I wouldn’t be surprised if Prime Minister Narendra Modi feels that he is running out of things to do at the moment. After all, the economy is ticking along nicely, the Goods and Services Tax (GST) has been rolled out, the Nifty has crossed the 10,000-point mark, Uttar Pradesh is won, Bihar is done and dusted, Rajya Sabha majority is pretty much in the bag and even the Gujarat wobble seems like getting sorted before the next election there. So, what next?
He might want to turn his attention to a problem which tends to get ignored by policymakers and planners in general, and disappears from the political radar with the first sign of good rains — water.
The problem is underfoot, literally, and hence out of mind. India is running out of water resources — principally groundwater resources — at an alarming rate. According to a recent study by the American Geophysical Union, the upper Ganges basin — home to more than half of India’s population — could run out of groundwater resources by 2050.
Wastage of rainwater
It is not as if this is because India doesn’t get enough rain. India’s average annual rainfall is over 1,100 mm. But studies estimate that of the total available water, more than a quarter is lost to just evaporation and run-off losses. Less than a fifth of the rainwater actually gets used — nearly half simply flows out to the sea. The infrastructure to trap and conserve this rainwater either doesn’t exist or is so poorly maintained that capacities are usually a third to a half more than what is actually available.
With growing urbanisation putting an ever-increasing pressure on the already creaky infrastructure, the problem is fast getting out of hand. According to statistics tabled by the Urban Development Ministry, in India’s six largest cities, water supply ranges from a low of half an hour per day in Hyderabad to a high of nine hours per day in Kolkata. But due to ramshackle infrastructure, most of this is lost in leakage. Consumption is still pretty low — averaging between 78 to 116 litres per capita per day. At least 22 of India’s 32 biggest cities face acute water shortage, with Jamshedpur, with a demand-supply gap of 70%, being the worst hit.
With civic administrations failing to deliver, private enterprise has stepped in. Tanker supply has taken the place of piped water supply. And since almost all of this tanker water is tapped from groundwater sources, this has meant tremendous strain on groundwater resources. India extracts an estimated 257 cubic km of water from the ground every year — more than the U.S. and China combined.
In peri-urban India, this has meant an alarming drop in water tables. In south India, which has perennially battled weak monsoons and consequent water shortages, an explosion of groundwater extraction has driven the water deeper into the ground, with nearly 30% of available groundwater accessible only at depths of more than 60 metres. In Chennai, for instance, where over 100 million litres of water per day is sourced by the Chennai Metropolitan Water Supply Board, the city’s water utility, from farms and deep borewells, this is leading to rising conflict between urban and peri-urban and rural populations over water, with farmers from areas surrounding Chennai taking to the streets in protest.
Meanwhile, policies lag behind by decades. The biggest thrust of governments remains on developing surface irrigation infrastructure, despite the known inefficiencies of this system. In unlined irrigation canals, the loss through seepage and evaporation is 40% — and this is before the water even reaches the field. And, in the field, most Indian farmers still prefer traditional watering systems of full flooding or border or furrow flooding, where another 40% of the water gets lost. In fact, though India nominally uses 83% of available water for irrigation and only 5% for domestic consumption, infrastructure issues and usage inefficiencies mean that both urban and rural water consumers face acute shortages, and see each other as the villains.
Rainwater harvesting
The solution is simple. We need a two-pronged approach to solving our water crisis. One, we need to change our focus away from building more inefficient large dams and wasteful irrigation projects and towards conserving the rainfall bounty we get through rainwater harvesting techniques.
Two, we need to improve efficiencies in agriculture. A mere 10% improvement in irrigation efficiency can solve the drinking water problem of our cities. And the technology is already available. Micro and drip irrigation, with the help of sensor-based technologies, can raise efficiency in water usage to up to 90%. Along with this, we need to rationalise water pricing. Water is badly mispriced in India, with neither the agricultural, industrial or urban consumers paying anything like a realistic price for water.
This is where the Prime Minister comes into the picture. Only he has the ability to sell a grand vision, the political muscle to cut through differences between the Centre and the States and the focus to actually deliver outcomes in a finite time frame. And this needs to be done in mission mode. Now.
