Jaipur, September 15.  Chief Minister, Smt. Vasundhara Raje directed that the projects related to water conservation and creation of water grid should be completed in a time bound manner. She said that for success of such projects, involvement of public at large is extremely important. For this, a large scale awareness campaign with participation of public representatives shall be launched soon.

Smt. Raje was speaking at a high level review meeting on works being carried out in the Mahi and Chambal River basins under the ambitious project of inter-linking of river basins.

She directed that the project should be expanded to cover the entire State in the phased manner so that the problem of water scarcity could be tackled.  She further directed the officials to explore the possibility of generating electricity from these projects.

The Chief Minister emphasized on the importance of wide coverage and timely execution and said that a team of experts would soon join and assist the government in these areas. She instructed that the employees of Watershed Projects should not be employed in any other work.

Water conservation expert, Shri Sriram Vidre, presented the progress report on the works being carried out in the Mahi and Chambal River basins. Shri Harnath Jagawat of the N.M. Sadguru Water & Development Foundation briefed the gathering about check dams, anicuts, water reservoirs, community lift irrigation projects executed by his organisation in the tribal and remote areas of Rajasthan and Gujarat.

The meeting was attended by Rural Development & Panchayati Raj Minister, Shri Gulab Chand Kataria, Water Resources Minister, Shri Sanwar Lal Jat, Agriculture Minister, Shri Prabhu Lal Saini and Energy Minister, Shri Gajendra Singh Khiwsar. The team of officials present included Chief Secretary, Shri Rajiv Mahershi, Additional Secretaries, Shri C.S. Rajan, Shri Ashok Sampatram and Shri O.P. Meena. Secretaries of  Water Resources and Power departments alongwith Commissioner, Panchayati Raj were also present in the meeting.