Punjab villagers show how to conserve water

New Delhi - Had the scheme been not in place, lack of water this summer would have driven the villagers into a desperate situation

By CP Surendran

Published: Wed 14 Jun 2017, 10:10 PM

Last updated: Thu 15 Jun 2017, 12:12 AM

Once Punjab was the seat of the Green Revolution of India. Punjab still produces the most wheat in the country. But all of it has come at a cost: depleting ground water level, despite the fact that five big rivers flow through the state. Last week, Man Aspal village was chosen by the Central government for the national award for water conservation.
No rocket technology was used. For conserving water, each house in the village dug soak-pits and septic tanks (tanks which are used to store used water) which help in recycling the water.
Man Aspal deputy commissioner Dharampal Gupta and Man Aspal sarpanch Gurjant Singh said: "The soak-pit project, which deals with waste water management to make the villages drain free, was started in 2015 as a pilot with the support from a multinational company."
Had the scheme been not in place, lack of water this summer would have driven the villagers into a desperate situation. Because they were ready for the water crisis, the village is now self sufficient in water.
The project involved the digging of soak-pits of four-feet-by-10-feet with a septic tank of three-feet-by-four-feet. There are 65 houses in the village. The pit and the tank for each house were constructed at a cost Rs329,000.
The Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGS), which was also responsible for cleaning up and reviving a river in Kerala, and digging up of scores of new wells when Kerala was stricken by drought this summer, funded the Man Aspal project also.

The village has 107 MGNREGS job card holders. The water now harvested in these pits and tanks could be used at least till the rains come and replenish the pits. With this, Man Aspal has become the lone village in Punjab that has implemented water conservation.

Man Aspal development officer, Jatinder Singh Brar, said apart from the soak-pit project, the village has also renovated defunct ponds, and laid a drinking water pipeline.

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