Mumbai, July 7 (IANS) Maharashtra Minister of Water Supply and Sanitation Gulabrao Patil, in a written reply, told the Legislative Council that the state has not received central funds for the Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM) scheme from October 2024, and is using its own funds to complete the ongoing projects.

The Minister also informed that a total of 51,558 schemes have been sanctioned, out of which 26,009 are still ongoing. The question was raised by Pradnya Satav, Satej Patil (Congress) and others.

Minister Patil said that the state government has given funds worth Rs 2483.58 crore to complete ongoing schemes.

However, the Minister of State Meghana Sakore-Bordikar, who was present in the council, intervened and said, “We are following up with the central government to release funds at the earliest. To ensure that the ongoing works are not stopped, for the year 2025-26, we have decided to give additional funds worth Rs 3913 crore.”

The state government’s reply accepted that the pace of the works undertaken in Jal Jeevan Mission has slowed due to the unavailability of lands, opposition of locals, permissions from different departments, delays from contractors, failure of sources and lack of funds.

The reply stated that Rs 2483.58 crore has been released as a special case from the Maharashtra government since the centre has not released funds for the scheme. It mentioned that three letters had already been sent to the Jalshakti ministry to release funds, and a meeting with the union minister was also held.

JJM was envisioned to provide safe and adequate drinking water through individual household tap connections by 2024 to all households in rural India.

The scheme under JJM refers to various components and initiatives implemented to ensure this aim. Till now, the state has spent around Rs 31,374 crore.

As per the government claims, the tap connection has now increased from earlier 33 per cent to 88.36 per cent with the completion of 15,537 schemes.

–IANS

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