Alipurduar: By March 2024, the Alipurduar Municipality will ensure access to drinking water to every household within the municipality area. The project is pegged at an estimated cost of approximately Rs 102 crore.
The demand for this essential service from the common people was initially raised during the era of the Left Front government and is now set to be implemented in Alipurduar town as part of the Amrut project.
A meeting was recently convened in Kolkata by Firhad Hakim, Minister of Urban Development and Municipal Affairs, attended by Chairman Prasenjit Kar of the Alipurduar Municipality and several other municipal chairpersons. During the meeting, Hakim urged the prompt execution of the project in Alipurduar.
According to municipal sources, the Amrut Project entails purifying water from the Nonai River in Alipurduar city and delivering it to homes. The drinking water project was initiated in 2020 at an estimated cost of Rs 102 crore.
The municipality divided the city into 5 zones for efficient implementation. While work on the reservoir and infrastructure development is progressing, the laying of pipelines has not yet commenced. Hakim emphasised the need to complete this work before March 2024.
Approximately 22,000 households across 20 wards in Alipurduar city currently face challenges in accessing municipal drinking water, relying primarily on purchased water or water from tubewells. By purifying water from the Nonai River near the city and distributing it to residents’ homes, this long-standing issue is expected to be resolved.
Chairman Prasenjit Kar of the Alipurduar Municipality stated: “The minister has urged us to swiftly submit the Detailed Project Report (DPR) for household water connections. We have already completed work on the water reservoir tank and other necessary infrastructure. Additionally, we have prepared the DPR by conducting surveys for the installation of door-to-door pipelines. The estimated cost for laying these pipelines is Rs 51 crore. All these efforts are being undertaken at a rapid pace and we anticipate that the residents of the city will have access to purified drinking water by March 2024.”