Our Correspondent
Kohima, Sep. 24 (EMN): The state government had ambitiously declared to provide functional household tap connection (FHTC) to all the rural households by March 2023, and so concerted effort is needed to achieve the target in 16 months’ time, said Minister for Public Health Engineering Department (PHED), Jacob Zhimomi.
He was addressing the mid-year review meeting on Jal Jeevan Mission at the PHED Conference Hall in Kohima, on Friday.
Jal Jeevan Mission is envisioned to provide safe drinking water through individual household tap connections to all households in rural India by 2024.
While lauding the officers of the department for their contributions, he said the state could have done better.
He said that he had assured at the meeting of PHED ministers from the Northeast in Guwahati that the state would achieve its target and urged the officials to plan, prepare and formulate policy to implement the available materials.
Stating that sufficient funds would be allocated, he told the executive engineers from all the districts to accelerate the pace of work along with the WATSAN Committee and contractors.
He told the officials that funds should be sanctioned based on the progress of work and called for collective effort as a team.
‘As far as fund is concerned, there are no constraints, so I don't see any reason to slow down the pace of work,’ he said. He also told the officers to set a daily target, upload it on the ministry’s IMIS and take feedback from the beneficiaries on how pipeline connections had helped them.
The minister expressed happiness over achieving 97.75% tap water connections in schools. However, he called to put more effort on coverage of tap connections in anganwadis and health centres, as it is below the average compared to other north-eastern states. He asked the officials to achieve a cent percent coverage in the next few months.
"Tighten your belt, rejuvenate yourself, keep good health and plan and strategise for your own district," he said.
He also announced that 'best performing district' would be rewarded, stating that in Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM), certain targets have to be achieved during the stipulated time frame.
Chief Engineer (CE) and Head of Department (HOD) of PHED, Repangyangba Longkumer informed that out of 3,85,699 households in the state, the number of households with tap water connection as on Sep. 23, 2021, is 93,121 which is 24.14%.
According to the Ministry of Jal Shakti, Sikkim tops in terms of JJM coverage with 78.57%, followed by Manipur- 53.10%, Arunachal Pradesh- 51%.93%, Mizoram- 46.29%, Tripura- 35.01%, Meghalaya- 27.32%, Nagaland- 24.14%, and Assam- 20.62%.
Longkumer pointed out that the department has set FHTC target for the financial year (FY) 2021-22 at 2, 06, 363 and has achieved 29,700 (14.39%) as on September 23.
On the occasion, the short film competition on 'Swachhata Filmon Ka Amrit Mahotsav' at state-level was given away to the winners. In Geographic Category, Mokokchung (Rongsentula, The Green Sight Project, Mopungchuket village) won the first prize, while Kohima (Sosinle) and Wokha (Aremo) walked away with the second and third prizes respectively.
In Thematic Category, first prize went to Mokokchung (Rongsentula, Folk Chanters Mokochung), second prize to Tuensang (Nohochem), while Kiphire (Horili) was placed in the third position.