12,500 habitations to get piped water in ’18

Remaining half will get drinking water by June 2018

Mission Bhagiratha, the flagship programme of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi government, which will provide treated piped water to all households in the state through taps, achieved a major breakthrough in 2017.

Pipelines were laid over 1.69 lakh kilometres to draw 42.67 tmc of water from the Krishna and Godavari rivers for the project.

The project made rapid progress in 2017 after Prime Minister Narendra Modi formally launched it in Gajwel in Medak district, in August 2016.

Ninety per cent of the work has been completed in 2017 leaving only 10 per cent to be completed in 2018.

Mission Bhagiratha, the brain child of Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, conceived in 2015, is a ‘life and death issue’ for the TRS since the CM has announced in the Legislative Assembly and at public meetings several times that the party will not seek votes in the 2019 Assembly elections if it fails to complete the project by then.

Half of the total 25,000 habitations in the state will get Mission Bhagiratha piped water by January 2017, ending people’s quest for clean drinking water in those areas.

Trial runs have been going on in all districts successfully. The main pipelines from the reservoirs have been laid to almost all the habitations, but laying of intra pipelines to villages, households and fixing taps has been delayed.

The CM has divided the implementation of the project into two parts. Part-I was to cover at least half of the total habitations by December 31, 2017, and this has been achieved.

The Part-II deadline of June 2018 has been fixed to cover all habitations.

However, with 90 per cent of the Mission Bhagiratha work already reaching the completion stage, the government is confident of meeting the deadline by April 2018.

Mission Bhagiratha vice chairman Vemula Prashanth Reddy said, “The project is already supplying bulk water to 4,229 rural and seven urban habitations after the Prime Minister launched the scheme in August 2016. Another 1,621 habitations were added in October this year in the Suryapet segment. All the 25,000 habitations in the state will be covered in the first half of 2018. We ended 2017 on a successful note with 90 per cent of the work being completed.”

Mr Reddy said the government believes that providing safe and adequate drinking water is the primary responsibility of the State and will go a long way in improving the health and economic standards of vulnerable sections of society.

“It (the government) intends to ensure that no one in any household anywhere should have to walk miles carrying a pot of water on their head,” he said.