Workshop Strengthens Community Engagement in Rural Water Supply Under Jan Bhagidari

The workshop comprised eight thematic break-out sessions facilitated by RWPF partners, State IEC teams and thematic officers.

The Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation (DDWS), under the Ministry of Jal Shakti, organised a one-day workshop of the Rural WASH Partners’ Forum (RWPF) on “Communication and PRA Tools to Promote Community Engagement (Jan Bhagidari)” at the SCOPE Complex in New Delhi. The event drew senior leadership from the water, sanitation and rural governance sectors, alongside state and Union territory representatives, development partners and civil society organisations.

Present at the workshop were the Union Minister for Jal Shakti, C.R. Patil; Secretary of DDWS, Ashok K.K. Meena; Additional Secretary & Mission Director of the National Jal Jeevan Mission (NJJM), Kamal Kishore Soan; Joint Secretary – NJJM, Swati Meena Naik; Joint Secretary & Mission Director of the Swachh Bharat Mission (Grameen), Aishvarya Singh; and senior officials from DDWS, the Central Ground Water Board (CGWB), India Meteorological Department (IMD), the National Water Informatics Centre (NWIC), the Bhaskaracharya National Institute for Space Applications & Geo‑informatics (BISAG-N), and the National Remote Sensing Centre (NRSC), along with representatives of States/UTs and RWPF partners.

Launch of Key Digital & Community Tools

During the inaugural session, Minister C.R. Patil formally unveiled several flagship initiatives aimed at strengthening community-centric water governance and communications, including:

• A Decision Support System (DSS) for Source Sustainability, which integrates layers such as rainfall, groundwater level, slope, drainage, aquifer mapping, recharge potential, land-use/cover, and water-quality datasets — presently operational in 234 districts and planned for nationwide roll-out this year.

• The newly launched JJM Panchayat Dashboard, accessible via the e-Gram Swaraj portal, enabling Gram Panchayats real-time access to data on water supply status, quality monitoring, asset tagging and community participation.

• The first episode of the community radio programme, “Swachh Sujal Gaon Ki Kahani: Radio Ki Zubani”, broadcast across 100 stations in 13 national and 34 local dialects, designed to promote rural engagement in WASH (Water, Sanitation & Hygiene) through storytelling, quizzes and local‐language dialogue.

• The Handbook “Jan Bhagidari se Har Ghar Jal” on Community-Managed Piped Water Systems in Rural India — a comprehensive guide for Gram Panchayats, Village Water & Sanitation Committees (VWSCs), SHGs and community leaders on commissioning, hand-over, operation & maintenance of rural piped water supplies, with emphasis on community ceremonies like “Jal Arpan”, “Jal Bandhan” and “Jal Utsav”.

Key Addresses: Emphasising Jan Bhagidari and Digital-Community Linkages

In his address, Minister Patil said that the missions of WASH in rural India — namely the Swachh Bharat Mission (Grameen) and Jal Jeevan Mission — embody the Prime Minister’s vision that “Jan Bhagidari se hi Jan Kalyan sambhav hai”. He highlighted that over nine crore rural women have been relieved of the burden of fetching water, and that according to WHO estimates, rural India can save some 5.5 crore person-hours every day — thereby enhancing productivity and women’s participation in the workforce. He also pointed to the “Jal Sanchay Jan Bhagidari” initiative focusing on groundwater recharge, rain-water harvesting and bore-well rejuvenation to ensure long-term water sustainability.

Secretary Meena stressed that “Jan Bhagidari” is the very philosophy of the Jal Jeevan Mission. He said the programme has been designed as a bottom-up model built on community ownership, local decision-making and sustainability. “People are not beneficiaries; they are guardians of their water systems,” he emphasised. He added that communication and behaviour change form key pillars for transforming participation into tangible outcomes, and that technology and transparency are twin pillars of the next phase of rural water governance.

Focus on New Tools and Community-Led Planning

Source Sustainability through DSS – The DSS has been developed to help district authorities and states plan interventions for source sustainability by assimilating multi-layer data. Datasets include rainfall (CGWB), water levels, slope (BISAG-N), drainage/aquifers (NWIC), recharge-potential zones (CGWB), land-use/cover (NRSC/NWIC), and water-quality (CGWB). Next-phase enhancements will include springshed data, criticality assessments of sources, artificial-recharge structures, and district-level rainfall data from IMD and agriculture departments. The revised guidelines under MGNREGA mandate dedicated expenditure for groundwater recharge, source protection and rain-water harvesting — thus aligning water-resource planning with rural employment and convergence.

