Agartala, July 17 (TIWN): Around seventy distant tribal habitations of the state are suffering from acute drinking water crisis with no initiatives to provide safe drinking water from the government, sources said. The source added that over 3,792 habitations of the state are partially covered by drinking water supply system, indicating spot sourcing or Deep Tube Wells which still leaves a mark of question on the purification of the drinking water.

The state government adopted an ambitious plan earlier this year in January to cover all habitations under permanent safe drinking water supply network. A total of 131 habitations were out of the safe drinking water supply at the time. While sixty new habitations were brought under the cover of drinking water supply in the meanwhile, around seventy are still waiting for their turn. The plan was apparently to complete drinking water supply to all habitations by May this year.

The state is currently having a total of 8,132 identified habitations out of which the government claims to have covered 4,368 habitations fully by safe drinking water supply. Unofficial sources said the figure of uncovered habitations would cross 5,000.

In the dry spell and heavy rains, Dasda, Manu and Chowmanu block in North Tripura district and Hezamara block in West Tripura district are usually worst hit by the crisis of safe drinking water supply.

A highly placed source in the Department for Drinking Water and Sanitation (DWS) today said that the department was considering to incorporate an Iron Removal Plant (IRP) with every scheme relating to safe drinking water. Asked about possibilities of other pollutants in the water, the source said that minimal amounts of fluoride and arsenic were found in few pockets of the state. He assured that toxicity levels from these elements is far below from alarming.