Govt mulls roping in Israel firm to set up water treatment plants

In a bid to ensure sufficient supply of drinking water in major parts of Basirhat and Bongaon in North 24-Parganas, the state government is planning to engage an organisation from Israel that will set up water treatment plants to produce potable water from salt water.

Subrata Mukherjee, minister, state Public Health Engineering department, said: "There is a necessity to take steps to ensure sufficient supply of potable water in areas including Basirhat, Taki, Hingalganj and Bongaon. There is no scarcity of salty water in the area. But they need to be recycled to potable condition so that they can be supplied to the people."

He said that representatives of an organisation from Israel had visited the places and he himself had also gone to the places twice.

"The organisation will set up water treatment plants using their updated and modern technologies to recycle the salty water to potable," he said adding that the detail project report is yet to be prepared and the project will be discussed with the Asian Development Bank (ADB).

Lakhs of people will be benefitted as there would be no shortage of water with setting up of the treatment plants.

At the same time, the state government has taken initiative to ensure sufficient supply of drinking water in Bankura and Purulia. Water is supplied in half of the Bankura district from the Damodar River. Initiatives have been taken to ensure supply of safe drinking water in the remaining parts of the district. ADB is funding the project for Bankura district.

Quite a similar project has been taken up for Purulia district to ensure that scarcity of potable water becomes a thing of the past in the district. Japan International Cooperation Agency is funding the project in Purulia. With implementation of the projects, people of the area would not have to face any trouble due to short supply of water.