Prime Minister Narendra Modi will launch the ‘Jal Shakti Abhiyan: Catch the Rain’ campaign on March 22, on the occasion of ‘World Water Day’.
The nationwide campaign will be launched at 12.30 pm via video conferencing.
The Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) said that a “historic” Memorandum of Agreement will be signed between Union Minister of Jal Shakti Gajendra Singh Shekhawat and the chief ministers of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh to implement the ‘Ken Betwa Link Project’. It is the first project under the National Perspective Plan for the interlinking of rivers.
‘Jal Shakti Abhiyan: Catch the Rain’
The campaign, to be launched on World Water Day, will be undertaken across India in both rural and urban areas, the PMO said in a statement.
It will be implemented from March 22 to November 30 – before and during the monsoon season. The project is being launched as a Jan Andolan, or a people’s movement, to “take water conservation at grass-root level through people’s participation”.
The ‘Jal Shakti Abhiyan: Catch the Rain’ campaign is intended to encourage all stakeholders to build rainwater harvesting structures suitable to the climatic conditions and subsoil strata, to ensure proper storage of rainwater.
Gram Sabhas will be held in all Gram Panchayats of each district (except in the poll-bound states) to discuss issues related to water and water conservation. Gram Sabhas will also take ‘Jal Shapath’ for water conservation, the PMO added.
Ken Betwa Link Project
The signing of the agreement will start inter-state cooperation to carry water from areas that have surplus water to drought-prone and water deficit areas, through the interlinking of rivers.
This project involves the transfer of water from Ken River to the Betwa River through the construction of Daudhan Dam and a canal linking the two rivers, the Lower Orr Project, Kotha Barrage and Bina Complex Multipurpose Project.
Once complete, the linking will provide annual irrigation of 10.62 lakh hectare, drinking water supply to about 62 lakh people and also generate 103 megawatt of hydropower, according to the PMO.
The project is also expected to benefit the water-starved region of Bundelkhand, especially the districts of Panna, Tikamgarh, Chhatarpur, Sagar, Damoh, Datia, Vidisha, Shivpuri and Raisen in Madhya Pradesh and Banda, Mahoba, Jhansi and Lalitpur in Uttar Pradesh. The Ken Betwa Link Project is likely to pave the way for more inter-linking of rivers.
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