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Opinion: How PM Modi's Jal Jeevan Mission Became A Boon For India's Poorest Villages
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The Jal Jeevan Mission is more than a water supply programme — it's a lifeline for India's poorest villages, redefining rural life with dignity, health, and opportunity
jal jeevanIn rural India, where the rhythm of life has long been dictated by the daily struggle to fetch water, Prime Minister Narendra Modi's Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM), launched on August 15, 2019, has emerged as a transformative force.
Envisioned as a movement to deliver safe and reliable tap water to every rural household by 2024, JJM is not just about water—it's about dignity, health, and opportunity.
With a staggering outlay of Rs 3.6 lakh crore, this flagship initiative reflects PM Modi's unwavering commitment to uplifting India's poorest villages, addressing a challenge that should have been tackled decades ago but required his visionary zeal to become reality.
The Vision and Objective of Jal Jeevan Mission
The thought behind JJM stems from a deep understanding of rural India's water crisis, where millions, especially women and children, spend hours daily fetching water from distant rivers, wells, or ponds. PM Modi, drawing from his experience as Gujarat's Chief Minister, where he prioritised water conservation through initiatives such as the Jal Mandir campaign, recognised that access to clean water is foundational to development. JJM's objective is ambitious yet clear: to provide Functional Household Tap Connections (FHTCs) to all 19.36 crore rural households, ensuring 55 litres per capita per day of safe drinking water. Beyond infrastructure, the mission promotes source sustainability through rainwater harvesting, greywater management, and community-driven water governance via Village Water and Sanitation Committees (VWSCs). By aligning with Sustainable Development Goal 6.1, JJM aims to bridge the rural-urban divide, empower communities, and transform lives by freeing them from the drudgery of water collection.
Since its inception, JJM has made remarkable strides, transforming water access from a distant dream to a tangible reality. As of October 2024, over 15.5 crore rural households—80.39% of the total—have tap water connections, up from just 3.23 crore (17%) in 2019. This translates to an average of 85,000 households connected daily, a testament to the mission's relentless pace. Eleven states and Union Territories—Goa, Andaman and Nicobar Islands, Dadra and Nagar Haveli, Gujarat, Haryana, Telangana, Puducherry, Punjab, Himachal Pradesh, Arunachal Pradesh, and Mizoram—have achieved 100% coverage, setting a benchmark for others. In aspirational districts, home to some of India's poorest communities, tap connections have risen from 31 lakh to 1.16 crore, with 123 districts and 1.53 lakh villages now fully covered.
However, progress is uneven. States like Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Rajasthan and Kerala lag significantly behind the national average. Challenges in these states include uneven terrain, scattered habitations, groundwater contamination, and delays in state funding. To address these, the government has intensified monitoring, with technical support from UNOPS and Denmark in water-scarce regions like Bundelkhand and Vindhya. Despite these hurdles, JJM's focus on prioritising difficult terrains (30% funding weightage) and SC/ST-dominated areas (10% weightage) ensures that the poorest and most remote communities are not left behind.
A Boon for Hilly Areas
In India's hilly regions, where geography poses unique challenges, JJM has been a game-changer. In states like Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand, and Ladakh, the mission has overcome rugged terrain and seasonal water shortages to deliver tap water.
For instance, Leh in Ladakh achieved 100% household coverage by October 2024, with winter-proof pipelines preventing freezing—a critical adaptation for high-altitude areas.
In Himachal Pradesh and Uttarakhand, 31,371 households across 320 villages now have FHTCs, reducing the time spent fetching water from distant sources. Women in these regions, who once navigated treacherous paths to collect water, now benefit from doorstep access, saving hours daily. Community-driven initiatives, supported by organizations like Himmotthan Society, have trained locals to maintain water infrastructure, ensuring sustainability despite climatic barriers. These efforts demonstrate JJM's ability to tailor solutions to the unique needs of hilly areas, bringing dignity and ease to remote communities.
