SHILLONG: The first meeting of the Meghalaya State Water Resource Council, under the chairmanship of Chief Minister Dr Mukul Sangma was held on Thursday.
The meeting was organized to discuss the Water Mission which is one of the nine missions under the State Government’s flagship Integrated Basin Development and Livelihood Promotion (IBDLP) programme.
The key elements of the Water Mission include knowledge management, institutional development and capacity building, water use and water use efficiency, water quality management, ground water management, flood management, promoting multipurpose use of water, water and climate change adaptation, water governance and convergence.
The Council discussed the important role that the Water Mission will play by linking the various initiatives by comprehensively involving all aspects of water management and linking them to various livelihoods with the goal to bring a positive change to the lives of people of the state.
One of the key issues that emerged from the meeting was the immediate need to enhance the knowledge about availability of water resources, both surface and ground water, in the State.
It was discussed that to ensure sustainable development and utilization of the state’s water resources it is critical that significant community participation takes place both in the planning and development of water resources projects.
The Council discussed that all efforts should be led from village level and upwards and the communities should be appropriately incentivized to take active part in developing and managing water resources projects that ultimately ensure sustainable and inclusive development throughout the State.
The Chief Minister also supported the initiative of launching a State-wide Water Campaign to sensitize various stakeholders and invoke active participation. A network of dedicated youth is to be put in place to contribute in capacity of green ambassadors to take forward this campaign.
The Council also discussed the significant issues surrounding water quality and livelihoods. It was emphasized that while availability of water is critical to sustainable livelihoods, it is also extremely important to ensure that development does not take place at the cost of environment due to over exploitation of available resources or pollution.
In this regard the Council has decided to put together a comprehensive water quality monitoring system and appropriate regulatory frameworks to ensure in sustainable water resources management particularly in over exploited urban areas and also in those areas where orchards are adversely affected because of such over exploitation. It was discussed that the water quality monitoring system shall encompass all forms of water resources including ground water.
The Council also approved the Water Plus initiative focusing on making incremental investments in the water bodies already created and also harnessing the best value from such investments by putting in place the approach of integrated water resources management (IWRM).
In addition to the State wide policies and legislative frameworks, the Council discussed the importance of development of Social agreements which shall define the exact roles and responsibilities of all the stakeholders.
As part of the concluding remarks, the Chief Minister clearly laid down the vision for the Water Mission to provide safe and adequate access to water for all in the state by the time the state celebrates 50 years of Statehood in 2022.
The Meeting was attended by Deputy Chief Minister Prof. RC Laloo, Forest & Environment Minister Prestone Tynsong, besides senior Government officials.