Due to four major water supply schemes in Bijbehara division remaining incomplete, water scarcity in many areas of Anantnag is looming large.
With an aim to provide potable water to 60 villages of South Kashmir’s Bijbehara division, four water supply schemes namely Watnar, Tantraypore, Daachnipore, and Shangus were taken up for execution in the year 2012.The estimated costs were Rs 25.42 crore, Rs 28.48 crore, Rs 18.90 crore, and Rs 32.85 crore respectively but the schemes are far from completion . A period of over five years is perhaps too short for these schemes to see the light of the day..
It is reported, on the other hand, that a paltry amount of Rs one crore for each project during these five years has been provided and therefore, again, as is customary with most of the state projects, funds crunch has dented these projects as well. That precisely has affected the pace of work on these projects, as is reliably learnt. The categorization by the Central Government too has affected the work as under the new categorization, the project with more than 25 percent expenditure would be funded by the Central Government while as those with less than 25 percent expenditure would be put under state funding. Coming under the second category, all the four projects got affected.
The locals in all these areas complain that in the absence of these four schemes getting commissioned, they are forced to fetch water from streams which in most cases are not fit to be consumed. People forced to collect untreated water are willy nilly becoming prone to contract water borne diseases. In fact, there have been some cases of suffering from Hepatatis C ailments presumably due to taking untreated water.
Despite repeated pleas and protests by the people of these areas in respect of absence of safe drinking watyer be available in the areas under reference, the authorities seemed least bothered. Missing repeated deadlines for the last five years and any immediate likelihood of any resolution round the corner are making the residents jittery.
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