Surface water supply is necessary for clean drinking water: Baghel

Central Chronicle News
Raipur, Jul 02: Bhupesh Baghel, during the review meeting of Public Health Engineering Department at his residence office on Thursday, directed to prepare surface water supply scheme for supply of clean drinking water to the people in industrial and mining areas including drinking water problem oriented development blocks of the state. He said that the situation is getting complicated due to exploitation of ground water in these areas.
Due to blasting in the mining area, the amount of heavy metal in the ground water increases, as a result various types of serious diseases have started to occur. The Chief Minister directed the officials of the Public Health Engineering Department to ensure a proper system for checking the amount of heavy metal in drinking water. Agriculture and Water Resources Minister Ravindra Choubey, Public Health Engineering Minister Guru Rudra Kumar, Chief Secretary Amitabh Jain, Additional Chief Secretary Subrat Sahoo and other senior officers were present in the meeting. The Chief Minister also identified Gurur in Balod district, Dharsiwa block of Raipur district, including Bemetara, Saja, Nawagarh, Berla, Balod, Takhatpur, Bilha, Rajim, Durg, Dhamdha and Patan as critical block and instructions were given to prepare surface water supply scheme for supply of drinking water in Rajnandgaon, Dongargaon, Dhamtari, Kurud, Basna, Pithora, Malkharod, Pandariya, Kawardha, Barmakela and Pusaur. He said that Narva treatment work for groundwater recharge and water harvesting needs to be done on priority in these blocks, so that arrangement for drinking water supply from surface water can be done in a better way. The Chief Minister said that drinking water is supplied from Kharun river in Raipur. He also directed to treat the drains of Balod, Dhamtari, Durg, Patan, Abhanpur areas and construction of water storage structures to ensure adequate water availability in Kharun river.
The Chief Minister said that due to excessive exploitation of ground water for irrigation in critical and semi-critical development blocks, the water level is going down. The problem of salt water is increasing. For its prevention, attention needs to be paid to the harvesting and utilization of surface water. In the meeting, Public Health Engineering Minister Guru Rudrakumar gave detailed information about the state’s latest water supply system and the progress of the works of Jal Jeevan Mission. Secretary, Siddharth Komal Singh Pardeshi informed through power point presentation that at present, 2,83,653 hand pumps, 4097 Naljal schemes are functional in the state. Out of which 11,160 hand pumps and 1178 tap water schemes have been established in the last two and a half years. Under the Minimata Amrit Dhara Yojana, 73,584 domestic tap connections have been given. For the supply of drinking water in such areas of the state where ground water is not available in sufficient quantity, action is currently being taken for the construction of group water supply schemes and tap water supply schemes to provide drinking water from surface sources.