The National Bank for Agriculture and Rural Development (NABARD) has approved a INR 1.27 billion (US$ 28 million) project to tackle the drinking water problem in Mahendragarh district of Haryana state.
The project will supply water to 64 water-starved villages and 34 dhanies (clusters) at a rate of 60 litres per capita per day.
A Public Health Engineering Department (PHED) spokesperson said that drinking water supply facilities had been improved in 4,925 villages during the past six years. Free water connections had been given to 779,148 Scheduled Caste households in rural areas and 138,793 in urban areas under the Indira Gandhi Drinking Water Supply Scheme.
The Naandi Foundation has provided reverse osmosis (RO) water treatment plants in 100 villages in the districts of Mahendragarh, Jhajjar, Kaithal and Mewat under a public-private partnership (PPP) initiative with Tata Projects. Safe drinking water was being supplied at a rate of ten paise (0.22 US dollar cents) per litre.
Source: UNI, New Kerala, 14 Jan 2011
