Assam performs worst in terms of providing tap water to rural families

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• Dec 16, 2022 | Dhupali Das

Under JJM, it took three years to bring tap water to 26.05 lakh Assamese households, with an estimated 8.68 lakh houses...

Digital Desk: When it comes to providing tap water to rural families under the Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM) of the Union government, Assam ranks the worst among northeastern states. The state's vast water resources are a boon. If the state wants to meet the federal requirement of 100% coverage by 2024, it must accelerate an installation.

Gajendra Singh Shekhawat, the Union Jal Shakti Minister, stated in the Lok Sabha on Thursday that after three years of JJM, just 41% of the 65.67 lakh rural Assamese families had access to tap water in their homes. This includes 1.11 lakh (1.69%) homes that had tap water before JJM was implemented in 2019.

Under JJM, it took three years to bring tap water to 26.05 lakh Assamese households, with an estimated 8.68 lakh houses meeting the target each year. To meet its goal of connecting the remaining 38.51 lakh families to tap water, the government will need to ramp up the pace by exceeding 19 lakh targets each year for the next two years.

In response to a written inquiry from Kokrajhar MP Naba Kumar Sarania, Shekhawat replied that "So far, about 26.05 lakh (39%) rural households (in Assam) have been provided with tap water connections in the last three years." According to Shekhawat, as of December 12, around 27.16 lakh (41%) of Assam's 65.67 lakh rural homes had access to running water.

The Union government, in partnership with the states, is implementing a programme to provide tap water to every rural home in each district. Each household member should have access to 55 litres of purified, drinkable water.

Data analysed from the Jal Jeevan Mission - Har Ghar Jal portal on Thursday revealed that Manipur had the highest coverage in the northeast, with tap water available to 74.86% of rural homes. Manipur is followed by Sikkim (73.86%) and Mizoram (71.59%) in terms of coverage. While Arunachal Pradesh has a coverage rate of 67.43%, Tripura and Nagaland have equivalent numbers of 55.83% and 55.60%, respectively. Assam still has only 41.52% of its households connected to tap water, lagging Meghalaya's 43.60%.

In Goa, Telangana, the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Puducherry, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Daman and Diu, Gujarat, and Haryana, the objective of supplying tap water to every rural home has already been achieved.