NIRMAL JALNIRMAL JALNIRMAL JAL

MESSAGE

Editor:Er. S. R. Aggarwal 2nd Year2nd Year No. 8

NIRMAL JALNIRMAL JALNewsletter (Quarterly)

Heartiest New Year greetings and felicitations! New Year is a perfect time to start afresh on the basis of experience of the previous years and to set realistic targets for the Year ahead. It gives me immense pleasure as well as satisfaction that the Department of Water Supply & Sanitation has been able to make significant progress in the achievement of targets. The field officers were able to generate community demand from 4137

villages as well as received beneficiary share from 3982 GPWSCs. Till date, Water Supply schemes in 2617 habitations have been successfully commissioned under IDA & GoI/GoP funded SWAp and works are under progress in 490 schemes. This clearly depicts that the Department is moving ahead and have successfully encountered the initial hurdles in the implementation of SWAp and it is expected that Department would be able to provide safe and potable water to all the targeted 3897 villages by 2013.

This year, the Department would focus primarily on Financial sustainability of water supply schemes commissioned under SWAp through Capacity Building of GP/GPWSCs, to make them self reliant which means users fully finance recurrent O&M costs through generation of adequate cash flows through user charges. GPWSCs have the freedom to fix water tariff depending on actual O&M expenditure such that costs are fully recovered. As of now, O&M of 1924 water supply schemes have attained sustainability.

Furthermore, to encourage and motivate GPWSCs to improve services & financial sustainability and to conserve water, Punjab Government has decided to install water meters in 100 villages where 100% i.e. all households have individual water connections, on pilot basis. This enables 100% household water metered connections with volumetric water tariffs (user charges reflect actual consumption of water; meaning rich pays more and poor pays less than before). Because water meters also support prudent use of water, the intermittent supply can move towards achieving 24x7 or continuous water supply round the clock. Till date, 11 villages have achieved 24x7 metered water supply. The DWSS will soon roll out this program in other districts also since 223 villages have already achieved 100% household connections leading to surplus revenue.

Emphasis would also be given for the implementation of sewerage schemes in 100 villages under PRWSS project on pilot basis and till date, Department has identified 48 villages, which were meeting with the selection criteria, for providing sewerage facility.

I sincerely wish that by the year end, the Department through its decentralized Sector Wide Approach would enhance self-sustainability of commissioned schemes which would further give an impetus to successfully accomplish the targets of coverage for the Year 2012-13.

Editorial Board: Er. P. R. Sharma, Ms. Priya Ojha, Er. Gurpreet Singh

contd. on pg 3

January-March 2012January-March 2012

Department of Water Supply & Sanitation, Punjab, in cooperation with the World Bank, New Delhi office and Ministry of Drinking Water Supply, GoI organized a National Workshop on sustainable operations of water and sanitation schemes on December 15-16, 2011 at Chandigarh, to highlight and share the experience of Punjab on the successful implementation of Water Supply schemes under SWAp and achieving their sustainable operations; show case the best practices adopted and to learn from good experiences/ innovations in water supply & sanitation sector from other states & achievements being carried out at National/ International level.

Senior officers from the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation, Government of India, delegates from 17 States of India and delegates from World Bank offices in Delhi, Washington and Bangladesh, WHO, Water Aid, IRC Netherland actively participated in the workshop.

Sh. P.S Aujla, Secretary, DWSS, provided brief introduction of the Punjab Rural Water Supply & Sanitation Project and highlighted efforts put in by field officers in changing the mindset, persuading and motivating the local community for adopting the project concepts.

The inaugural address was delivered by Sh. S.C Aggarwal, Chief Secretary to Government of Punjab. He remarked that the project's authorities have achieved remarkable success in implementation of rural water supply & sanitation schemes in Punjab, under SWAp wherein beneficiaries contribute towards capital cost; own their scheme and take over the scheme for its O&M after completion. There is not even a single city in Punjab which can boast of 24X7 metered water supply system where as under this project, 11 villages of the State are already providing 24X7 metered water supply and department has set up an ambitious target of covering 100 villages. He conveyed his sincere thanks to the World Bank for not only providing funds for implementing the project but also for value addition on technical as well as administrative aspects at all stages of the project.

