• Over 15 crore rural households, ensuring 78.58 per cent of rural homes, now have access to potable water, a sharp increase from the 17 per cent coverage when the Jal Jeevan Mission began.

• The initiative, which is also tackling water quality and drought-prone areas, is directly benefiting 19 crore rural families. 

What is Jal Jeevan Mission?

• The central government assistance to states for rural water supply began in 1972 with the launch of Accelerated Rural Water Supply Programme. It was renamed as National Rural Drinking Water Programme (NRDWP) in 2009. 

• The Modi government restructured NRDWP into Jal Jeevan Mission in August 2019. 

• The Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM) was announced on August 15, 2019 to provide Functional Household Tap Connection (FHTC) to every rural home by 2024.

• In 2019, out of about 19.35 crore households in rural areas, about 3.23 crore (17 per cent) had tap water connections. Thus, 15.70 crore households were to be provided with tap water by 2024. 

• In addition, functionality of all existing water supply systems and tap connections is also to be ensured. This means that drinking water sources have to be strengthened and grey water has to be treated and reused. 

• Under JJM, every rural household is to be provided with a functional tap water connection and ‘no one is left out’, irrespective of their socio-economic conditions.

• It is about achieving long-term drinking water security in such a way as to avoid making emergency arrangements through deployment of tankers or trains, hand pump installation, etc in any village.  

How is it being implemented?

• With JJM, focus is on ‘assured and regular water supply at household level’, which means  water supply in adequate quantity (55 litres per person per day) of prescribed quality (as per Bureau of Indian Standards) on long-term and regular basis, which constitutes the very definition of the ‘functionality’ of taps or water supply systems. 

• The Mission forms part of one of the government’s biggest community infrastructure outlays with an amount of Rs 3.6 lakh crore giving a boost to manufacturing industry, creating job opportunities and extending support to lift the rural economy. 

• It is implemented in a decentralised manner following the ‘bottom-up’ approach, wherein the local village community plays a key role starting from planning to implementation and from management to operation & maintenance.

• Village Water & Sanitation Committees (VWSCs)/ Pani Samitis are being constituted and strengthened. So far, over 5.32 lakh VWSCs (Pani Samitis) have been constituted.

• States are giving priority to SC/ST majority populated villages, aspirational districts, villages in drought prone and desert areas and quality-affected habitations.

• Special focus is given to the districts affected with Japanese Encephalitis/ Acute Encephalitis Syndrome (JE-AES) which is one of the reasons behind infant mortality in the affected districts. 

• Water quality monitoring & surveillance activities are given top priority under the Jal Jeevan Mission. Five women in each village are being trained to test water samples of any kind of contamination by using field test kits (FTKs). The FTK helps to test water on nine parameters — pH, alkalinity, chloride, nitrate, total hardness, fluoride, iron, residual free chlorine and H2S. More than 24 lakh women have been trained so far to test water quality through FTKs.

Achievements of the mission

• As on October 6, 2024, the mission has provided tap water connections to 15.19 crore rural households, ensuring 78.58 per cent of rural homes now have access to potable water, a sharp increase from the 17 per cent coverage when the programme began.

• The mission has added 11.95 crore new tap water connections since its launch.

• As many as 11 states/UTs — Goa, Andaman & Nicobar Islands, Dadra Nagar Haveli & Daman Diu, Haryana, Telangana, Puducherry, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Punjab, Mizoram, and Arunachal Pradesh — have reported ‘Har Ghar Jal’, which means every household has access to clean drinking water through tap.

• Additionally, over 9.29 lakh schools and Anganwadi centres across the country now have access to clean water.

• Over 24 lakh women have been trained to test water quality using Field Test Kits, with more than 54 lakh water samples tested so far.

Challenges

• The mission faces several challenges, such as a lack of dependable water sources in certain areas, groundwater contamination, uneven geographical terrain, scattered rural habitations, and delays in obtaining statutory clearances, etc. 

• To address these challenges, the government of India has taken various steps, including financial assistance through the Ministry of Finance, the appointment of nodal officers to coordinate with central ministries, the establishment of state and district programme management units, and the implementation of the 'Nal Jal Mitra Programme' to ensure the availability of skilled personnel at the village level.

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