Empowering Panchayats via Dashboard – The JJM Panchayat Dashboard now allows Gram Panchayats to log-in (67,273 Sarpanch & Panchayat Secretaries have done so) through the e-Gram Swaraj portal. Through the dashboard they can:

• Provide real-time updates on water supply status, quality monitoring and community participation.

• View pipelines and assets tagged under PM Gati Shakti National Master Plan.

• Update Water-Supply Operator details.

• Access IEC material, water-quality data and lists of women trained in Field-Test-Kit (FTK) testing.

Community Radio & Handbook for Grass-roots Engagement – The “Swachh Sujal Gaon Ki Kahani” radio series represents a vital step to connect with rural audiences in local languages, enabling participatory dialogue, listener-quizzes and community storytelling. The Handbook “Jan Bhagidari se Har Ghar Jal” lays out structured protocols for commissioning rural piped-water systems, hand-over to community involvement, the role of the Village Water & Sanitation Committee (VWSC), and the recourse mechanism via District Technical Units (DTUs). Symbolic community events like “Jal Arpan”, “Jal Bandhan” and “Jal Utsav” are designed to convert ownership transfer into a collective celebration, reinforcing the idea of shared responsibility and pride.

Break-Out Sessions & Collaborative Tool-Creation

The workshop comprised eight thematic break-out sessions facilitated by RWPF partners, State IEC teams and thematic officers. The themes included:

1. Functionality assessment and service-delivery

2. Source sustainability and protection

3. Commissioning and hand-over protocols

4. Preventive maintenance and grievance redressal

5. VWSC enterprise models

6. Safe-water awareness and trust-building

7. Grey-water management

8. Promoting Jan Bhagidari through local celebrations like Lok Jal Utsav

In the concluding plenary, partners presented outcomes of the sessions. Joint Secretary Swati Meena Naik noted that the PRA (Participatory Rural Appraisal) tools discussed are initial steps toward decentralising implementation, strengthening local governance and embedding community participation for efficient and sustainable piped-water services.

Way Forward: Translating Policy into Practice

Additional Secretary & Mission Director Kamal Kishore Soan urged participants to carry forward the spirit of Jan Bhagidari — reminding that the Jal Jeevan Mission is a people’s movement built on trust, participation and purpose. He emphasised that the newly launched tools — the handbook, DSS, Panchayat Dashboard and radio series — must now translate into tangible field-level outcomes. The vote of thanks by Deputy Secretary Umesh Bhardwaj reaffirmed DDWS’s commitment to “Jan Bhagidari se Har Ghar Jal”, ensuring every drop delivered to every home is sustained through community participation and shared responsibility.

Implications for Rural WASH & Governance

• The workshop signals a shift from infrastructure-led delivery to community-led governance, emphasising ownership, transparency and accountability.

• The integration of digital tools (DSS, Dashboard) with grassroots communication (radio, handbook) reflects a hybrid model combining high-tech and high-touch approaches.

• Convergence with MGNREGA and other rural-employment programmes underscores the inter-linkage of water-source sustainability with livelihoods, climate resilience and rural governance.

• Emphasis on participatory tools, local celebrations and symbolic community rituals aims to embed water governance into village culture, not just as a service but as a shared civic commitment.

• The approach models a decentralised, responsible institutional ecosystem: Gram Panchayat/VWSC → DTU → DWSM → SWSM, supported by digital data and community communication.

The one-day RWPF workshop organised by DDWS has laid the groundwork for a renewed phase of the Jal Jeevan Mission — one in which community engagement, communication tools and participatory governance take centre-stage. With innovative launches like the DSS for source sustainability, Panchayat Dashboard, community radio series, and the community-handbook, the Mission offers a clear pathway from household tap-connections to enduring, sustainable governance of rural water supply — truly realising the promise of Jan Bhagidari se Har Ghar Jal. The coming task will be translating these promising tools into action across the field, thereby transforming rural water supply from an infrastructure project into a living, local movement.