Jal Jeevan Mission

News: Jal Sakti Ministry has said that States, aside from those in the North East and the Himalayan region, will have to bear half the fiscal burden of the Jal Jeevan Mission

Facts:

About Jal Jeevan Mission:

• Aim: It seeks to provide safe and adequate drinking water through individual household tap connections (HarGharJal) to all rural households by 2024.
• Implementing Agency: It will be implemented by Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation under the Jal Shakti Ministry.
• Finance:
  • The project is estimated to cost Rs 3.60 lakh crore, with the Union government and non-Northeast and non-Himalayan states sharing the expenses 50:50.
  • However, in the case of N-E and Himalayan states, the funding pattern will be 90:10.
  • In Union Territories, the Centre will bear the full cost of the programme
• Features:
• It seeks to generate maximum community participation in the form of ‘jan andolan’ to achieve the target of functional household tap connection by 2024.
• It is based on a decentralised approach. It seeks to embrace the beneficiary population as stakeholders — both in the initial implementation and subsequent maintenance phase. 
  • It seeks to galvanise a Jan Andolan (people’s movement) with the total involvement of the village community. Here, the community is even expected to contribute 5% of the expenditure by cash or voluntary labour.
• It prescribes a “bottoms-up” five-year village action plan through the formation of a village water and sanitation committee or Pani Samiti, under the gram panchayat.
  • It is to play a key role in planning, implementation, operation, and maintenance of the in-village water supply system.
  • The long-term aim is to convert these Pani Samitis into local “Water Utilities” to manage both technical and commercial aspects.
• It is the ultimate delivery and not the mere establishment of supply infrastructure that will determine its true success or failure.
  • Service delivery standards have been adopted whereby a household will receive a potable water supply of 55 liters per capita per day, of prescribed quality. 
  • Sensor-based control systems will be installed to measure the quantity, quality, and regularity of water supply through an internet-based real-time format.
  • This will feed into a public-domain dashboard at village levels. Water quality monitoring will be done by the local community; with a focus on empowering village women to take over this task. 
  • The state will support this activity by opening up laboratories to have the water samples tested at a nominal rate. 
• It identifies specific areas where priority attention is to be given. These relate to arsenic and fluoride-affected locations, drought-prone, and desert areas. 
  • It also includes SC/ST majority villages and socio-economically backward “aspirational districts.” 
• Need: According to the Jal Shakti Ministry, only 18% of India’s rural households have access to piped water. Thus, to improve coverage of households with piped safe drinking water the mission has been initiated.