Jal Jeevan Mission 2.0: Nal Jal Mitra and Sujalam Shakti Push

The Department of Drinking Water and Sanitation (DDWS), Ministry of Jal Shakti, on 21 September 2026 held its first National Virtual Conference with States and Union Territories on building a skilled rural water workforce under Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM) 2.0. It followed the Departmental Summit held on 1–2 September 2026.

DDWS Secretary Ashok K.K. Meena said the long-term success of the Mission depends not just on building pipelines and tanks but on having trained people to run, maintain and monitor them. Assessments suggest that more than 13 lakh personnel may be needed in the coming years to operate and maintain rural water supply systems.

Nal Jal Mitra

• An NSQF-aligned qualification developed by DDWS with the Ministry of Skill Development and Entrepreneurship and the National Council for Vocational Education and Training (NCVET).
• It creates village-level multi-skilled technicians for routine operation, preventive maintenance and first-level repairs of pumps, pipelines, treatment systems and electrical fittings.
• Two pathways: a 510-hour Short-Term Training course for new entrants, and a 120-hour Recognition of Prior Learning (RPL) route for existing plumbers, electricians, pump attendants and operators.
• States must decide by 15 October 2026 whether to adopt the existing Nal Jal Mitra (Jal Vitran Sanchalak) course or develop their own.

Sujalam Shakti

• A women-led initiative to create a trained village-level workforce for water quality surveillance, testing and basic disinfection.
• Based on the NSQF Level-2 qualification "Fundamentals of Basic Water Quality Testing and Disinfection", covering water sampling, Field Test Kits, chlorination, sanitary inspection and digital reporting.
• The first phase aims to train about 1.35–1.70 lakh women, working with State Rural Livelihood Missions, Panchayati Raj Institutions and RSETIs.

Other points

AICTE presented a new elective course on Water Supply Management for diploma and engineering students, and IIT Kanpur spoke about building IoT monitoring, SCADA, GIS and machine learning into future water-sector training. The Ministry of Skill Development pointed to opportunities under PMKVY 4.0. Odisha, Telangana, Jammu & Kashmir, Madhya Pradesh, Haryana and Punjab shared their experience.