State Level Steering Committee to be formed for effective implementation of Atal Bhujal Yojana

*State Level Steering Committee to be formed for effective implementation of Atal Bhujal Yojana*

*Atal Bhujal Yojana in Champawat, Haridwar and Udham Singh Nagar*

*Sustainable groundwater management will be improved through community leadership and participation*

Chief Secretary Smt . Radha Raturi has given instructions to form a State Level Steering Committee under Atal Bhujal Yojana to oversee water budgeting and implementation of the program at the local level in the three water-scarce districts of the state, Champawat, Haridwar and Udham Singh Nagar. The committee will coordinate for groundwater management between various state agencies. The Chief Secretary has given instructions to include Drinking Water and Sanitation, Urban Development, Panchayati Raj, Irrigation, Rural Development Department and Spring and River Rejuvenation Authority (SARRA) in the committee by making the Minor Irrigation Department the nodal department. She has also directed the committee to regularly review the program on a monthly basis. CS Smt. Raturi has directed the nodal department to nominate master trainers at the level of local bodies and take necessary action for their training. These master trainers will assist in making water plan and budgeting.

Chief Secretary Smt. Radha Raturi has also directed to include the activities of Catch the Rain, AmritsarSover, Spring and River Rejuvenation Authority (SARRA) under Atal Bhujal Yojana in water-scarce districts Champawat, Haridwar and Udham Singh Nagar.

Emphasizing on the effective implementation of Atal Bhujal Yojana, CS Smt. Radha Raturi clarified that the main objective of this scheme is to improve sustainable groundwater management through community leadership and participation through convergence between various central and state schemes currently being run. She directed that work should be done to bring about behavioral change at the community level through awareness programs and capacity building to promote sustainable groundwater management. The Chief Secretary directed for active participation of communities and panchayats in various activities in the districts such as formation/strengthening of Water User Association, monitoring and dissemination of groundwater data, preparation of water budget and gram panchayat-wise water security plans (WSP) and their implementation.

Chief Secretary Smt. Radha Raturi said that one of the main objectives of Atal Bhujal Yojana is to bring about behaviour change at the grassroots level. For this, water related data like water availability and use will be used while preparing water budget and water security plan. These plans will be prepared with community participation and the data used in the plan will be disseminated to the entire community. Apart from this, various equipment like Digital Water Level Recorder (DWLR), Water Level Sounder, Rain Gauge, Water Flow Meter will be installed to improve water related data. Apart from this, Government of India is also installing various Real Time Data Acquisition Systems (RTDAS) for both surface and ground water under the National Hydrology Project.

It is noteworthy that under Atal Bhujal Yojana of Government of India, participation of women in water budget and water security plan exercise in Panchayat level has been kept at least 33 percent. The existing Gram Jal and Sanitation Committee has been expanded in each Gram Panchayat and their cooperation is being taken in this program. Atal Bhujal Yojana (Atal Jal) is being implemented in 8,562 Gram Panchayats of 80 districts of 7 states like Gujarat, Haryana, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, which mainly aims to improve community-led sustainable groundwater management through convergence between various ongoing central and state schemes. Three water-stressed districts of Uttarakhand state, Haridwar, Udham Singh Nagar and Champawat have also been listed under the scheme.

In today’s meeting related to Atal Bhujal Yojana chaired by Chief Secretary Smt Radha Raturi in the Secretariat, Secretary Shri Shailesh Bagauli along with officials of Panchayati Raj, Drinking Water, Urban Development, Irrigation, Minor Irrigation, Rural Development Department were present.