As summer nears, water crisis looms

Rivers and ponds have been drying up, the groundwater table has fallen to alarming levels, and plans for piped water are in doubt. Even before the onset of summer, a potable water crisis is challenging India's ambition of providing safe drinking water to all rural people.

About 20 rivers and streams have dwindled or reached the brink of dead flow in the eastern Indian state of Bihar, with a population of 120 million. These rivers once had water all year round and would irrigate large areas of agricultural land, in addition to meeting the drinking water requirements of local residents.

Kanwar Lake, Asia's largest freshwater oxbow lake that once spread over 67.5 square kilometers, seems to be becoming a wetland.

"Rivers are dying up because there's no base flow," said Ajay Kumar Sinha, director of River Conservation at the Central Water Commission. "The groundwater used to be replenished during the rainy season, but overexploitation has made the situation critical."

Thirty-nine percent of underground water aquifers in India are overexploited, said Rajendra Singh, an activist who won the Stockholm Water Prize in 2015.

"This is a water emergency."

The potable water crisis has become severe across nearly half the country in recent years. A recent government report identified as many as 100 water-stressed districts, spread over the South Indian state of Tamil Nadu, which last year faced one of the worst potable water crises in its history.

The Ministry of Jal Shakti, the federal peak body of water resources, launched a massive campaign last year in 256 water-stressed districts.

The federal government plans to spend 3.6 trillion rupees ($48 billion) over the next four years to provide safe drinking water. For 2020-21, the Jal Jivan Mission, India's flagship rural drinking water plan, was allocated 1.15 trillion rupees. Its scheme gives top priority to augmenting local water sources, replenishing existing sources and promoting water harvesting.

Bihar state says it plans to clean 3,000 ponds, restore 8,387 wells and 1,600 traditional water bodies, and build 6,000 soak pits and 2,000 check dams across small rivers.

Yet according to a telemetry report of Bihar's Minor Water Resources Department, issued last month, the groundwater table in 11 out of the state's 38 districts declined alarmingly, ranging between 4 meters and about 8 meters in the past four months.

What particularly alarms environmentalists is that the groundwater table has fallen about 8 meters even in districts such as Katihar and Begusarai, which are crisscrossed by several big rivers such as the Mahananda and the Kosi

A government report said that groundwater in 1,186 blocks across 17 Indian states has been overexploited.

NITI Aayog, a federal government think tank, reported that 21 Indian cities including Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai, and Hyderabad, are likely to run out of groundwater as early as this year, affecting the lives of 100 million people.

The writer is a freelance journalist.