Making villages secure for drinking water and waste management facilities

In rural communities, it is critical to ensure access to clean and safe drinking water as well as effective waste management for the overall well-being of residents. Under this project, it is proposed to work with 50 villages in 3 blocks (namely Mokhada, Dahanu, and Palghar) of the Palghar District of Maharashtra to develop and implement both -  a water security action plan and a waste management plan. The identification of potential activities will be based on stakeholder consultations with the Gram Panchayat (GP) officials, local communities, and the HDFC team.

The key activities will include:

a) an assessment and action plan for drinking water security and waste management,

b) implementation of projects for drinking water security and waste management in villages. This will also include rainwater harvesting for communities and institutions, revival of shallow wells/groundwater recharge structures, mini piped water schemes, water quality surveillance, digital monitoring system and waste treatment facilities for segregated waste at cluster of villages, and

c) support for scaling up at the state/district level through capacity building, strengthening of GPs, and setting up monitoring systems at the state/district/block levels. The overall approach would be to provide technical support to GPs, district, division, and state nodal offices to secure villages' drinking water and ensure sustainable waste management facilities. This will be done through the demonstration of selected projects and a series of capacity-building efforts. 

The project objective is to provide safe and equitable water and waste management services by providing technical support, building capacities of local stakeholders, including local government and communities, and strengthening planning, implementation, and monitoring systems.