Counting Every Drop

“Rural families trekking miles for drinking water in scorching summers, Chellanam’s anxious residents bracing for rains, endless queues of tankers supplying water to pilgrims at Sabarimala—these distressing scenes are fading as Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan’s decade in office draws to a close. These transformative measures reflect a government committed to people’s welfare, rising above politics.”

-Roshy Augustine
Minister for Water Resources

The Kerala Water Authority has grown into an institution that supplies drinking water to approximately 2.58 crore people in the state through 853 clean water supply projects, 45.73 lakh household connections and 90,492 public taps. Water treatment plants with a daily production capacity of 4,283 million litres are operational across the state. The Kerala Water Authority has been able to provide 27 lakh new drinking water connections in the last five years alone. The Water Authority has been able to achieve significant progress in the drinking water supply sector and sewage treatment sector through various schemes like Jal Jeevan Mission, AMRUT, KIIFB, State Scheme, ADB, NABARD, RKI.

Jal Jeevan Mission
Through the Jal Jeevan Mission and the AMRUT scheme, comprehensive plans have been envisaged to provide drinking water connections to all the households in the rural and urban areas of the state. In the four years since the Jal Jeevan Mission project began operating in the state, more than 21 lakh connections have been provided. As of December 2025, 38.81 lakh households have been provided with drinking water connections. Although the Central Government has envisaged a daily per capita water availability of 55 litres through the Jal Jeevan Mission project, the projects are being implemented with a daily per capita water availability of 100 litres in the state.
Through the Jal Jeevan Mission project, more than half of the rural households in the state have been provided with drinking water connections. As of December 2025, 120 panchayats in Kerala have already achieved 100 percent drinking water availability. 9 assembly constituencies have also achieved 100 percent drinking water availability. More than 50 percent connections have been provided in 7 districts.

The construction of the Rs 1243 crore Meenachil-Malankara project, the largest drinking water project in the history of the Kerala Water Authority, has begun.

Micro Irrigation
The K.M. Mani Micro Irrigation Project has been launched in 11 places in various districts of Kerala. Social micro irrigation projects have been completed in Karadippara (Rs. 3.10 crore) in Palakkad district, Moonkilmada (Rs. 6.79 crore), Valiyeri (Rs. 3.88 crore), Navitankulam (Rs. 3.00 crore), Kunnamkattupathi (Rs. 5.21 crore), and Athichal – Mundankolli (Rs. 2.65 crore) in Wayanad district using the Rebuild Kerala Initiative financial assistance.
The construction of K.M. Mani Community Micro Irrigation Projects is progressing at Pazhayannur in Thrissur district (2 crore), Thirumarady in Ernakulam district (5.27 crore), Seethathode in Pathanamthitta district (2.85 crore), Vandanmedu (3.10 crore), Kamakshi (3.23 crore), Kamakshi-2 (2 crore), Kalvary Mount (9.91 crore) in Idukki district and Kanjiramoozhi in Kozhikode district (5.08 crore).

Coastal Protection
The coastal protection project carried out at Chellanam using tetrapod technology at a cost of Rs. 344 crore is now a model for the entire state of Kerala. The first phase of the project has been completed. The second phase, which is six kilometers long, has been approved at a cost of Rs. 4046 crore. The fear of coastal residents being washed away by the sea is being eradicated forever. Apart from coastal protection, this has also helped in a big jump in the tourism sector.
10 hot spots have been identified along the 560 km long coastline in nine districts of the state. Government measures have helped in reducing the impact by building defences using tetrapods and geotubes in the coastal areas.
Construction of embankments envisaged for coastal protection in Alappuzha district: from Kattoor to Omanapuzha, from Kakkazham to Punnapra in Ambalappuzha constituency, and Pathiyankara, Arattupuzha and Vattachal in Haripad constituency (184 crores). 78% of the specified project has been completed.

Drinking Water to Sabarimala
The fact that drinking water was supplied to Sabarimala pilgrims through the Nilakkal-Seethathode drinking water project through a pipeline is another example of the government’s social commitment. During the first Sabarimala Mandala-Makaravilakku pilgrimage season after the project was launched, only 1890 kilolitres of water had to be supplied through tanker lorries. During the last Mandala season, 1.02 lakh kilolitres of water was supplied through tanker lorries. During this pilgrimage season, 1.17 lakh kilolitres of water reached Nilakkal through the distribution line. Due to this, the Travancore Devaswom Board was able to save Rs. 3.54 crore during this pilgrimage season.
4.69 lakh kilolitres of water was supplied through pipelines to Pampa and Neelimala. Adding 1.17 lakh kilolitres of water from Nilakkal, a total of 5.87 lakh kiloliters of drinking water was supplied to Sabarimala during this pilgrimage season.

Digitalisation
All the services of the Water Authority have been made online. Quick Pay system has been introduced to pay drinking water charges online. Online payment facility has been made available for water quality testing. Application for drinking water and sewerage connections has been made completely online through the e-TAP system.
A self-meter reading app called K-Self, which helps the customers to determine their own meter reading, and a meter readers app have also been introduced to enable meter readers to read their meters. Efforts are also being made to attract more customers to switch from paper bills to green bills that are issued only through SMS.

Water Quality Labs
Currently, more than 100 labs have been set up across Kerala to conduct testing at a reasonable cost. 86 water testing labs have been approved by the national agency NABL.

Bottled water at Low Cost

Hilly Aqua has been made available in the market at a low price with an international standard purification system. Private companies sell bottled water for Rs. 20 but Hilly Aqua is sold in the public market for Rs. 15. Currently, Hilly Aqua has plants in Thodupuzha and Thiruvananthapuram. The government is moving ahead with steps to start a new plant in Kozhikode.

Wastewater Treatment
As part of the AMRUT project, projects to implement a sewerage system for wastewater treatment across the state are being implemented in various phases.
Two sewage treatment plants of 5 MLD each at Thiruvananthapuram Medical College and Kochi Elamkulam were constructed and made operational under the AMRUT project. In addition, the sewage project at Guruvayur, which had been incomplete for years, was also made operational. A project to replace humans with robots from the dangerous and primitive work of maintaining the sewage system was also initiated, for the first time in India.

VCB cum Regulators

The government decided to build regulators in response to the demand of farmers. During this government’s tenure, the construction of 4 regulators has been completed and inaugurated. The construction of 9 more is in progress.

Key figures
• 853 clean water supply projects
• 45.73 lakh household connections
• 90,492 public taps
• Drinking water supplied to 2.58 crore people
• 27 lakh new drinking water connections in the last five years alone
• 745 major works started under various projects.
• Of these, 264 projects already completed.
• About 50 lakh people got access to drinking water.
• With the completion of the remaining 481 projects, about 2 crore more people will have access to adequate drinking water.
• 44 projects that could not be completed in the previous years due to various reasons have been completed.
• Total number of rural households to be provided with drinking water connections is 69.82 lakh.
• Of these, 38.81 lakh households (up to December 2025) have been provided with drinking water connections.