NEW DELHI: With reporting irregularities in implementation of the Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM) scheme, seven states have imposed penalties to the tune of round Rs 129 crore, together with the utmost Rs 120 crore by Gujarat, towards contractors and others, and registered instances towards them and sure officers following a directive from Prime Minister Narendra Modi to spare nobody in terms of irregularities within the flagship initiative.Modi is realized to have additionally instructed the Jal Shakti ministry and the states involved to provoke motion towards all such instances of irregularities and directed the strict monitoring of the scheme, with zero tolerance for any monetary, procedural and quality-related violations.The government has recovered round Rs 13 crore in these states up to now, with greater than Rs 6.6 crore being recovered from Gujarat. The six different states from the place penalty restoration has been made are Rajasthan (Rs 5.3 crore), Maharashtra (Rs 2 crore), Tripura (Rs 1.2 crore), Karnataka (Rs 1 crore), Assam (Rs 5 lakh) and Tamil Nadu (Rs 3 lakh).In line with the ministry, 20 states/UTs — Assam, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Kerala, Ladakh, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Manipur, Meghalaya, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tripura, Tamil Nadu, Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, and West Bengal — have reported instances of irregularities and brought motion in 607 instances towards 621 departmental officers, 969 contractors and 153 Third Get together Inspection Companies (TPIAs).9 FIRs have been registered towards 20 officers, 10 contractors, and 1 TPIA. One former Congress minister in Rajasthan (Mahesh Joshi), 10 officers and eight contractors have been arrested up to now.Launched in Aug 2019 to supply purposeful faucet water connections to all (approx.) 19.3 crore rural households within the nation, JJM has up to now coated greater than 15.7 crore households (81% of all). Although the federal government deliberate to cowl all households by 2024, JJM’s deadline has now been prolonged to 2028.