Purulia: West Bengal Chief Minister Suvendu Adhikari on Monday inaugurated a Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA)-backed drinking water supply project in Purulia district, which is expected to benefit over eight lakh people.
"Today, our NDA government completed 100 days in West Bengal. On this day, we launched a drinking water project in Purulia. It pains me to see that the district did not have drinking water supply even when the country was celebrating its 80th Independence Day," Adhikari said.
"I would like to thank the Japan government and JICA for this initiative. Out of the Rs 1296.25 crore project, they contributed 889.06 crore," he said.
The project will benefit Manbazar-I, Barabazar, Purulia-I, Puncha and Arsha blocks, besides Purulia municipality, he said.
According to Adhikari, 87,271 families across 458 mouzas and a population of around 8.13 lakh will benefit from the project.
Each person will receive 70 litres of treated drinking water daily, he said.
The project received administrative approval from the then state government on February 8, 2019, and has been implemented by the state Public Health Engineering Department.
Under the scheme, water will be drawn from the Mukutmanipur reservoir and carried through a 1.2-km pipeline to another reservoir, where it will undergo treatment using modern technology.
The treated water will then be transported through a 272-km transmission pipeline to 42 overhead tanks.
A 1,594-km distribution network has been laid from these tanks to supply around 68 million litres of water daily to the targeted areas.
