Introduction

Jalanidhi had a remarkable success in enabling people to plan, build and operate their own water supply schemes with substantial participation from the beneficiary.  A significant number of them have weathered the test of time to survive as examples of community ownership. The Jalanidjhi project at Nadathara panchayat here scripted a success story by providing drinking water to 2877 households which had been depending on taker water. The 12.6 core project was completed in Aug 2015 with 75 percent of fund from World Bank aid and 15 percent from the Nadathara Panchayath. The remaining was contributed by the beneficiaries.
 

Back ground of Nadathara LWSS

Nadathara Grama Panchayath was selected under batch 1 of Jalanidhi Phase II projects. The Grama Panchayath appointed M/s KESS Thrissur as Support Organization from the list provided by the KRWSA. After a series of IEC activities viz. Special Grama sabha, Door to door campaign, cluster meetings 2685 beneficiary households were identified as beneficiaries of the project. Based on locality the beneficiaries were grouped in to 56 BGs and were registered under Societies Registration Act. After a series of discussions, it is decided to rehabilitate 3 GP schemes for 257 households in 3 BGs. 

It is not economically viable and technically to develop 53 sources for the remaining 2438 households in 53 BGs. Hence search for better option ended with the genesis of Nadathara Large Water supply scheme. 
 

Location and Demographic features:

Nadathara GP falls in the Ollukkara block of Thrissur district and having population of 31857. The Gama panchayath situates at out skirts of Thrissur Municipal Corporation and shows the tendency of floating population. Out of 8057 families 3004 belongs to BPL (37%) and 427(5.3%) are SC. 42 ST families also resides in this GP

The Scheme

“The source of water is a well, constructed on the bed of Manali puzha which is located 3 km from the main 4 lakh litre tank on minor road in between Nadathara and Poochatty.  “Even in the worst summer this part of the river will have water” SLEC President Jeshin assures. “Peechi irrigation project is in this river”. This is one of the tributaries of Karuvannur  puzha. 

 

The main components  of the scheme are  well cum pump house, raw water  pumping main, 1.25 mld  water treatment plant consisting of  stepped aerator, sedimentation tank, pressure filters,OHSR-  Zinc Aluminum,4.1 L  ls, GLSR, zinc Aluminium 1.1 L ls, BPT  2 nos, distribution lines  102 km  length.in 2 Zones Water is supplying daily 5 hrs in morning  & 5 hours in evening. Two other tanks of the project are located at Cherumkuzhi in Panchayath on a higher terrain

Execution of Scheme

For the execution of the scheme initially there was a delay of one year for inviting and settling tenders etc. Initial tender call was for a single package.  As the response was poor work is sliced in to 5 packages and arranged. Issues with PWD & BSNL caused delay. Road restoration charges payable to the PWD increased to 3 crores from 2crores anticipated early. SLEC was very keen in watching progress of the work and quality of the work

 

While tendering for RCC reservoirs no competitive offers received. Hence SLEC in its meeting on 20.5.14 decided to go for Zinc Aluminium tank. This is an innovative idea. The reservoirs of the project was made of cost effective  and time saving technology using zinc aluminum plates with inner bladder made of rubber. The specialty of this tank is that it can be dismantled and shifted to different locations if needed.

 

The Institutional set up

The Implementation, Operation and Maintenance of Nadathara LWSS are handled by 9 member executive committee selected among the representative of 53 Beneficiary Groups (106 members). There also have 17- member advisory committee of Grama panchayath ward members. This type of administrative set up enables cordial relationship between Grama panchayath and the SLEC.

Operation and Maintenance

SLEC appointed 11 member O&M brigade comprising office staff, pump operators, valve operator and meter readers. 6 women got appointed out of 11. The appointed staff members are having qualification from SSLC to Maters.  

The SLEC fixed a minimum tariff of Rs. 100 for 1 KL and the coast will go up gradually as per the use above this limit. 

Complaint redressal system

Nadathara LWSS has well -defined conflict redressal mechanism which is the one of the back bone of success of this scheme. The complaints are received either directly or by Telephone (9446697355) is recorded in a complaint register kept in SLEC office. All complaints received are handed over to field staff for rectification. He records work done in complaint register. The Nadathara LWSS ensures transparency in operation through the following 

 

• Well defined O&M bylaw

• Advisory committee of GP members

• Auditing of Accounts by Chartered Accountant

• Regular BG Meeting and SLC Meetings

• All BGs and SLC renewed society registration

• Computer aided billing system

• Support from KRWSA

 

 

The Value Addition 

After the successful four -year operation, SLEC has achieved financial security/ sustainability as it has a reserve of Rs. 86.35 Lakhs. Besides this the SLEC took following initiatives as development activities

• Provided 439 new connection after commissioning

• Purchased 13.5 cents of land at Nellani for constructing Reservoir to smoothen the supply to Edathattamkunnu Zone

• Planned to provide additional connection and better service to existing consumers

• Purchased 2 vehicles – timely response to address complaints 

Learnings

• House hold consumer/Community has developed a mindset that water tariff needs to be paid regularly. 75-80% payments are regular

• Grass root level BGs remains active and vibrant. New Connections are given only with recommendation of BGs where the applicant resides. A portion of connection charges are allotted to BGs for their operations.

• Good support and cooperation from Gram Panchayat for a success of a project not only for its implementation but operation and management phase too

 

Conclusion

The Scheme level Executive committee selected from the beneficiaries takes care of the daily functioning of the project which includes operation of sedimentary, filtering and chlorination. It is evident that that the scheme is a big relief to Gramapanchayath by cut shorting their expenditure in Water sector after the inception of the scheme.