Chhattisgarh’s Deputy Chief Minister Arun Sao stated in the Vidhan Sabha on Tuesday that the previous Congress government falsified data regarding household tap water connections. While the official portal indicated that 36 lakh households had a water supply by December 2023, only 21 million had actually received it, he said.
Sao was responding to a question raised by former chief minister and incumbent MLA from Patan, Bhupesh Baghel, on the slow implementation of the Jal Jeevan Mission in the state during the BJP rule since December 2023.
Baghel said that the BJP government has failed to meet its target of supplying water to 49.98 lakh homes. “In 2022-2023 and 2023-2024, during our rule, we allocated Rs 4,200 crore and Rs 5,374 crore respectively, and after your double-engine sarkar came, the budget came down to Rs 3,500 crore. Why did the budget come down when you are not able to meet your target?”
Sao alleged that the Jal Jeevan Mission data was fudged to show 15 lakh additional households received water supply in Chhattisgarh during Baghel’s term. “The government of India has an IMIS portal where data has to be uploaded regarding work done on tap water connections. To show progress of work till December 2023, it was shown that 36 lakh households received tap water connection, but there was no verification done to find out if these households received water or not. Just statistics were shown. In June 2024, when we did verification, we found out that only 21 lakh households received water supply. In 15 lakh households, only a tap connection was given, but no water supply was provided. This was because you (the Congress government) took two years to start work on tubewells. But we are counting only those households where water supply has been provided. The mission was to complete in 2024, but now the central government has extended it.”
Responding to Sao, Baghel said, “You say that 21 lakh households received water supply till December 2023. As per your reply, in these 20 months, you provided water supply only to 10 lakh households, claiming the triple-engine sarkar is working fast. Now the question is whether these 10 lakh households have received water supply or this data is false too.”
The issue led to a fracas in the assembly, with Congress MLAs saying the government scheme has not been implemented properly. Congress MLAs staged a walkout when Sao did not reply to a question on how many households received water supply till date this year.
