By Our Reporter
SHILLONG, Oct 25: Chief Minister Conrad K Sangma on Wednesday announced that the Jal Jeevan Mission Functional Household Tap Connections (JJM-FHTC) has crossed the four-lakh mark.
“Meghalaya crosses a remarkable 4 Lakhs #JalJeevanMission Functional Household Tap Connections! Congratulations and best wishes to the @jjmmeghalaya team as we continue to pursue our target of 100% FHTCs in our State,” the CM wrote in a social media post.
Meghalaya’s tap water connection status indicates that East Garo Hills has the highest coverage (80.09%), followed by South West Garo Hills (79.02%), Ri-Bhoi (72.83%), North Garo Hills (69.35%), Eastern West Khasi Hills (67.56%), South Garo Hills (65.56%), South West Khasi Hills (65.15%), West Garo Hills (59.82%), West Khasi Hills (57.52%), West Jaintia Hills (50.29%), East Khasi Hills (50.01%) and East Jaintia Hills (44.50%).
There are 6,51,529 households overall out of which 4,00,812 have access to tap water (61.52%).
JJM is a flagship plan that Prime Minister Narendra Modi announced in August 2019 with the goal of providing all rural Indian families with access to safe and sufficient drinking water through individual household tap connections by 2024.
For the third year in a row, Meghalaya received an additional grant-in-aid of Rs 299.24 crore from the Ministry of Jal Shakti in April in order to provide functional household tap connections under JJM.
Meghalaya is the only state to receive the bonus package for a third year in a row for effectively adopting JJM.
The state government has set a target of January 2024 for supplying tap connections to all of the targeted households.