Rajasthan might emulate Maharashtra's 'Jal Yukt Shivar Abhiyan'

Mumbai: Impressed with the progress of Maharashtra's 'Jal Yukt Shivar Abhiyan,' Rajashtan may also adopt the state's flagship water conservation and Integrated water management scheme.

Aiming to learn more about the state's water conservation programme, a delegation from Rajasthan, comprising a minister and senior bureaucrats are on Maharashtra tour and will visit a few sites where the project is currently underway.

"Jalyukta Shivar Abhiyan is an ambitious program of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and he has toured almost each and every district to visit the project sites,” Pankaja Munde, minister for water conservation said.

She said that the scheme is being implemented successfully in the state because of the active participation of people from villages.

"Our state's success story reached Rajasthan Chief Minister Vasundhara Raje and after being impressed with our scheme, she has sent a delegation to study our scheme,” Munde said.

The delegation from Rajasthan includes Shreeram Vedire, chairman of River Basin and Water Resource Corporation, Shrimant Pande, principal secretary to Rural Development department, Anand Kumar, secretary to Panchayat Raj department, Amitabh Sharma, secretary to Water resource department, EGS Commissioner Rohit Kumar, Somesh Mathur, chief engineer of Water Resource and other officials.

The delegation met Munde yesterday at Mantralaya to get the details of the scheme.

After meeting Munde, Vedire said, "Though Rajasthan is implementing schemes of water conservation and we had done a lot of work, Maharashtra model is different in which the government is focusing on people's participation. This is what has impressed us and we want to replicate this model in Rajasthan as well."

The delegation will visit a few sites at villages in Latur and Osmanabad today.

They also had a detailed discussion with the officials involved in Jalyukta Shivar Project in Mantralaya.

"If Rajasthan adopts our scheme, it will not only be an honour for my department, but it will make the whole state proud as well because after Employment Guarantee Scheme (EGS) and Right to Information (RTI), Jalyukta Shivar scheme will be honoured at the national level," Munde said.