The technical session consisting of 4 sessions spanning on December 15-16, 2011 had 15 papers in all. The first technical session covered topics pertaining to sustainable operation of water supply & sanitation services by Dr. Dinesh Chand, Additional Advisor Government of India, second paper by Sh. Sudhir Bhatia, Chief Engineer, DWSS, Punjab on challenges of bringing financially self-sustainable O&M. The other topics

P.S. Aujla, IASSecretary, Water Supply & Sanitation Department, Punjab

National Workshop on Sustainable Rural Water Supply &Sanitation Services operations in Chandigarh

Today’s Wastage is Tomorrow’s Shortage - “Save Water, Secure Future”

Participating delegates and Senior Officers of the Department at the National Workshop held on December 15-16, Chandigarh.

For spreading awareness about sanitation and to inculcate the habit of people to use toilets, 51 Gram Panchayats of six districts were conferred with Nirmal Gram Puraskar (NGP), a national award for fully sanitized and open defecation-free villages under Total Sanitation Programme for the year 2010-11 by Department of Water Supply & Sanitation, Punjab on dated 15-11-2011 at Chandigarh. Panchayats of six districts which were declared Nirmal Grams were given awards by the Chief Guest, Sh.P.S. Ajula, IAS, Secretary, Department of Water Supply & Sanitation, Punjab. Also present at the function were Chief Engineer (South), Sh. R.L. Kauldhar, Chief Engineer (North), Sh. Sudhir Bhatia, Sh. S.R. Aggarwal, Programme Director, SPMC, Sh. P.R. Sharma, Senior Programme Specialist and Ms. Priya Ojha, Sr. CM Specialist, SPMC.

Sh. P.S. Aujla, in his augural address, informed that 22 Nos. villages in year 2008-09, 74 Nos. villages in year 2009-10 & 51 Nos. villages in 2010-11 have been awarded with Nirmal Gram Puraskar. The selection of these villages was done by Government of India on the basis of a village being open defecation free, with

criteria being cleanliness, proper use of toilets and adequate supply of drinking water. Sh. Aujla also said that Punjab Government has taken a loan of Rs. 124 Crore from NABARD for construction of one lakh individual household latrines in villages and on completion of the project, 3081 villages will become Nirmal Gram villages. Further, the Department has also fixed the target to provide 70lpcd drinking water to each house of Punjab State by 2013. On this occasion, the students of Shri Guru Harkishan School recited Shabad Gayan, which was followed by a theme song on “Safe Water” by a team of Department officers. Followed by this, a play 'Taweet' was enacted with a theme showing the importance of using toilets which enthralled the audience.

Thereafter, Er. N.K. Dhir Punjab State Coordinator of Nirmal Gram Puraskar stated that these villages have got the award of Rs. 48 lakh , out of which 28 villages with population less than 1000 are awarded with Rs. 50,000/-, 12 Nos. villages with population between 1000 to 2000 are awarded with Rs. 1 lakh & 11 Nos. villages of the range of population between 2000 to 5000 are awarded with Rs. 2 Lakh.

Capacity Building of DWSS officers on Procurement Management in Public sector

During the National workshop organized from 15–16, December 2011 in Chandigarh, Shri S.R Aggarwal, Programme Director, SPMC highlighted that the setting up of SNK has increased the credibility of Rural water supply operation in Punjab. It helped in checking absenteeism amongst operation staff in remote villages, which, in turn, has resulted in availability of safe drinking water on sustainable basis. The participants evinced keen interest to know more about the Shikayat Nivaran Kendra (SNK) which caters to the need of 14.9 million rural populations in 13380 habitations of Punjab.Ms. Elizabeth Kleemeier, World Bank, Washington D.C, USA, Mr. Martin

Khalkho, Chief Engineer, Jharkhand, Sh. R. M Tripathi, Joint Director, Uttar Pradesh and Dr. S. S. Phulia IAS, Additional Deputy Commissioner, Ambala, Haryana visited the Public Complaint Redressal cell. The delegates were demonstrated how consumers can register their complaints on through the toll free no. on 24 × 7 basis and the complaints are only closed after having been resolved to the satisfaction of the complainants. SNK has improved the quality of service delivery and enhanced efficiency of water supply system. The

delegates highly appreciated this endeavor made by the Department and felt that it was a great tool in achieving sustainable operations.

