WATER SCARCITY: IMPACT AND SOLUTIONS

 WATER SCARCITY: IMPACT AND 

SOLUTIONS 

#Environment #Conservation

WHY THIS TOPIC? 

As per the NITI Aayog report, around 60 crore people in India 

are facing water scarcity. Even Chennai, a major metropolis is 

facing the crisis and also the millennium city, Gurgaon. If this, 

continues then it is going to impact the entire country by 

2030. So, the need of the hour is wholesome state and non-

state actors participation in water conservation. 

INTRODUCTION 

Problems are huge as precious evolutionary living resources, 

natural infrastructure, are going extinct. While we 

thoughtlessly build artificial infrastructure, we forget that this 

kills natural infrastructure which took evolution aeons to 

create and cannot be engineered. We are missing the 

essential point that this is our lifeline on the planet. Forests, 

rivers, mountains, aquifers and soil are being lost at an 

alarming rate. Today, India is in the midst of a suicidal water 

crisis as urban and rural landscapes go thirsty. 

Over the years, we have seen activists, scientists and experts 

from across India working on bottom-up schemes to revive 

and rejuvenate lakes, wetlands, streams and other small 

water bodies. While these movements have brought about a 

significant change at the local level, the scale of our water 

problems is much larger. 

MAIN BODY 

Here we have two intractable issues. First, cities today are 

vast agglomerations that continue to spread, with bursting 

populations of tens of millions. They are huge parasites on 

water, food, energy and all other resources. High densities of 

our cities do not allow for water harvesting to fill the gap. 

Until now, invasive schemes like dams to service these large 

cities and the huge needs of agriculture have caused extreme 

ecological devastation. 

Second, in our global market economies, the products and 

services that are derived from natural infrastructure have 

often led to the terminal loss of the source itself. The global 

free market, and with it the scale of human intervention, now 

exceeds the scale of the planet. These resources (forests, 

mountains, floodplains and rivers) are often lost to the greed 

of governments, institutions, corporations and individuals. 

This is long-term loss for short- term gain. Natural resources 

are living evolutionary resources that are constantly renewed 

by natural cycles. Therefore, they provide us perennial value 

as long as we use them with natural wisdom and not kill them 

with exploitation — which is the order of the day. 

Groundwater plays an important role in our lives and India’s 

economy, but it is disappearing fast. There is mounting 

evidence that we are extracting more than can be naturally 

replenished. In the hard-rock aquifers of peninsular India, 

drilling 800 ft. or deeper is becoming the norm. Groundwater-

dependent towns and villages spend an increasing fraction of 

their budgets chasing the water table. Stories abound of 

farmers spending their life savings or taking loans to drill a 

borewell, but failing to find water. If we “run out” of 

groundwater, millions of people will be left without any 

means to sustain themselves. 

Scientific evidence also points to over-exploitation. The 

Central Ground Water Board classifies all blocks in India 

based on the fraction of recharge that is extracted and trends 

in long-term groundwater levels. Since 2004, almost a third of 

blocks have been classified “over-exploited” or “semi-critical”. 

If we understand the problem and if the consequences are so 

severe, why are we unable to address it? The answer lies 

partly in politics, partly in the invisible nature of groundwater, 

and partly in our reliance on simple techno-economic fixes. 

Flawed regulatory structure: Electricity is supplied to 

farmers free of cost. This policy made sense when 

groundwater was abundant in the 1980s. Indeed, it helped 

millions of farmers escape poverty. But today, where 

groundwater levels have fallen hundreds of feet below the 

ground, the subsidy is actually only utilised by the richest 

farmers who can afford to drill deep. And even so, not all are 

lucky enough to strike water. Access to groundwater in hard-

rock regions has almost become a lottery. Yet in the absence 

of alternative water sources, charging farmers for electricity is 

seen as political suicide.

Groundwater is inherently difficult to monitor and control, in 

part because of its invisibility, which also perpetuates the 

illusion that each well is independent. The myth is enshrined 

in Indian groundwater law that allows landowners to extract 

as much as they want. In reality, not only is groundwater 

within an aquifer interconnected, but aquifers and rivers are 

also interconnected. So depleting groundwater means drying 

rivers. Despite this, groundwater and rivers are regulated by 

different agencies that do not properly account for the 

linkages between them, often double counting the quantum 

of the resource. 

