Chandigarh, May 14: Reiterating its commitment to provide water connection to all rural households, Haryana Government is speedily moving forward to provide Functional Household Tap Connection (FHTCs) to all rural households by December 2022, under the ‘Jal Jeevan Mission’ (JJM), which is much ahead of the national target date, which is 2024.

Additional Chief Secretary, Public Health Engineering Department Mr. Devender Singh, shared this during a review meeting of ‘Jal Jeevan Mission’ chaired by Haryana Chief Minister Mr. Manohar Lal here today.

The Chief Minister was apprised that as many as 29.72 Lakh households have been surveyed and the remaining households are likely to be surveyed at the earliest. It was informed that by December 2019, 11.82 lakh Households had Functional Household Tap Connection (FHTC). Since December 2019 Public Health Engineering Department has released 9.28 Lakh regular water connections in rural households, further the pending 8.62 lakh would also be provided FHTC soon.

Mr. Devender Singh informed the works in habitations have been divided into three categories. As per the plan Category-I include such villages where there is no problem of the water source, Category-ll encompasses those villages which experience water problem in summers and Category- III covers such villages which have perennial source water problems.

The Chief Minister was apprised that on May 12, 2020, Haryana Annual Action Plan 2020-21 for providing FHTC under ‘Jal Jeevan Mission’ was presented to the Government of India. Mr. Devender Singh shared that the State’s Action plan was widely appreciated by the Ministry of ‘Jal Shakti’. The micro and macro planning was ranked outstanding by the Ministry and they want other states to emulate Haryana pattern in planning their way forward in ‘Jal Jeevan Mission’.

The ‘Jal Jeevan Mission’ is a Central Government initiative aimed at providing piped water to every household in the country. While in Haryana, the Mission was kick-started in December 2019 by the Chief Minister. After the launch of this scheme, the State Government had decided to waive off road cut charges at the rate Rs. 2000 per new connection for encouraging the regularization of the water connections.

While in order to monitor the progress under ‘Jal Jeevan Mission’ various online dashboards suitable for department officials, Deputy Commissioners and General Public were developed. Chief Minister launched Jal Jeevan Mission dashboard for General Public on April 29, 2020, which is available on the department website at https://phedharyana.govin/PHED-Dashboard/Index.html for viewing.

In the meeting, Chief Secretary, Mrs. Keshni Anand Arora, Additional Chief Secretary Finance, Mr. T.V.S. N Prasad, Additional Chief Secretary, Public Health Engineering Department, Mr. Devender Singh, Deputy Principal Secretary to Chief Minister, Mrs. Ashima Brar were present in the meeting.