- Er. J.J. Goel

Nirmal Gram Puraskar to 51 Gram Panchayats

Study Visit by Dignitaries from Various States and Overseas to the Shikayat Nivaran Kendra at Mohali (Chandigarh)

Department of Water Supply & Sanitation, Punjab is executing a $154 Million Rural Water Supply and Sanitation project with the assistance of World Bank. Around 9000 contracts are expected to be awarded under the project following the World Bank procurement guidelines. The procurement capacity has always been an area of concern. Many initiatives have been taken by the project to build the capacity of various stakeholders

World Bank Implementation Support Mission emphasized on continued effort of the State Programme Management Cell, DWSS and Govt. of Punjab to build procurement capacity of central level as well as at decentralized level and suggested that atleast two procurement staff may be provided training at some international venue, such as Turin (Italy).

As such, Government of Punjab nominated two officers namely Sh. P.R. Sharma, Senior Programme Specialist and Sh. J. J. Goel, Executive Engineer for a training on Procurement Management in the Public Sector at International Training Centre, ILO, Turin (ITALY) with the objective to enhance economy, efficiency and transparency in the management of Public Procurement Operations.

A total 32 participants from India, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Georgia,

Ghana, Kosovo, Maldives, Nigeria, Vietnam and Yemen attended training course. The course also included exposure visit to World Trade Organization (WTO), Geneva, Switzerland.

This course was designed to explain the significance of public procurement to national development, its founding principles (with reference to UNCITRAL Model Law, European Union procurement directives, World Bank procurement guidelines and WTO/GPA) and typical models for the design of its institutional and managerial frameworks. In addition the course provided essential practical business ski l ls indispensable for successful implementation of the public procurement process for goods, construction works and services .Course delivery methodology adopted was a combination of presentations by subject-matter specialists, interactive discussions

on key issues, individual and group exercises and case studies.

Close interaction and thorough interactive dialogue with highly experienced faculty unfolded ambiguity of some intricate points and helped in expanding & broadening the horizon. This trained staff now will discharge responsibility to train more staff at district level.

Visiting delegates at the International Training Centre, Turin(Italy)

Sh. P.S. Aujla, IAS, alongwith Nirmal Gram Puraskar awardees

Delegates of the National workshop at the Shikayat Niwaran Kendra in Mohali

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contd. from pg 1

deliberated were based on the experiences from a multi country study by Dr. Kurian Baby Netherland & a study based on Jalnidhi (Kerela) experience for sustainable water supply sanitation by Sh. Pranabjyoti Nath.

ndThe speakers in the 2 technical session were Sh. N.K Dhir, Superintending Engineer, WSS Department Punjab who made a presentation on 24 × 7 metered water supply which highlighted the importance & benefits of 24X7 metered water supply. Thereafter, Sh. H.V Harish, Superintending Engineer, Karnataka made a power point presentation on the importance of Panchayati Raj.

Sh. R.P Gupta, Executive Engineer, WSS Department, enumerated various PPP models adopted by the department for contracting out water supply & sewerage operations. Ms. Elizabeth Kleemeier, Senior Water & Sanitation Specialist, World Bank, Washington D.C. highlighted that private operators are required by the village committee to gain market experience, better management and financing.

rdThe speakers of the 3 technical session were Dr. A. Gunasekhar from WHO, highlighted water quality monitoring through implementation of water safety plan. He agreed to take up a pilot WSP in Punjab for rural water supply. Sh. G.K. Gupta and Sh. Ranjeet Singh from DWSS presented the early experiences and highlighted challenges and opportunities for providing sewerage in rural areas. They presented case studies for sewerage schemes Chawa based on traditional sewerage system and of sewerage

scheme for village Baba Bakala based on solid-free sewerage system and Sh. T. Vijay Anand, CDD Society, Bangalore highlighted the DEWATS Technology for the treatment of waste water through decentralized waste water treatment solutions.

thThe 4 Technical Session was held on 16.12.2011. Four papers were presented in this session. Ms V Tamilarasi, Chief Water Analyst, TWAD Board, Tamilnadu highlighted the pattern of prevalent water quality problems and discussed the organizational chart for TWAD Board laboratories for water quality monitoring to

ndensure supply of safe & potable water to the public. The 2 speaker, Ms. Jasmine Ahirwar, Programme Officer, Water Aid highlighted community based approaches for addressing drinking water quality in rural areas on the basis of experiences from the various studies conducted by Water Aid.

rdThe 3 paper was jointly presented by Sh. Mohd. Ishfaq, Executive Engineer, WSS Department, Punjab & Ms. Priya Ojha, Senior Community Mobilization Specialist, State Programme Management Cell regarding community mobilization &

thempowering of PRIs. The 4 paper was delivered by Sh. S.R Aggarwal, Programme Director, SPMC Mohali, Punjab who elaborated upon the Public Complaint Redressal system which helped in achieving sustainable operations.