Much of the current action on the ground is through techno-

economic fixes. These have clear benefits in terms of 

reducing pumping costs and using local aquifers instead ofbuilding big, expensive dams. But what they do not do is 

create “new” water. 

Solution can be floodplain. Research has shown that 

floodplains of rivers are exceptional aquifers where any 

withdrawal is compensated by gravity flow from a large 

surrounding area and can be used as a source of providing 

water to cities. Floodplains are formed over millions of years 

by the flooding of rivers with deposition of sand on 

riverbanks. Some floodplains, such as those of Himalayan 

rivers, contain up to 20 times more water than the virgin flow 

in rivers in a year. Since recharge is by rainfall and during late 

floods, the water quality is good. If we conserve and use the 

floodplain, it can be a self-sustaining aquifer wherein every 

year, the river and floodplain are preserved in the same 

healthy condition as the year before. 

The Delhi Palla floodplain project on the Yamuna is an 

example of this. By utilising 20 sq.km of the river length and 

running at half its capacity, it provides water to almost a 

million people daily. Piezometers and a control system have 

been installed to monitor water levels and other parameters 

through the year, to ensure sustainable withdrawal. Besides, 

it provides huge revenue to the Delhi Jal Board. 

Preserving the floodplain in a pristine condition is essential 

for this scheme to work. Land on the floodplains can be 

leased from farmers in return for a fixed income from the 

water sold to cities. The farmers can be encouraged to grow 

orchards/food forests to secure and restore the ecological 

balance of the river ecosystem. 

Currently, mineral water is brought from faraway mountain 

springs, putting huge pressure on the mountains. It is 

packaged and consumed in plastic bottles that end up in 

landfills. Forested hills are a result of evolution over millions 

of years. They are not polluted and sit on a treasure of 

underground aquifers that contain natural mineral water 

comparable to that found in a mountain spring. This is 

because the rain falls on the forest and seeps through the 

various layers of humus and cracked rock pathways, picking 

up nutrients and minerals and flows into underground 

mineral water aquifers. 

Research shows that the water in these aquifers is 

comparable to several international natural spring mineral 

waters. It also shows that if a scheme of ‘conserve and use’ is 

applied correctly, it would allow a forest (like Asola Bhatti in 

Delhi) to be sustained as a mineral water sanctuary. About 30 

sq.km of the forest could then provide enough natural 

mineral water to 5 million people in the city. The Aravalli 

forested hills can provide mineral water to all major towns of 

Rajasthan. This water can substantially improve the health of 

citizens and preserve forests at the same time. The marvel is 

that we can provide quality natural mineral water for all from 

a local forest tract for 20 times less than the market price and 

yet reap great economic returns. 

Such non-invasive, local, large-scale ‘conserve and use’ 

projects till now have not been part of our living scheme. 

They change the relationship between nature, water and 

cities. They differ in scale from the small, community-driven 

projects of check dams, water harvesting and lakes and can 

service large populations. Unlike large-scale dams, these 

projects work with nature rather than against it. They can be 

used around the globe. If we were to recognise the true value 

of our natural infrastructure and ‘conserve and use’ our 

evolutionary resources with the help of science, it would 

secure the future for humanity and the natural world. 

Further, boosting recharge through rainwater harvesting 

structures such as small check dams is a popular measure. 

Another technological solution is to improve efficiency 

through subsidised drip irrigation or energy-saving pumps. 

CONCLUSION

The way forward is comprehensive water budgeting, 

simultaneously in each watershed and the river basin as a 

whole. Water budgets at the watershed level will inform 

communities about how much water they have, so it can be 

equitably shared within communities. Water budgets for the 

river basin will inform communities how much must be left 

for downstream users, ensuring that water resources are 

allocated between communities fairly and transparently. 

Given the zero-sum nature of the game and the impossibility 

of creating “new” water, it is likely that we cannot restore the 

water balance in severely depleted regions without painful 

cuts in water use. However, there are some glimmers of 

hope. Water users everywhere are worried about the 

disappearing resource and willing to engage. The trick lies in 

combining technology (low-water-use crops, xeriscaping) and 

economic incentives that reduce actual water use (“cash-for-

blue” schemes) without reducing productivity or quality of 

life. This needs a strong water governance system based on 

awareness building, science and a commitment to fairness 

and sustainability.