Maha ZPs to implement small drinking water schemes

The Maharashtra Cabinet today decided to hand over the work for implementation of drinking water schemes with a cost of Rs 5 crore to Zilla Parishads with a view to increase the pace of their completion in rural areas.
The government has made an annual outlay of around Rs 700 crore for implementation of the schemes, a senior Water Supply and Sanitation department official said.
As per a decision taken at the state cabinet meeting here, the rights of implementation of drinking water schemes will be handed over to zilla parishads because they have all the technical staff and expertise available for such work, he said.

"Post implementation, daily functioning and maintenance will be taken care of by a rural drinking water supply and cleanliness committee which consists of village representatives and local administrative officials," a state government release said.
While a drinking water scheme with Rs 5 crore budget will be implemented by the respective ZP administration, the bigger schemes by the Maharashtra Jeevan Pradhikaran, a body under the Water Resources Department.
"This will improve the speed of completion of work as rural population is largely dependent on such schemes," the official said.

Meanwhile, the cabinet also widened the scope for raising funds for construction of village roads, which will improve the rural infrastructure network.

Earlier, the funds for the purposed used to be made available under Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee scheme (MGNREGS).
However, as the MGNREGS funds used to be limited, the government today decided to provide funds for village approach roads from local area development funds of MPs and MLAs, development corporations, and grant several subsidies for gram panchayats and zilla parishads.
"If a village or a farm does not have a approach road, it should be constructed through various funding sources at village level. The existing raw roads should be converted into well-constructed roads, which can be functional in all seasons," the release said.

In another decision, the corporators of civic bodies will now be able to submit their caste validation certificates within six months from the date of election result. The decision will remain valid till June 30 next year, the release said.
"The government today decided that corporators and other representatives of self-governing bodies can submit their valid caste certificates within six months from the date of poll result," it stated.
A similar decision was taken on April 7, 2015, but its validity expired on December 31, 2017.