Shortlisted for Creating Resilient & Sustainable Communities Award

Project Background

Jal Jeevan Mission - Rural Water Supply "HAR GHAR JAL HAR GHAR NAL", the flagship project of Government of India aims to provide a functional tap connection to every house in India.

Over the years several programmes have been introduced to address water supply coverage in India. However, many of the solutions were underdeveloped and lacked proper execution. Subsequently, poor operation and management systems combined with limited community collaboration has caused rural water supply to fall into a state of disrepair.

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SMEC has been involved in the planning and project management of the project across 4 different states, setting new technical benchmarks that are sustainable, innovative, and cost-effective. The framework has been developed in a way that can be easily replicated across geographical locations for efficient implementation.

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The objective of the project is to develop and provide support to the implementing agencies to effectively implement water supply schemes to the inhabitants of the villages through an overarching Detailed Project Report (DPR). To achieve the objectives of the project and consulting services, the SMEC’s guiding principles are:

• QUALITY of the data, information, and analysis

• PARTICIPATION, consultation, and formulation with the key stakeholders

• CREDIBILITY based on a synthesis of outputs, judgments, and decisions

• CLARITY in the presentations, discussions, and reports

• SUSTAINABILITY through acceptability and knowledge transfer.
   

The challenge:

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Assam

No of Villages under the DPR: 364

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Assam is still dependent on water from rain, streams, and rivers for drinking and other domestic purposes. These sources have proven to be unsafe. Access to safe drinking water and the status of sanitation & hygiene in Assam is substantially less than the national average. Assam has 63.35 lakh rural households, out of which only 6.67 lakh (10.75%) are getting tapped water supply. Public Health Engineering Department (PHED) is the main government agency which is responsible for water supply. However, many international NGOs, private organisations, and individuals fulfil the daily demand of the rural population by utilising ground water sources through dug wells. Soils are reported to contain contamination from toxic chemicals such as fluoride.

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Uttar Pradesh

No of Villages under the DPR: 1,389

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The Bundelkhand and Vindhya regions in Uttar Pradesh, India, are some of the most water-scarce areas in the country. Only around 19% of the rural population in UP have access to piped water supply schemes. Several people are forced to walk long distances to obtain water which may not be available in absolute quantity or of prescribed quality, leading to water-borne diseases. More than 37% of ground or surface water in rural habitations is contaminated.

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Karnataka

No of Villages under the DPR: 2,467

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Groundwater quality is a serious problem in more than half of the villages of districts such as Bagalkot, Bijapur, Chamarajnagar. The Union ministry of water resources shows that 43% of 59,774 rural habitations don’t have full drinking water coverage. Of 59,774 rural habitations in Karnataka, 34,345 (57%) have full coverage, while 24,977 (41%) have partial access less than 40 litres per day while the remaining habitations get contaminated water. The districts water supply is also affected by toxicities including:

• Fluoride in 14 districts for 10-67% of total habitations.

• Brackishness in 13 districts for 10-27% of total habitations,

• Nitrate in 8 districts for 10-51% of total habitations

• Iron in 12 districts for 10-63% of total habitations

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Rajasthan

No of Villages under the DPR: 31,000

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Rajasthan is dependent on ground water, but sources are affected by fluoride, nitrate, and salinity. Currently, only 1.16% of surface water and 1.70% of ground water is available for consumption with 12.2% households having a piped water supply. The state is considered a dry state with nearly 70% of the area classified as arid and semi-arid region.

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To fill this enormous gap and address the significant health, social and economic issues arising from a lack of access to clean water, the Government planned multi-village and regional water supply schemes to improve water supply coverage and provide all rural households with 70lpcd water supply through piped connection. Certain projects were identified as a priority due to being impacted by disease caused by drinking arsenic and fluoride contaminated groundwater.

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The Solution

For the project, SMEC has prepared and implemented detailed project reports to frame Jal Jeevan’s roll out in each geographical region. The project reports focus on improving health and living standards in 20 districts (area: 2700sqkm) pan India.

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The detailed project reports consisted of proposals for complex water schemes including surveying, engineering design, analysis of ground and surface water sources, water allocation and environmental assessment. The detailed project reports adopted three principals:  

• Sustainability of the system at design, operation, and management stages

• Technical and management innovations to deliver the best outputs

• Strict adherence to the prescribed specifications, timeline, and budget.

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The proposed methodology was based on profound knowledge, gained from delivering similar Water Supply sector projects in the past and familiarity with the local region and regulations. SMEC carried out additional work for census towns beyond its scope of services and submitted two additional final DPRs in the interest of the project and the rural population beneficiaries.

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The roll out has required coordination of multidisciplinary teams and wide-ranging stakeholder consultation activity, also extending support to the State Water and Sanitation Mission. Milestones to date include delivery of the inception report and development of the final DPR Clusters.

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Key activities for the detailed project reports included:

• Topographical and geo-technical surveys based on assessment of the existing in-village infrastructure with respect to drinking water, existing road networks, institutional buildings, other water structures.

• Robust population forecasting and demand estimation was undertaken. Data from 1971 to present day was obtained from the office of the Department of Census, Government of India, to help inform population projections.

• Network analysis based on the topographical survey and actual number of households by using Water Gems, which includes requirement of new pipelines, appurtenances, and fittings, positioning of valves, and assessment of existing pipelines for suitability and justification for replacement of any existing pipelines.

• The DPRs are prepared for each habitation and includes details such as topographic survey, water distribution networks (including house service connection with water meters & rate for flow control device), assessment of drainage, and road works including cost estimates. For a smoother and quicker work process, automation was adopted to generate the cost estimates.

• DPR automation: A new automation tool was developed at Karnataka Phase II to reduce the time taken for bulk DPR production. SMEC identified variable fields for the report into a consolidated dataset, capturing information relating to demographics, census codes, road network lengths, existing assets, and infrastructure.