Surface water based water supply in Pb: Sidhu

To check rapid decline and deterioration of ground water,  Punjab Government has initiated the process to switch over to Surface water (Canal water) based water supply for all three major cities.

Local Government Minister, Navjot Singh Sidhu on Saturday said detailed proposals were made by the Department of Local Government under the guidance of Principal Secretary A. Venu Parshad and CEO, PMIDC Ajoy Sharma, for using Canal water and provide treated potable water supply in the three cities of Ludhiana, Amritsar and Patiala with the study report concerning Jalandhar also in the pipeline.

The minister said considering the huge investment requirements, Punjab government had approached the Union Government for arranging the funds through External Funding Agencies such as World Bank (WB) and Asian Development Bank (ADB).

The Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs ( MoHUA), had accorded the technical clearance of in all the three water supply schemes the months of April 2018 and further forwarded it to Department of Economic Affairs (DEA), Ministry of Finance (Government of India) . A meeting was held on Saturday in the office of DEA, Ministry of Finance wherein, in Principle approval has been granted to the proposed Surface water based water supply schemes for all the three cities.

Sidhu gave details that the Union Government will now send the proposal to World Bank for Ludhiana & Amritsar and to ADB for Patiala, for the assistance and fund allocations. The total cost pertaining to the implementation of the project in the 3 cities is Rs. 3508.1 crore.

The process of approvals and sanctioning of Loan from lending agencies and further selection of contractor is expected to be completed with 12-14 month, after which the works are expected to start on ground.

The minister said that the drinking water supply system of major cities -- Amritsar, Ludhiana and Patiala is based on Ground water. The cities have witnessed sharp decline of Ground water levels in recent few years and the situation is worsening due to unregulated and over extraction of ground water.

As per the reports of Central Ground water board (CGWB), the groundwater level in these cities have declined at an alarming rate of approximate 1m per year in last 3-4 years. The report mentions that the extraction of ground water in these cities is more 150% than the net groundwater availability, and therefore, these areas have been declared in '' DARK ZONE '' category.  

Sidhu said Ludhiana city, having a census 2011 population of more than 16 lakh, is proposed to be served through Sidhwan canal. The proposed works will include Water Treatment Facilities, Transmission network, additional Storage facilities and Revamping of old and damaged distribution system of the city area. The investment requirements are estimated to be around 1468.86 Crore.

Amritsar will be served treated surface water from MBL canal. In addition to new Treatment and storage facilities , the old and problematic distribution systems will be replaced with a new and robust pipe network. The works will require investment of about 1339.24 Crore.

Patiala will get water from Bhakra canal and will require investments of Rs 700 Crore for construction of new facilities and revamping of existing distribution system.