Shri T.M. Vijay Bhaskar, Joint Secretary, DDWS Ministry of Drinking Water & Sanitation appreciated the initiative taken by Punjab Government in organizing the National Workshop for sharing their good experiences with other States. He remarked that Government of Punjab has adopted number of good practices. Adoption of SWAp by involving community has become very successful in Punjab. Government of India too in the guidelines issued for the

implementation of NRDWP, has kept a provision of 8% of the allocated fund for the support activities and for community involvement. Involvement of community should not be kept confined to some projects but it should be adopted for the entire sector. Low cost decentralized waste treatment technology for village ponds and provision of shallow solid free sewer system adopted by Punjab State are commendable. However Punjab is lagging in the construction of individual household latrines whereas the neighboring State Haryana has developed good IHHL model and has increased its coverage from 30% to 60% by triggering demand through effective IEC which illustrates ill effects on health, income and time due to poor sanitation.

thHe disclosed that in the 12 five year plan document, focus is on providing piped water supply schemes and supplying water through households connections preferably through metered connections. To ensure O&M sustainability of water supply schemes Government of India has also recommended to increase the present service level of water supply from 40 lpcd to 55 lpcd.

Mr. S.C. Aggarwal, Chief Secretary, Government of Punjab, in his concluding remarks said “Water is a necessity and sanitation is a habit. People need to experience what good sanitation is before they can start asking about it.” Mr. Aggarwal expressed that though the National figures are impressive as far as water supply is concerned, but the country has a long way to go in the implementation of rural sanitation programme. Having done water supply and learning some lessons through new approaches,

Punjab should now try it on sanitation. He appreciated that the workshop provided a good platform for sharing experiences across the country and requested GOI to organize such workshops on regular basis.

Recommendations/conclusions of the workshop:

· Community involvement at all stages of development of water and sanitation schemes is the key to achieve sustainable operation and maintenance of the created assets.

· Well designed IEC with adequate and qualified manpower and support is essential.

· Importance of capacity building of stakeholders.

· People are ready to pay for the service provided, satisfactory service is received by them.

· Each State may launch at least one pilot 24x7 operation in each district.

· Lessons emerging from the installation of solids-free sewers and the different kinds of treatment technologies should be studied and documented.

· Setting up of a sound Grievance Management System will improve quality of service delivery system & enhance efficiency of the water supply system.

· Water Safety Plan should be adopted to ensure safe water quality to the consumers.

· Local private operators for the operation & maintenance of water supply and sewerage services should be encouraged.

· To ensure improved sanitation facilities to rural communities.

Er. D. K. Bhasin

Conserve water today, for a secure tomorrow

Participants during the National workshop on December 15-16, Chandigarh

contd. from pg 1

A field visit of the delegates who participated in the National Workshop on Sustainable Water Supply and Sanitation Services at Chandigarh, was organized by the DWSS, to sewerage scheme of village Baba Bakala and Water Supply Scheme of village Naushera, district Amritsar on Dec. 17, 2011. The delegation comprised of 14 participants from six States of India (Jharkhand, J&K, Manipur, Tamil Naidu, Uttrakhand and Uttar Pradesh) and 4 participants from Bangladesh. Both these schemes have been implemented under World Bank assisted Punjab Rural Water Supply & Sanitation Project with active participation of Gram Panchayat and village communities. Sh. Sudhir Bhatia, Chief Engineer (North) and other senior officers of the department received the delegation at Sewerage Scheme Baba Bakala and apprised them about the details of the schemes.Sewerage Scheme Baba Bakala costing Rs. 4.5 crore was commissioned in February 2011 and serves the population of 9726 persons. The village community contributed Rs 5.81 lacs towards beneficiary share. 1120 out of 1626 households have sewerage connections. It is one of the five schemes taken in hand on pilot basis by adopting solid free sewerage technology. Under this technology, each house has intercepting chamber upfront sewer connection where the domestic

