Safe, adequate and sustainable supply of water is basic needs, and essential componentsrnof socioeconomic development of a given society. However, a great section of society stillrnremained without access to safe, adequate and sustainable supplies of water. Thernproblem is severe within rural communities than urban. Some of the major causes of thernproblem are; limitations in development of new water supply schemes and nonrnsustainability of already developed water schemes are major ones. To tackle the problemrnof sustainability, development agents are using village level operated and maintainedrntechnologies such as hand pumps. However, empirical evidence shows that huge numbersrnof community managed water supply hand pumps are not operational. As result, numbersrnof people with safe water supply are decreasing and wasted investment capital isrnincreasing. Having these issues in mind, the researcher assessed factors affectingrnsustainability of rural water supply hand pumps, in Aleta Wendo Wereda.rnThe research was initiated by conducting scheme inventory to know current status ofrnhand pumps. Then after, probability and non probability sampling techniques werernemployed to select sample handpumps, respondents for households survey, focus grouprndiscussion participants and key interview informants. Specifically, 7 handpumps (5rnfunctional & 2 nonfunctional) were selected by applying proportionate stratified randomrnsampling; 128 households were selected through simple random sampling for householdsrnsurvey; 5 focus group discussions were held with selected water committees, womenrngroups and wereda water office staff members; Key informant il1lerviews were conductedrnwith 9 individuals selectedfrom community, government offices and NGOs. Furlhermore,rnquantitative data were analyzed using descriptive statislics, frequency (Qble& crossrntabulation using SPPS version 15 sofnvare. Also, hand pumps inventory data werernmapped by using Arc View 3.2a sofnvare and qualitative data were analyzed throughrnnarration.rnThe study has revealed that 47.5% of handpumps are not operational during schemerninventory exercise. Furthermore, performance of water commillee were found to be weakrnsince scheme management training were not provided in most cases,. lacks workingrnmanuals& by-laws ,and legal recognition as well. Women do not made real participationrnduring hand pumps development; also, number of women in water committees variesrnbenveen 20-40% and their responsibility limited to mere membership of the commillee inrnmost cases; community technicians, toolkits and spare parts supply chain were almostrnnon existent in the study area. Majority of users do nol contribute for O&M regularly;rnsome hand pumps are abandoned because of waleI' quality problem and low yield asrnresult of inappropriate site selection and lack of conslruction supervision; instilutionalrncapacity problems of wereda water office in terms of human, material and jinancialrnresources were also identified.rnHence the study calls for: adequate scheme management trainings along with necessalYrnworking manuals and directives to be provided for WCs; legal status of WCs should bernensured; women's decision making roles should be strengthened; local communityrntechnicians should be trained and necessary toolkits to be provided before scheme handrnover to community. Simultaneously, to address problem of spare parts, RSP F should bernestablished in wereda cenler; inlegrated feasibility study and construction/drillingrnsupervision should be conducted by appropriate professionals; instilutional capacity ofrnWWRDO should be strengthened in terms of human, material andjinancial resources.