Hyderabad: Mission Bhagiratha, the project for safe drinking water for every village and city household in Telangana State has finally been completed and water is being released through taps in every house. According to government statistics, in Telangana state, more than 55 lakh houses are receiving purified water.
Mission Bhagiratha, which has received the accolades from Central government stands as a role model for the other states in the country. The state governments which have studied the project are gearing themselves to start similar projects. The objective of Mission Bhageerath is to provide every house purified water.
Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao has extended the programme that he had implemented in his constituency (Siddipet) 30 years ago to the entire state. For this Herculean task, he named it as Mission Bhageerath and taken up the scheme of providing river water through taps and completed it on time. Mission Bhagiratha project, launched with the lofty intention to provide water to every house, has been completed in record time.
Since the work went on under continuous supervision, the fruits of success could be reaped in the first year itself. It was commenced on June 9, 2015, in Choutuppal of common Nalgonda district, by erecting a pylon. The foundation for the project was laid from that fluoride-infested area, to provide treated water to each and every house.
The Gajwal Segment
Prime Minister, Narendra Modi inaugurated Gajwel Segment, taken up as part of Mission Bhagiratha, on 7th August 2016. With that, from that day onwards, the state has begun reaping the fruits of Mission Bhagiratha. Since then, in stages, Mission Bhagiratha works were being completed in segments and water is being provided through taps in the houses.
Through Mission Bhagiratha, fully treated water is being supplied in bulk to 23,968 villages in the state. Of them, in 23,919 villages protected water is being provided to all the houses through taps in the houses. According to Mission Bhagiratha statistics, it has to be done only in 49 more villages. In the state, of the 55,59,172 villages, the water connection is provided 100%. Of these 55,26,518 houses are being supplied water through tap connection in the houses.
- Water to remote tribal hamlets in agency areas
There are far-flung Lambada hamlets in Nallamala forests. Even there, in Chenchu Pentala is getting Bhagiratha water. For Lambada (Banjara) people who have not known what is safe water, Bhagiratha water is like Amrit (elixir) from heaven. They, who used walk kilometres together for fetching drinking water, are now getting treated water at their doorstep. Their joy is indescribable.
Even to Chenchu Pentalu, a remote tribal village in Nallamala forest, water from Mission Bhagiratha is reaching. Seven hamlets of Chenchu Pentalu, situated in Lingala Mandal of Kurnool district, in Appapur Penta Grama Panchayat, are receiving water through solar pumps. Since this place is 730 metres above sea level, water is pumped up.
85 Chenchus (a type of tribals), in 41 houses live here. A study, conducted by CESS (Centre for Economic and Social Studies) along with UNICEF, revealed that there are several advantages of Mission Bhagiratha. It says people’s health would improve and thereby their social and economic conditions would also improve.
Irrigation experts say that the water being supplied through Mission Bhagiratha is a lot safer. Bhagiratha Project has already received several accolades and awards. Even the Central Government also lauded the scheme. Neeti Ayog also recommended that such a scheme should be implemented in all the states of the country.
The SCADA method (Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition) being used in Mission Bhagiratha for supply and control of water, is enabling water to reach everyone with the same pressure. Jal Jeevan Mission also recommended that the same policy should be adopted in all the other states.
In this background, several states are evincing interest to implement the scheme in their states. So far, representatives from 18 states have visited the state and studied it. To name a few, Uttar Pradesh, Maharashtra, West Bengal, Odisha, Karnataka, are in the list.
- A scheme of providing river water through taps and completed it on time
The objective of Mission Bhagiratha is to provide 100 litres for each person in rural areas, in municipalities 135 litres, and in Metros 150 litres of protected water through taps. They have allocated 10% of the water in the project to the industrial sector. In 2018, according to the needs of that time, they decided to supply 42.67 TMCs of water from Krishna and Godavari rivers through Mission Bhagiratha.
Keeping the future requirements for 30 years in view, up to 2048, they estimated that 78 TMCs of water would be required. They intended using 30 TMCs from Krishna river and 48 TMCs from Godavari river. Mission Bhagiratha project was taken up not only to provide river water to quench the thirst of people but also to supply purified river water.
This project was envisaged keeping in view the difficulties of people, especially rural people, remote area people, tribal hamlets, banjara tribal dwellings. It was intended to mitigate the difficulties being faced by people without clean water during the monsoon and other times in far-flung areas and hamlets. It was also intended to drive away heavy water which was causing Fluorosis, kidney disease and other long term diseases and to provide them purified drinking water.
Keeping all these in view, the Chief Minister initiated Mission Bhagiratha projects. After doing the extensive and protracted study, Chief Minister, KCR has taken up Mission Bhagiratha project prestigiously. He set for himself a target of 3 years to complete the project and has nearly reached his target by now.
