Kinangaon villagers forced to drink water of stream, out of JJM

Kinangaon: Despite the government’s aim to make the Jal Jeevan Mission a success story in rural India, villagers in and around Kinangaon under Chaygaon Legislative Assembly constituency in Assam’s Kamrup district have been forced to quench their thirst with a natural stream.

Kinangaon village, inhabited mostly by the Garo tribe, is located about 14 km from the Boko Sub-Division of the Public Health Engineering Department (PHED).
More than 50 disgruntled families from Kinangaon and nearby Chakrasila village (about 2 km away) are fetching drinking water from a stream near the hill in Kinangaon. They alleged that due to negligence of the state government, they are bound to exploit the natural resources.

The women and girls of this area fill water from the river in pitchers and bottles which they carry in bamboo baskets.
“More than 30 women from my village walk to this place and collect around 20 liters of drinking water,” said Samadika Rabha from Chakrasila village. There is no trace of JJM in her village.

Although there are wells, the Kinangaon river is the only source of clean drinking water for the local people. He said, “This series is a Jal Jeevan scheme of nature for us.
Notably, the JJM envisions providing safe and adequate drinking water to every rural household by 2024. This ambitious scheme has achieved a 22.17% success rate in Assam by 2021.
Bita Sangma from Kinangaon village said she has been using the river as a source of water for three decades since childhood.
Sub-divisional officer of Boko PHED, Mukut Barman, said, “Under Boko sub-division, which includes Boko, Chaygaon and Palashbari constituencies, almost 80 percent of the retrofitting work for drinking water has been completed. including the revised schemes.”
He revealed that 10 percent work related to new schemes is also nearing completion. He said that works like finalization of land and boring of deep tube well are going on.

“All contractors under Boko PHED sub-division are working to complete the work by March, 2024,” added SDO Mukut Barman.