JAL JEEVEN MISSION IN LADAKH | 90% of rural households provided with clean drinking water

Kargil, Dec 14: About 90 percent of the rural households in Ladakh have been provided with clean drinking water under the Jal Jeeven Mission (JJM).

As JJM is nearing the completion of its implementation stage, the Public Health Engineering Department is now working towards building its team for handling the scheme’s operations and maintenance to ensure the sustainability of the scheme. Officials said that In this regard, the department has collaborated with organisation, “We The People”, a key recourse centre for a three-day training of Level 2 functionaries on operations and management of Rural Water Supply Systems under JJM. M Chandrashekhar, Water, Sanitation and Hygiene (WASH) expert is the resource person for the training.

Deputy Commissioner Leh, Santosh Sukhdeve attended the inaugural event as the chief guest. He commended the department for nearing the completion of the implementation stage of the scheme. Sukhdeve stressed that operations and maintenance of the scheme in Ladakh will call for greater challenges and urged the trainees to make the most of the training to learn and be able to sustain the scheme with collective efforts of the local communities, and the handholding department of PHE. Sukhdeve also highlighted the need to work to achieve sustainability of the project with emphasis on ensuring the sustainability of its source as the Himalayan belt is experiencing the effects of the global phenomenon of climate change.

The training aims primarily at generating understanding about four main components of the scheme, viz institutional sustainability, operational sustainability, financial sustainability, and source sustainability, with discussions on the role of different stakeholders, including the PRI, the field functionaries and the department. The training also aims at discussing the best practices from across the country and will also conduct a field visit to one of the gram panchayats to understand the ground realities. SE PHE/I&FC PHE circle Leh, Sonam Wangchuk, Ex En PHE Division Leh, Mohammad Ali, concerned AEEs, JEs, and PHE officials Leh were present during the training which was introduced by CEO We the people, Ajay Mohapatra.