Over a 100 villages in the southern region of Allahabad district are set to benefit from the World Bank’s plan to revive water projects.
The international agency has accepted the Allahabad Jal Nigam’s (AJN) proposal for reviving the Kaurihar Gram Samuh Drinking Water Project, said senior officials.
The project, under the AJN’s Nirman Fund, will ensure supply of potable water to 104 villages in the Meja and Kaurihar blocks. It was conceived in 1967-68 and inaugurated in January 1972, when the region faced severe drought and several families were compelled to migrate. Around 150 villages spread over 50 kilometres benefited from the World-Bank-funded project on the banks of the Tons, the largest tributary of the Yamuna.
However, it was abandoned in 1980 — due, primarily, to lack of maintenance. The supply pipes, which were linked to tanks and provided water directly to the villages through underground pipes, are in a dilapidated condition.
Since the region’s terrain is rocky, tube wells have failed over the years. According to a Union Ministry of Water Resources report, Kaurihar falls under the semi-critical category as far as ground water is concerned. Out of the 820 blocks in Uttar Pradesh, 107 are described as semi-critical, with six — Bahadurpur, Dhanupur, Saidabad, Urwa, Pratappur and Kaurihar — located in the district.
Further, a 2008-2009 Ground Water Brochure of Allahabad notes that construction of canals or strengthening of the existing canal system should be emphasised in four blocks — Bahadurpur, Chaka, Kaurihar and Meja. Around 35 per cent of the district’s population depends upon groundwater and this project will benefit as many as 1,35,259 persons, including 30,417 belonging to the Scheduled Castes (2001 Census).
AJN executive engineer J.N Mishra said the details of the plan would be in place within a month. The date of implementing the project would also be known then. The administration is hopeful that the project will start by this year.
