WEB DESK
The Jal Jeevan Mission has achieved a milestone of providing tap water to nine crore rural homes in the country. It has provided tap water supply to more than 5.79 crore rural households, in a short span of two and half years and despite COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown.
Now, every rural household has tap water supply in Goa, Haryana, Telangana, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Puducherry, Dadar and Nagar Haveli and Daman and Diu.
Many more States like Punjab with 99 percent coverage of tap water supply, Himachal Pradesh with 92.4 percent, Gujarat with 92 percent and Bihar with 90 percent are on the verge of becoming Har Ghar Jal this year.
On 15th August 2019, when the Jal Jeevan Mission was announced, out of 19.27 crore households only 3.23 crore households in India had tap water connections. Now, 98 districts and 1.36 Lakh villages in the country have tap water supply to every rural household. To ensure the health and well-being of children by providing clean tap water in schools and anganwadi centres, Prime Minister Narendra Modi had announced a 100-days campaign, which was launched on 2nd October 2020. So far, 8.46 lakh schools and 8.67 lakh anganwadi centre across the country have been provided with potable tap water supply for drinking and cooking mid-day meals, handwashing and use in toilets.
The Jal Jeevan Mission is ‘no one is left out’, thus ensuring every household irrespective of its socio-economic status, gets tap water supply. It strives for the freedom of mothers and sisters from centuries old drudgery of fetching water for the household, and improving their health, education and socio- economic condition. The Centre has allocated 3.60 lakh Crore rupees to provide tap water supply to every rural household by 2024. 60 thousand crore has been allocated to Har Ghar Jal in Union Budget 2022-23.