Nalanda: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Sunday while inaugurating the 'Har Ghar Ganga Jal' scheme in Rajgir, drank tap water from Naresh Prasad and Vinod Prasad's house through the pipeline to give a strong message on the purity of the water being supplied through the project. Kumar made the announcement of the scheme back in 2015 and within seven years, he made drinking water accessible to 19 wards of Rajgir. Next in line is Gaya, where the Bihar CM will inaugurate this scheme on November 28.
With the successful implementation of the programme, Kumar seeks to launch the second phase of the scheme, by June 2023, with a target to make Ganga water accessible in Nawada. The Bihar government's Water Resources and Information and Public Relations Minister Sanjay Kumar Jha said that the 'Har Ghar Ganga Jal scheme' is the dream project of the CM. He further said that the ambitious scheme was approved in a special cabinet meeting held in Gaya in December 2019 under the chairmanship of Kumar.
Jha, emphasising on the project, added that there is a general saying that the thirsty go to well, and not the other way round but Nitish Kumar dared to dream about making drinking water accessible to each and every house in Bihar. Under the CM's far-reaching campaign 'Jal-Jeevan-Hariyali', he conceptualised using the surplus water of river Ganga as drinking water by diverting it to the water-stressed cities of south Bihar.
The minsiter further said that under this scheme, about 8,031 houses in 19 wards of Rajgir city, about 75,000 houses in 53 wards of Gaya and about 6,000 houses in 19 wards of Bodh Gaya city will get pure drinking water. The target is to supply 135 litres of pure water per person. Apart from this, water will also be provided to different institutions, hospitals and hotels so that pure water can be supplied to a large number of tourists and devotees coming to these cities.
Under the scheme, 15 lakh people will get 1.89 crore litres of pure drinking water every day. The government is spending an amount of approximately Rs 32,000 on each person. The Water Resources Department started working on the Ganga Water Supply scheme in 2019, and it was expected to wrap up in 2021 itself, but due to the pandemic, it was delayed.
The Gangajal has been taken to Rajgir, Bodh Gaya and Nawada with the help of a 190-kilometre pipe from Maranchi to Mokama in Patna. For this, big pumps were installed. The plan includes storing Gangajal for four months and supplying it all year round. The water is to be supplied through three reservoirs at Rajgir, Bodh Gaya, Gaya and Nawada.
