The Tamil Nadu Rural Development officers are all praise for Mission Bhagiratha and appreciated the Telangana government for providing greater per capita protected drinking water than prescribed by the Centre. They even indicated that a similar scheme might be launched in Tamil Nadu.
The Mission Bhagiratha became a topic of discussion among political leaders and officials of Tamil Nadu, said the officials from T.N., who arrived here to participate in a high-level meeting of the officials of Rural Development Department of both the States on Wednesday.
Chief Engineer Jaganmohan Reddy made a PowerPoint presentation on Mission Bhagiratha to the visiting officers and explained they were taking water from reservoirs and projects to ensure there was no shortage in future. Even if there was no satisfactory rainfall for two to three years, there would be no problem supplying drinking water, he said.
Mr. Reddy explained the finance model and how they went about taking permission from various departments for the household drinking water supply scheme.
The Tamil Nadu officials were surprised that the Telangana government could get permission from railway, forest and national highways authorities in the shortest possible time.
The visiting team had quite a few questions on the existing drinking water supply in villages and urban areas and how would the existing water supply schemes be linked to the Mission Bhagiratha. Tamil Nadu Drinking Water Supply Chief Engineer Vairavanathan said they got interested in Mission Bhagiratha after the Central government advised the States to follow the Telangana government’s initiative. Appreciating the coordination between the Mission Bhagiratha field-level engineers and high-level officials, Mr. Vairavanathan said they would submit a detailed report on their impression of the scheme to their government.
