Villages in most parts of the State may be facing acute shortage of drinking water, especially in summers but the Government is confident about availability of hand pumps for them. Minister for Drinking Water and Sanitation Chandra Prakash Chaudhary claimed that as against standard of one hand pump among 250 persons Jharkhand has the ratio as low as 1:50.
“We have more than required number of hand pumps in the State. Over per 50 persons we have one hand pump while the national standard set is for 250 persons. It is more than required. The real worry is that we are able to supply just 15 per cent water through pipelines and this needs to be scaled up,” said the Minister in the Assembly during a special discussion on power and water situation on Friday.
Notably considering the dipping ground water level across the country the government think tank has been advocating to do away with borewell practice that has been quite popular among the representatives to deal with water crisis. State Government subsequently has even taken back allocation of hand pumps earlier meant for the MlAs in their respective areas.
He added that 660 mini drinking water projects are ready in the State but issues such as power supply, its quality and large number of vacancies in the Departments were making the execution difficult.
Talking about situation of drinking water in towns of the State, Urban Development Minister CP Singh said that by 2017, 81 lakh people or 25 per cent of the total population would be covered by the piped water schemes. “APl families would have to spend total Rs 4000 for getting a piped connection while for BPl it would be absolutely free. As the same time we have to keep Departments such as PHED, Urban Development and Energy in a loop to achieve the target,” said CP Singh.
He also put some light over power scenario in the State that is drawing 351 MW from the Central pool to meet is requirement. “We are in the middle of an agreement with NTPC and if it is materialised, Jharkhand would be able to generate 4000 MW of its own. It would meet its entire demand,” said the Minister.
BJP’s Radha Krishna Kishore said that since its inception in 2000 the State has purchased power worth Rs 23673 crore which would have sufficient to erect its own generation capacity of 4000 MW through power plants. “PTPS is of 800 MW capacity but generates just 85 MW. Rs 400 crore has been spent on its renovation. TVNl is also generating just 333 MW. We have not been able to add even a single unit since the State has been formed despite sitting on 80,000 million ton of coal reserve,” said Kishore. JVM Pradeep Yadav opposed handing over power distribution work to franchises and also alleged that unbundling of the erstwhile JSEB had not been done properly.