Technical snags hit water purification plants in schools

Anantapur: Crores of rupees invested on water purification plants in schools are going waste due to lethargic attitude of officials in running them properly and lack of timely repairs to the machinery. The villagers, the schools, mandal education officers and head masters of schools concerned and even DEO, all have a role in monitoring the plants functioning and attending to timely repairs. These plants cater to thousands of students in nearly 1,200 government schools and a lot of money had been spent in giving facelift to schools under Nadu-Nedu programme.

Nearly 740 water plants involving equal number of schools have no drinking water for children despite the government boasting of creating corporate level basic amenities in the schools. When a machine develops a technical snag, it is not immediately attended to. Nor do the head masters bother to apprise higher authorities but simply remain mum until the media focuses on it and becomes a public issue. They see the children suffering but do not look for a solution. Even if the problem is conveyed to authorities, though late, they sit over it and do not act on the complaint. When Rs 33 crore is spent by the government on installation of machinery, the authorities do not evince interest in monitoring the plants functioning. The engineering department of the Integrated Training Centre is supposed to monitor the plants functioning. Once plants are installed, the authorities think their job is over and many of the plants were not even running because of developing technical snags even before they were brought to use. The contracting agencies, who supplied the machinery had even given guarantees and warranties for an year or two but the stake holding departments do not bother.

As many as 1,140 schools were supplied the machinery but 738 of them have developed technical snags and stopped functioning even before completion of year. Only a couple of days back, District Collector Nagalakshmi Selvarajan called for constitution of a committee to inspect the status of water purification plants and submit a report. Instructions have been given by the collector to attend to repairs within a fortnight.