Panaji: Minister for Department of Drinking Water Subhash Phal Dessai on Thursday said around 40% of the population in Goa will receive potable water for 18 hours per day, while rest of the population will be supplied water for an average of 12 hours daily in the next six months with the commissioning of a 325 MLD (million litres per day) water treatment plant.
Phal Dessai, who was recently allocated the new portfolio, took a review of water management and said the new water treatment plant will help the government to further improve the supply of water in the state.
Phal Dessai said he has instructed the executive engineers concerned and the superintendent engineers to work out a plan for providing potable water to every household in the state for 12-18 hours a day.
According to him, currently only 9% of the state’s population receives water for less than four hours a day, while 45% of the people get supply for around 8 hours a day. He said around 24% of the population presently receives 24-hour water supply.
“I will hold the next review meet in 15 days to check what action has been taken by the engineers concerned to improve the supply of potable water to households,” Phal Dessai said.
Stating that nearly 40% of Goa’s drinking water supply is lost as non-revenue leakage, the minister attributed the leakages to old pipelines. He said there are 526 water tanks in the state and he proposes to install water flow meters to keep a check on the distribution of water supply.
“This will be a costly affair. But I will talk to Chief Minister Pramod Sawant on this proposal. We will also try to obtain funds from the Centre as well as explore the possibility of using funds from the 16th Finance Commission for this purpose,”he said.