sewage is collected. Solids settle down in the intercepting chamber and only liquid effluent enters the sewer pipes. The liquid effluent is taken to a sewage treatment plant comprising of Facultative Pond, Sludge Drying Beds and Composting Pits. The O&M of the scheme is being carried out by GPWSC from the same contractor who executed the scheme.The delegation was then taken to Water Supply Scheme Naushera which was commissioned in March 2010 at an estimated cost of Rs. 1.12 crore. The community contributed Rs. 5.59 lacs as beneficiary share towards capital cost. All the 1075 households have obtained individual water connections

from the scheme. The GPWSC is operating the scheme since its commissioning on sustainable basis and have also generated surplus revenue of Rs. 10.67 lacs through water connection fee and user charges. The State Government has awarded First State Level prize of Rs. 2 lacs to the GPWSC for sustainably operating the water supply scheme at village level. The delegation visited many households and interacted with the community regarding their satisfaction level and functioning of the GPWSC.The delegates appreciated the successful implementation and operation of the scheme by the community on sustainable basis with the support provided by the department.

Village Manhera Jattan, District Fatehgarh Sahib has now become a symbol of progress due to its round the clock metered water supply. This is amongst the 11 villages of the State that was targeted for 24 ×7 metered water supply thanks to the initiative taken by the Department of Water Supply & Sanitation. This village has a population of 746 persons with 124 households and initially there was no planned water supply system in the village. The inhabitants of this village had no option but to drink water from hand-pumps and wells which during summer seasons became dry. Residents were thus, facing great scarcity of water to meet their daily requirement. Pro-active members then decided to approach the Department of Water Supply & Sanitation since they had heard about the World Bank assisted PRWSS project through newspapers. The Department officers took up the initiative to visit this village and held preliminary dialogue with the community and explained the project scheme in totality. The community was very keen on to adopting this scheme and willingly agreed to contribute their beneficiary share towards capital cost. Consequence upon this, the scheme was implemented under the project and potable piped water supply was made available to the residents in August, 2008.The GPWSC while running the scheme successfully

Delegates from Bangladesh and other States of India visiting Sewerage Scheme of Baba Bakala and Water Supply Scheme Naushera, District Amritsar.

felt a lot wastage of water and realizing the benefits of metering in other villages also decided to avail this facility to curb water wastage and approached the Department for installing water meters. The department while installing water meters at individual households provided a bulk water meter at source also to measure the quantity of water being supplied to the village. The villagers are very happy as now they are paying according to their actual consumption. Also, now there is no wastage of water and the electricity bill has greatly reduced and the scheme became self-sustainable. The Government of Punjab has awarded the GPWSC of this village with first District Level award of Rs 75,000/- for the year 2011-12 for it being a best performing GPWSC in district Fatehgarh Sahib.Looking at the best practice adopted by this village, 29 delegates from different States of India (Arunachal Pradesh, Goa, J&K, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Manipur, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttrakhand, Uttar Pradesh, West Bengal) including delegates from World Bank, New Delhi office, Bangladesh and Netherland, who

were participating delegates in the National workshop organized by the Department in cooperation with World Bank on December 15-16, 2011 at Chandigarh, visited the scheme and interacted with the GPWSC and village community on December 17, 2011. Er. R.L. Kauldhar, Chief Engineer(South), DWSS along with Senior Officers of the Department welcomed the delegation and briefed them about the 24 × 7 metered water supply. The delegation visited many households and interacted with the community regarding the benefits of the scheme and they were impressed by the functioning of the GPWSC in operating the scheme with full transparency and accountability. The delegates appreciated the Department's initiatives and congratulated the GPWSC for sustainable operation of the water supply scheme around the clock

Delegates from Bangladesh and Other States within India a taking keen interest in the Sewerage Baba Bakala

Websitewww.pbdwss.gov.in

Emailpdspmc@gmail.com

Delegates in village Manhera Jattan, District Fatehgarh Sahib

Symbol of Progress – Round the Clock Water Supply

State Programme Management CellWater Works Complex

Phase-2, S.A.S. Nagar (Mohali)Ph.: 0172-4330316, 4330317