Ponds for van panchayats to boost water availability

Tribune News Service

Dehradun, December 26

To address the problem of water scarcity in rural areas of Uttarakhand, each of 750 van panchayats in the state will get a pond of around one lakh litre capacity by June 2018. 

This was revealed at the Uttarakhand Forest Resource Management Project review meeting held in Dehradun today. The project is being implemented by the Uttarakhand Forest Department with the financial support of Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA). 

Chairing the meeting, Uttarakhand Additional Chief Secretary Ranbeer Singh said that following Uttarakhand Chief Minister’s directives Uttarakhand Forest Resource Management Project has made provisions to construct one pond of around one lakh litre capacity in each of the 750 van panchayats in Uttarkhand by June 2018. 

He said the project would create one model water conservation scheme in each of the 13 forest divisions in the state, which he said would improve water availability to four to five van panchayats over the next three years.

Sharing the progress made under the various components of the project in the state over the last two years, Chief Project Director Uttarakhand Forest Resource Management Project Anup Malik said so far the project had helped to construct around 3,500 small and big chaal, khaal and other traditional water bodies in around 400 van panchayats in the state.

En-course of the review of the progress of eco-restoration and nursery production works, it was disclosed at the meeting that a total of 37,500 hectares of degraded forests area would be restored under the project. 

A total of 130 lakh seedlings would be raised and planted under the project, of which 33.95 lakh seedling have already been planted,” Anup Malik pointed out. 

It is noteworthy that Uttarakhand Forest Resource Management Project has an outlay of Rs 807 crore and the project activities would be taken up in 750 van panchayats across 13 forest divisions of the state.