Drinking water for all, resource conservation govt's major

Jammu and Kashmir minister Sham Lal Choudhary tonight said the state government has set for itself three major goals of providing safe drinking water, harnessing and conserving water resources, and protecting life, land and property from floods.
To provide drinking water for all, he said the government has set a target of completing 183 water supply schemes with a corpus of Rs 306.26 crore during 2017-18.
The minister for public health engineering (PHE), irrigation and flood control (I&FC), said the water supply schemes will benefit around 2.29 lakh people in the state.
Winding up a discussion on demand for grants of PHE, I&FC departments in the Legislative Assembly, he said the state government is making all efforts for creating dependable infrastructures to improve and augment these services.

Regarding augmentation of water supply in urban areas, Choudhary said to meet shortfall and future demand of drinking water supply in Srinagar City, two schemes were taken up under Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM) at an estimated cost of Rs 269.37 crore.
He said 86 schemes, at an estimated cost of Rs 335.30 crore, were being executed from LIC loan assistance under PHE sector to meet water requirements in urban areas.
The minister said Srinagar City, Anantnag, Leh and Kargil towns have been included under the Union urban development ministry's 'Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT)' programme.