Drinking water is a luxury for rural families
Water is life and every family should have easy access to safe drinking water. But for many rural families, that is not the case. Only 21% of rural households in Tamil Nadu have access to tap water connection, leaving the rest without a reliable source of water. Additionally, groundwater in over 80% of India’s districts is not fit for drinking as the concentration of fluoride, iron, salinity & arsenic exceeds tolerance levels.
Consuming unclean water disproportionately affects all aspects of life including health & nutrition, education; employment; livelihood and household savings.
Making safe drinking water affordable for all
UWC is tackling this issue by setting up community RO plants that provide high quality drinking water at affordable prices to under-served communities.
Our 360-degree network including local authorities and technical experts helps us ensure that every Community RO plant is sustainable in the long run. Implemented in partnership with the Government of Tamil Nadu, the land, water and electricity connection in every approved RO site will be provided by the respective municipal administrations.
Additionally, we charge a small user fee (Rs. 7 for 20 litre can) such that even the poorest family can afford high quality drinking water and at the same time cover all operational and maintenance costs. These include water tests, quality checks and audits, replacement of parts, operator salaries, electricity charges, etc for a period of 10 years.
Ensuring 24x7 water supply all year round
The water supplied will meet or exceed WHO guidelines and Indian IS10500 STANDARDS for drinking water.
Once the RO plant is set up, local youth / unemployed women will be identified from the community, trained and employed in the RO plant to monitor the day to day operations. Customers from the communities will be asked to register for free and provided free smart cards to access the RO facility.
The field quality engineers conduct random audits on the installations and the quality of water. The water is sampled and sent to reputed laboratories and the results are displayed at each station, whereby the consumer gets to know the quality of water he/she is drinking.
We also do real time analysis using a remote monitoring system to help track key parameters such as Customer wise water consumption and Plant wise Water consumption.
This project also includes a strong outreach programme to create awareness on health, hygiene and safe drinking water through informative and entertaining formats such as street plays, school campaigns, door to door campaigns, cleanliness drives etc.