Enhancing Rural Life: Education, Health, and Beyond
The ripple effects of JJM extend far beyond water access, reshaping education, health, and socio-economic conditions in rural India. By providing tap water to 15.5 crore households, the mission has freed women and girls from the backbreaking task of fetching water, which previously consumed hours daily—40 minutes one way in Jharkhand, 33 in Bihar, and 38 in Uttar Pradesh. In Tripura, 95% of women and adolescent girls reported relief from this drudgery, allowing them to pursue education and livelihoods.
An SBI Research report notes an 8.3% decline in households fetching water outside, correlating with a 7.4% increase in women's participation in agriculture, with states like Bihar and Assam seeing over 28% growth in female workforce engagement. This shift empowers women financially and redefines gender roles, fostering independence and dignity.
Health outcomes have also improved dramatically. JJM's focus on water quality, through Field Testing Kits and Iron Removal Plants in high-contamination areas like Tripura, has reduced waterborne diseases by 93% in some regions. In Leh, disease incidence dropped from 4% to 1.3%, while Karnataka villages reported lower healthcare costs due to cleaner water. Schools, too, have benefited from the scheme: 12 states have achieved 100% tap water coverage in schools, ensuring better hygiene and reducing absenteeism, particularly among girls. These improvements enhance educational outcomes and create healthier, more productive communities.
Economically, JJM stimulates rural growth by fostering local ownership through VWSCs, with over 50% women members in Assam and Tripura. Awareness campaigns, such as 560 training sessions in Karnataka and tariff collection in Leh and Himachal Pradesh, ensure long-term sustainability. By reducing time spent on water collection, JJM unlocks opportunities for income-generating activities, positioning India's rural economy to grow from 2% to 8% of the global space market by 2033.
PM Modi's Visionary Zeal: A Long-Overdue Revolution
The success of JJM reflects Prime Minister Modi's visionary zeal and unrelenting drive to execute transformative change on a war footing. Decades ago, India's rural water crisis should have been addressed, but it languished under leaders disconnected from the ground realities of village life. PM Modi, shaped by his experiences in drought-prone Gujarat, understood the 'agony of life without water".
His insistence on decentralization—empowering Gram Panchayats and Pani Samitis with over ₹2.25 lakh crore—has made JJM a village-driven, women-led movement. The mission's scale, covering 600,000 villages and connecting 85,000 households daily, is unprecedented, surpassing seven decades of prior efforts in just five years.
PM Modi's personal commitment is evident in his words: 'The value of water is understood by those who face scarcity." By prioritising water as a national mission, he has turned a basic need into a catalyst for social revolution. The Jal Jeevan Mission App and Water Quality Monitoring Framework ensure transparency, while partnerships with states, UNOPS, and Denmark amplify impact. This resolve, coupled with innovative solutions like IoT-based sensors and climate-resilient infrastructure, positions JJM as a global model for sustainable development. What should have happened generations ago took PM Modi's will to transform rhetoric into reality, ensuring no rural family is left behind.
A Legacy of Transformation
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The Jal Jeevan Mission is more than a water supply programme —it's a lifeline for India's poorest villages, redefining rural life with dignity, health, and opportunity. From the hills of Ladakh to the plains of Assam, JJM has delivered tap water to 15.5 crore households, empowered women, reduced disease, and unlocked educational and economic potential. While challenges remain in laggard states, the mission's progress—driven by PM Modi's visionary leadership—sets a new standard for public welfare. As India moves toward universal water access, JJM stands as a testament to what is possible when a nation unites with purpose, proving that clean water is not just a resource but a foundation for a brighter, more equitable future.
The writer is a well-known author and national spokesperson of BJP. Views expressed in the above piece are personal and solely those of the author. They do not necessarily reflect News18's views.
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New Delhi, India, India
First Published:
August 13, 2025, 20:00 IST
News opinion Opinion: How PM Modi's Jal Jeevan Mission Became A Boon For India's Poorest Villages
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