Srinagar, April 25: The Jammu and Kashmir government has formally renamed Public Health Engineering and Irrigation and Flood Control (PHE I&FC) Department as ‘Jal Shakti Department’.

An order issued in this regard by Additional Secretary General Administration Department, Rohit Sharma on Friday, also gave sanction to the rechristened department at Serial 27-A in the First Schedule of the J&K Government Business rules.

The Friday’s order was issued in pursuance of the Administrative Council decision of February 5.

The Administrative Council, which had met under the chairmanship of Lt Governor G C Murmu on Feb 5, also accorded sanction to the implementation of the Jal Jeevan Mission (JJM) and roadmap to achieve 100 per cent coverage of piped water supply by December 2021 across the UT, an official spokesman said.

The administrative council also approved the appointment of financial auditors at the provincial level to undertake an audit of the expenditure under the JJM, hiring of consultants for the project appraisal committees and appointment of third party technical monitors, an official spokesman said.

He said special cells will be set up by the revenue and forest departments for speedy clearance of land and forest cases related to the Jal Jeevan Mission across J and K.