Meeting on Effective Implementation of Irrigation and Spring Censuses held

Bhubaneswar: It is for the first time a complete census of water resources are being conducted in the State at the instance of Ministry of Jalshakti, Department of Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation, Government of India. The censuses are undertaken through Computer Assisted Personal Interview (CAPI) and Web-based Application. This comprised of four censuses- i) 1^st Census of Major and medium Irrigation Censuses, ii) 1^st Census of springs iii) 2^nd census of water bodies, iv) 7^th census of minor irrigation census. This is a unique opportunity for the State to create a comprehensive database of all water resources in the State from the village level to the State level.For the first time this is being conducted in a coordinated and convergent manner by the Department of Water resources and Planning and convergence department. This is a unique instance of user and producers of the statistics working together for ensuring better data quality.

Smt. AnuGarg, Development Commissioner-cum-Additional Chief Secretary to Govt. of Odisha conducted a detail review of the censusprogrammes in the State. Senior officials of all the stakeholders Departments like Water Resources Department, Panchayati Raj and Drinking Water Departments, E&IT Department, Directorate of Economics and Statistics, Chief Engineer, Minor irrigation, Odisha Lift Irrigation Corporation, Central Ground Water Board, Govt. of India, State Ground water Board, Government of India participated. Besides, Superintending Engineers, Deputy Director, DPMUs  from the districts also participated.

The focus of the meeting was for effective implementation of the irrigation and spring censuses to capture quality data. DC-cum-ACS emphasized on coordinated and convergent approach of all the Stake holders for quality data collection so that a comprehensive database of all water resources can be made. This will be a comprehensive database for planning water resources of the state for irrigation, industry, pisciculture, human and animal consumption etc. It was further emphasized that at the District level, Superintending Engineer, Executive Engineer, Deputy Director, Planning and Statistics to work together for making these census operations a grand success.