हिंदी
Chandigarh, September 3: Haryana Additional Chief Secretary, Irrigation and Water resources Department, Sh Devender Singh said that under the Atal Bhujal Yojana, the state has a target to reduce the groundwater depletion by minimum 50 per cent over a period of five years. He said that 14 districts of the State would be covered under the scheme which includes 36 groundwater stressed blocks with a total of 1669 Gram Panchayats .
Sh Devender Singh disclosed this while addressing a State-level workshop on Atal Bhujal Yojana organized jointly by Haryana Water Resources Authority (HWRA) and Irrigation and Water Resources Department here today. The workshop was conducted for sensitization of various line departments and District implementation partners (DIPs).
The Atal Bhujal Yojana is a Participatory Groundwater Management scheme supported by the Central government and World Bank and implemented by the Haryana government. The major objective of this scheme is to create the Hydrogeological data network of groundwater resources in Haryana and also to build community institutions to manage the ground water resources in the state. As a part of the programme, community mobilisation and awareness activities as well as capacity building of stakeholders would be taken up. Initially, the Water Security Plan of each village would be prepared and the same would be implemented over the next four years.
While throwing light on various initiatives taken by the State government to work towards the depleting ground water table, Sh. Devender Singh stressed upon making the invisible – visible, taking the actual data of ground water table available to all the citizens. He said that the strategy would be to use the decision support tools for groundwater management by strengthening community based institutions to foster management, thus improving water use efficiency and enhancing groundwater recharge. Besides, he also stressed on fiscal decentralization of Atal Jal programme not only focuses on building state institutions but also supports the general move of the Government of India (GoI) towards fiscal decentralisation.
He said that in Atal Jal, funds are to flow from the central government to the states and from there onwards to the appropriate implementing levels that is districts, blocks, Gram Panchayats and the beneficiaries. He emphasised on the Mera Pani Meri Virasat scheme that incentivized farmers of Rs 7000 per hectare when adopting paddy to non-paddy crops. Under this scheme, the Government also ensures Minimum Support Price (MSP) for crops to promote crop diversification. The Major focus would be on convergence of the entire National and State scheme, which would pave a way of success of this programme, he added.
Addressing the workshop, Smt Keshni Anand Arora, Chairperson HWRA, said that this workshop on participatory water management has been organized for bringing together the ground level workers of Atal Bhujal and other line departments whose policies can be brought into Atal Jal Scheme through convergence. While emphasizing on the need of community participation to achieve the target under this programme, she said the DIPs should ensure community participation at every level of engagement.
She said that Water Security Plans (WSPs) would set the path for the future groundwater management and the targets of the Atal Jal Haryana could only be achieved with convergence with other line departments. He asked all the line departments to take Atal Jal Haryana on priority. She further emphasized that the Atal Jal team and all line department should plan out the detailed convergence programme and make the Atal Jal a grand success
Among those present on this occasion included Dr. Satbir Singh Kadian, Project Director, Atal Bhujal Yojana-Cum-Chief Engineer, Irrigation and Water Resources Department, senior officers of Departments including Rural Development, Agriculture and Farmers’ Welfare and members of Technical Support Unit of Atal Bhujal Yojana.
