A study by international institutes, led by the Sanford School of Public Policy and the Duke Global Health Institute, has found that the drinking water of nearly 90 per cent of households in rural Andhra Pradesh is contaminated by faecal bacteria. There are 71,540 habitations in the state, accounting for 534.35 lakh rural population. The paper titled The effect of water quality testing on household behaviour: Evidence from an experiment in rural India was published in the journal of the National Institute of Biotechnology Informa-tion, Maryland, US, in July. The study has been assisted by the Network for Engineering and Econo-mics Research and Mana-gement, Mumbai; and the Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab, South Asia, New Delhi.
“We randomly split a sample of households in rural AP. The treatment group observed a contamination test of drinking water in their own household storage vessel. The drinking water of 90 per cent tested households showed evidence of faecal bacteria,” the study notes. Earlier studies have proved that water-borne diseases, caused by the faecal contamination of drinking water, are a major health hazard in the state. The state government is not willing to take responsibility on the basis that this is due to the lack of hygiene in households.
Rural water supplies minister K. Jana Reddy says the government is providing potable water: He explain-ed: “We are covering around 44,000 villages in the state under various piped water schemes. We are spending Rs 3,000 crore to improve the situation.” Rural Water Supply (RWS) Scheme chief chemist A. Satish argues: “The faecal contamination occurs during storage due to poor water handling. The personal hygiene of the individuals is resulting in this.” However, RWS chief engineer R. Chakrapani says he has never come across any case of faecal contamination. He claimed: “We have 51 labs across the state and lift 4 lakh samples every year to test them. We haven’t come across any such cases of faecal contamination.”