Indira drinking water scheme launched in Haryana

Ambala, Nov 19 (UNI) Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda today launched the ambitious Indira Gandhi Drinking Water Scheme to provide individual, free-of-cost drinking water connections to eight lakh families belonging to Scheduled Castes (SCs) in the state.

Consumers of the general category would not be charged the connection fee for upto one year. The connection fee is Rs 500 in rural areas and Rs 1000 in urban areas.

The Chief Minister, accompanied by Public Health Minister Randeep Singh Surjewala and Education Minister Phool Chand Mullana, visited several households in Nahoni village in this district to see whether drinking water was being provided to the households under the scheme, especially those belonging to the Scheduled Castes.

He interacted with the families especially the women, to get their response on the scheme.

The women expressed their gratitude to the Chief Minister for implementing such a scheme which would now relieve them of walking long distances to fetch water. They said their children would now be able to get safe drinking water easily.

After the launch of this scheme, the State Public Health Department removed 359 water stand posts from Nahoni. All households, including 315 of Scheduled Castes and 275 of general category in this village will now have individual water connections.

Mr Hooda said each household of a Scheduled Caste family would also be provided a water storage tank of 200 litres capacity equipped with a tap, free-of-cost, and the expenditure of supplying water to their homes would also be borne by the government.

The Chief Minister said with the launching of the scheme on the occasion of the birthday of former late Prime Minister Mrs Indira Gandhi, more than 3000 households of Scheduled Caste families in 31 villages in all the 20 districts of the state had been provided free water connections.

UNI HS PB HT1815