How Odisha achieved the seemingly impossible feat of ‘Water for All’

‘Jal Sathis’. Photograph: Shagun / CSE

…I strongly believed that enhancing the function of water displays, who had already been chosen from the native communities and skilled and who functioned as a part of the grassroots-level groups, would give higher outcomes.

Thus, the thought of Jal Sathis was born as an improved and upgraded model of water displays. Since then, Jal Sathis have crammed the hole in the neighborhood join and are appearing as a bridge between the customers and the PHEO.

With applicable orientation and coaching, Jal Sathis have been offering higher consumer-friendly companies as a result of they hail from the local people and are extra accountable to their very own neighborhood.

Girls are hit the toughest when there’s a water drawback at residence as a result of, since time immemorial they’ve been answerable for fetching water for all family wants. Entry to wash and secure water at residence results in ladies’s empowerment as ladies would now not must trudge miles and spend hours to fetch water, so we thought it might be most applicable to have ladies as companions in ingesting water distribution administration on the habitation degree.

Odisha has a robust legacy of girls empowerment, with the Mission Shakti14 initiative spearheading the ladies’s SHG motion for the final twenty years. CM Naveen Patnaik has at all times believed that until ladies are given a voice and their rightful function in each facet of life, society and the state can’t progress.

Impressed by his imaginative and prescient, in 2001, we federated the block-level and district-level SHGs in Ganjam district and I organized the primary ladies’s SHG conference because the collector and invited Naveen Patnaik who had simply accomplished one yr as CM.

At this time, we have now many energetic and dynamic ladies SHGs and their federations in city areas all through the state. By the point we began upgrading the water displays to Jal Sathis, the state authorities had already engaged ladies SHGs for the gathering of electrical energy dues, paddy procurement and noon meal preparation actions beneath its Mission Shakti programme.

The H&UDD, by ULBs, has additionally began partnering with Mission Shakti Teams (MSGs) in a number of areas, notably within the sanitation sector (strong waste administration [SWM] and faecal sludge administration), and achieved impactful outcomes. The MSGs have been efficiently managing city-level septage therapy and SWM services protecting the complete state.

This emboldened us to go for a sturdy engagement with Jal Sathis with increased roles and duties. We had already examined the effectiveness of the motivation system in different sectors of city governance, so we adopted the identical method with the Jal Sathi mannequin and outlined quantifiable efficiency deliverables and related incentives.

After we determined to interact Jal Sathis throughout the state to operate as an prolonged arm of the PHEO, we thought it essential to set out the guiding rules governing the partnership. A typical working process (SOP) was laid down, which detailed the roles and duties of Jal Sathis and the defining rules of the partnership, to deliver readability to the alliance between the PHEO and Jal Sathis.

The SOP particulars all of the features of the Jal Sathi programme: programme targets, businesses supporting the implementation, implementation technique, standards for collection of Jal Sathis, capability constructing, roles and duties of Jal Sathis and the supporting businesses, dos and don’ts, incentives, and many others.

On 18 December 2019, Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik formally launched the Jal Sathi initiative in a state-level occasion organized to start water costs assortment by Jal Sathis from the buyer’s doorstep utilizing a cell level of sale (MPoS) system machine. By paying the water costs for his residence, Naveen Niwas, and getting a receipt by the MPoS machine from a Jal Sathi on the occasion, the CM grew to become the primary shopper to avail of the Jal Sathi service.

The Jal Sathis at the moment are the go-to individuals for customers in municipal wards throughout the 115 cities within the state for water supply-related issues. Their duties vary from testing water high quality on the shopper’s finish to studying the meter, invoice technology, supply, assortment of water costs, facilitating complaints redressal and, above all, managing buyer relations.

The facilitation function initially performed by water displays has matured right into a deeper and extra intense function as Jal Sathis, and so they have now grow to be the pillars of the city ingesting water administration system in Odisha.

The Jal Sathi initiative that began in Bhubaneswar has reached all ULBs throughout the state, with greater than 900 Jal Sathis until August 2022. The collection of Jal Sathis from the ladies SHGs and their federations is finished by a clear course of by the involved municipalities, and a memorandum of understanding (MoU) is signed between the PHEO and the group/federation.

Every Jal Sathi is assigned a clearly specified geographical space of a number of wards with a number of hundred connections having a mixture of residential, business and institutional customers to make sure that an honest earnings is earned by every Jal Sathi.

The Jal Sathis are supplied with a uniform to put on whereas on obligation, an ID card, a shoulder bag containing the MPoS machine, a water-testing equipment and registers. They’re additionally skilled within the technical expertise required to discharge their features together with smooth expertise for buyer relationship administration earlier than their deployment within the area. Jal Sathis are incentivized handsomely for his or her companies within the water provide administration chain.

…

The Jal Sathi initiative in Odisha is an exemplar of the effectiveness of neighborhood partnerships. Jal Sathis have been chosen from the local people and skilled to offer customer-friendly companies. They grew to become the primary pillars of the city ingesting water administration system, resulting in improved water provide administration that achieved 100 per cent HCs and improved income assortment. The initiative has offered financial and social empowerment to ladies in Odisha and proved to be a transformative step in water provide service supply.

Involving neighborhood members can foster a way of possession and accountability in them, leading to sustainable success. Moreover, neighborhood engagement may help construct belief and strengthen relationships between the federal government and the local people, resulting in efficient collaboration in different sectors too.

Excerpted with permission from People First: How Odisha’s Drink from Tap Mission Quenched Every Thirst by G Mathi Vathanan. @2024Rupa Publications