Jaipur:
State water supply department has decided to install reverse osmosis (RO) systems in around 1,800 schools in the rural areas across the state. An ambitious project christened 'Jal Mani' - with a cost of Rs 6.80 crore - has been chalked out to install RO plants in village schools.
"Availability of safe potable water is a major problem in majority of rural areas. To provide clean drinking water to school students, we would be implementing the 'Jal Mani' scheme under the public-private partnership (PPP) mode," a chief engineer at Jal Bhawan said.
The private partner will also maintain the RO plant for the next five years, he added.
According to experts, Rajasthan, the largest state of the country, faces a grim scenario in the availability of potable water. Official data reveals that 21,190 villages in the state are facing the problem of saline water while 23,297 villages have fluoride content in their water and 20,659 get nitrate content in water.
Recently, an expert committee appointed by the state government for preparing a report on integrated water resource management (IWRM) in the state has also underlined the problem of availability of safe drinking water in the state. Experts say that poor health of children due to unavailability of safe drinking water is also a major impediment in enrolment in schools, especially girls. "It is a reality that state dependence on groundwater is 91% for drinking water and 60% for irrigation. From the coverage status of water supply, it is observed that nearly 50% of the habitations have become problematic due to over-exploitation of groundwater," MS Rathore, a water conservation expert, said.
Rajasthan has about 65,000 rural schools covering primary, upper primary and secondary and higher education with lakhs of students enrolled therein.
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