Jal Jeevan Mission promotes innovations and R&D

The Technical Committee constituted in the Department of Drinking Water & Sanitation, Ministry of Jal Shakti in its last meeting considered 6 innovation proposals and 8 R&D proposals and they would now be considered for listing in the innovation portal of the Department. The recommendations by the Committee would help the States/ UTs to use these technologies depending on their requirement and suitability.

Since August 2019, Government of India is implementing Jal Jeevan Mission in partnership with States to make provision of tap water supply to every rural home of the country by 2024. To realize the goal of the mission with ‘speed and scale’, amidst the diverse challenges that are encountered, require innovative technological solutions.

To assist the implementation agencies, a Technical Committee under the chairmanship of Principal Scientific Advisor to Government of India has been constituted under Jal Jeevan Mission to identify new technologies and select high end R&D proposals for funding. The Committee has representatives from Scientific Departments of Government of India, IITs, State Governments, NITI Aayog, NGOs and UNICEF.

The Committee was set up in October 2019 and despite CoVid-19 pandemic and other constraints, the Committee has met four times so far. It considered 114 innovative technologies and 84 R&D proposals and has accepted 10 innovative technologies and 2 R&D proposals for funding. The fourth meeting of the Technical Committee was held on 27th August, 2021 during which, it considered 6 innovation proposals and 8 R&D proposals. One of the R&D proposals considered in the meeting was undertaking IoT based monitoring of drinking water quantity and quality in rural drinking water systems in different parts of the country. The proposal was presented by different CSIR labs coming together as partners.

The National Jal Jeevan Mission has two separate portals each for recognition of innovations and funding R&D proposals in drinking water and sanitation sector. Companies/ technology service providers desirous of getting their innovation accepted by the Committee can upload them in the innovation portal. Similarly R&D proposals from young innovators, researchers, academia, entrepreneurs, start-ups working in this sector including action research proposals for adopting evidence-based technical intervention to manage rural water supply efficiently, effectively and economically can be uploaded in the R&D portal of the mission.

The innovative technologies approved are in the areas of decentralised and packaged sewage treatment, treatment of grey water and black water using a combination of green plants and bacterial culture, drinking water disinfection using auto-chlorination, IoT based electric vehicle for delivery of drinking water to households, water quality measurement kits using photometry and IoT based AI/ ML driven on-line water quality monitoring and disinfection. Under the R&D proposals, one was on to develop an inexpensive hand-held user-friendly device to produce quality drinking water in an emergency such as a flood and can be used to directly convert contaminated floodwater into potable water. The other was on demonstration of a technology for remediating community well water contaminated with an emerging & endocrine disrupting micro pollutant, Perchlorate in the State of Kerala.

The National Jal Jeevan Mission consolidates all the accepted innovations and shares the same with State Governments for consideration and adopting them. It is uploaded in the innovation portal giving wide publicity and recognition. At times, State Governments while seeking innovative solutions for the challenges faced, mention in their request for proposals that innovative technologies approved by the Technical Committee would be given preference. The results of the R&D studies would be shared with the States for pilot scale implementation followed by large scale deployment.

With focus on leveraging the use of technology for assured service delivery, the National Jal Jeevan Mission encourages young entrepreneurs, institutions, start-ups to upload their technologies/ seek funding for R&D in the frontier areas for filling the knowledge gap. The proposals can be uploaded in the portal using the following web links.

For innovative technologies acceptance: https://ejalshakti.gov.in/misc/home.aspx

For R&D funding: https://ejalshakti.gov.in/misc/RndDProject/ProjectLogin.aspx