Drinking water quality at Ayodhyagarh, Gaighata and Porapara


NSS has been monitoring drinking water quality at several villages over the past several months.  These villages rely on groundwater for their drinking water needs.  Water samples from four tube wells serving two schools and the tribal community of Porapara village and two shallow water wells also serving Porapara were found to be too acidic to be fit for human consumption.  Their iron concentration and bacterial load also exceeded the limits set by WHO for potability by large margins.  Iron overdose can damage internal organs such as brain and liver particularly affecting young children and bacterial loads in drinking water exposes users numerous water borne diseases and chronic malnutrition.  Although only a few villages were monitored in this assessment, experience indicates that situation in other villages adopted by NSS would also not be very different.  School going children and their families (in fact, the entire village in many cases) are continuing to rely on these water sources for their drinking water needs.







At the insistence of NSS, use of the tube well at Gaighata Primary School has been discontinued.  The school has since been connected to the piped water supply network of Sajal Dhara project of West Bengal government.  NSS has also prepared low-cost filter beds, assessed their efficacy of producing potable water over several weeks and set them up for use at the schools at Ayodhyagarh, Gaighata, Hiradihi and Nachna.  School authorities and local self-help groups at these locations have been trained to maintain, disassemble and reassemble these units to ensure the filter units remain effective in the long run.  The findings of this assessment has been circulated among school authorities and Panchayat members to help develop a sustainable water treatment strategy in this area.



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