BHUBANESWAR: With drinking water supply in rural areas emerging as one of the major challenges, the State Government has decided to cover at least 35 percent rural population under the safe and sustainable piped water scheme (PWS). Official sources maintained that sustainability and water quality have emerged as two problems in rural water supply sector. The ground water estimate made in 1994 identified 43 blocks as hydrologically critical and estimation of 1999 shows two blocks, Bhograi and Baliapal, in Balasore district over-exploited with limited scope for further extraction. The ground water table has progressively declined by several metres between 1978 and 1999. The recharge of ground water is estimated at 4.78 percent of precipitation. The sustainability of source has posed a major problem ever since the water table has been observed to fall sharply in many areas due to excess and indiscriminate withdrawal. Depletion of water table has resulted in either the non-functioning of more than 35,000 drinking water wells and around 1.5 lakh irrigation wells. This has also given rise to geo-chemical changes resulting in widespread chemical contamination of ground water which was not observed in the past. The capacity of surface lakes, tanks, rivers and reservoirs has also come down due to catchment disturbances and associated human activities. Sources maintained that the per capita availability of water is estimated at 1400 cubic metres per annum. The ground water utilisation in the State has increased with 1,95,430 wells for irrigation and drinking water. The physical target for the 11th Five-Year Plan envisages covering of over 1,41,368 habitations on sustainable basis with PWS in 2136, 2,56,657 tube-wells and 8,314 sanitary wells. The State Government has decided that NGOs will be associated with planning and implementation of large-scale PWS in the State. It has been decided that the Rural Water Supply and Sanitation (RWSS) functionaries at the block level will identify villages with good sources of water that can be upgraded to PWS. The Rural Development Department will exempt 10 percent public contribution for early and timely completion of schemes. The Panchayati Raj Department has been asked to direct the gram panchayats and panchayat samitis to spend funds on identification of source and initial cost of electrification of Accelerated Rural Water Supply Programme (ARWSP) projects. The gram panchayats will operate and maintain these new projects.