Staff Reporter
GUWAHATI: The supply of drinking water is one of the basic amenities that any government has to meet. Is Assam successful on this front? A reality check shows that as many as 6,401 projects under the piped water supply scheme (PWSS) in the state are either non-functional or partially functional. This is 32 per cent of the total PWSSs in the state.
The main purpose of a PWSS is to provide safe, treated, and adequate drinking water through household tap connections to rural communities.
According to information, the state has as many as 19,859 piped water supply projects under the PHE Department. According to government records on paper, 13,184 projects are functional, 4,185 projects are fully non-functional, and 2,216 projects are partially functional.
According to sources, the Kokrajhar district has the highest number of 423 non-functional water supply projects in the state, followed by the Udalguri district with 312 and Kamrup with 298 projects. The breakup of non-functional water supply projects in the other districts is: 36 in Bajali, 190 in Baksa, 107 in Barpeta, 70 in Biswanath, 41 on Bongaigaon, 87 in Cachar, 1 in Charaideo, 80 in Chirang, 209 in Darrang, 62 in Dhemaji, 142 in Dhubri, 152 in Dibrugarh, 39 in Dima Hasao, 124 in Goalpara, 127 in Golaghat, 121 in Hailakandi, 55 in Hojai, 18 in Jorhat, 10 in Kamrup Metro, 93 in Karbi Anglong, 250 in Lakhimpur, 34 in Majuli, 138 in Morigaon, 222 in Nagaon, 59 in Nalbari, 41 in Sivasagar, 209 in Sonitpur, 31 in South Salmara-Mankachar, 106 in Sribhumi, 164 in Tamulpur, 83 in Tinsukia, and 51 in West Karbi Anglong. The Nalbari district has the highest number of 193 water supply projects.
In most of the rural areas, water supply projects are lying idle, maybe due to disruption of power connections, damage of pipes and machines, etc. Despite the government's claim that 13,184 water supply projects are operational, the actual status of some schemes remains uncertain. Some villages commonly say they lack potable water.
The situation should draw the attention of Public Health Engineering (PHE) Minister Krishnendu Paul to make the non-functional and partially functional water supply projects fully functional.
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