diarrhoeal Deaths:
JJM has the potential to save around 4 lakh lives from diarrhoea. This highlights that delivering piped potable water to every household in India saves lives.
Avoidance of Disability Adjusted Life Years (DALYs):
The JMM is helping to prevent approximately 14 million cases of diarrhoea and saving USD 101 billion and 66.6 million hours a day which would otherwise have been spent mainly by women who collect water.
Challenges of the program:
Covid-19 Pandemic:
The global pandemic had a broad range of impacts in different sectors, including infrastructure development projects such as “Har Ghar Jal” mission. The constraints have slowed down the pace of implementation, as they affect the availability of essential construction materials such as pipes and building material which has resulted in additional delays.
Certification and connectivity:
Although steps have been taken to increase the number of tap connections in some states, such as Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan, certification and complete village connectivity remains limited suggesting that further efforts are needed. The majority of villages don’t have a complete connection for all households. Rather, these villages achieved around half or more of the households having access to water by pipes.
Water contamination:
The issue of water contamination continues to exist in some regions, including West Bengal and Kerala, which makes it difficult for the public to access safe drinking water. Moreover, in many states there is also a lack of skilled labour for the construction of tanks, cisterns and water connections with good quality.
Implementation delays:
Work on providing tap connections to households under the Joint Undertaking has not yet started in some cases, leading to delays in the achievement of the objectives. About 1.75 million homes have not started work, out of approximately 19.2 million households which are targeted to benefit from the scheme and comprise about 5% of total households.
What’s been the performance of JJM?
Currently about 12.3 crore (62%) rural households have piped water connections up from 3.2 crore (16.6%) from 2019.
Five states have made it 100% coverage, namely; Gujarat, Telangana, Goa, Haryana, Punjab and 3 Union Territories: Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Daman Diu & Dadra Nagar Haveli and Puducherry.
In the near future, Himachal Pradesh will also have reached a saturation level of 98.87% followed by Bihar at 96.30%.
Links
https://jaljeevanmission.gov.in
