National Seminar of Technical Experts in Rural Water Supply & Sanitation 25 th July 2008

1. National Seminar of Technical Experts in Rural Water Supply & Sanitation 25th July 2008 Issues on Rural Water Supply in India A.Bhattacharyya Joint Secretary Department of Drinking Water Supply

2. Water • Builder • Purifier • Diluter • Divider Catch every drop of water that is falling on Earth

3. Ground water development in India • Traditionally rural water supply systems are based on ground water sources (more than 85%) • About 85% of the ground water sources are drawn for irrigation and rural drinking water draws hardly 3% • Ground water development in Delhi, Haryana, Punjab & Rajasthan is more than 100% and in States of Gujarat, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Uttar Pradesh it is more than 70%. (CGWB report 2006) • Causing imbalance between over-withdrawal of ground water and deficit recharge • Resulting permanent fall in the water table every year to the tune of 2 -3 meters

4. Ground Water Usage Cleary indicates that drinking water is a very small consumer of both the surface and ground water and it is primarily due to extensive and indiscriminate use for agriculture . Comprehensive management and conjunctive use of both surface and ground water, incorporating both quality and quantity aspects of water is largely lacking Note the disparity ! 85-90% of surface water sources are tapped by Urban water supply Source: Earth Treads 2001, World Resources Institute

5. Map of extent of Ground Water Exploitation • Heavy extraction of groundwater, especially for irrigation – groundwater levels in many districts have fallen by more than 4 meters (@ > 20 cm/year) during 1981-2000. • 15% of the blocks fall under dark/grey/over-exploited area • Source: CGWB Caution : Excess withdrawals cause ingress of chemical contaminants

6. Fresh Water Availability • Utilizable water resource in Brahmaputra valley is 18,417 cu.m. and in the Sabarmati Basin it is as low as 180 cu.m. Rajasthan has 8% of population with 1% of country’s water resource and Bihar has 10% of population with 5% water resource • Rapid urbanization (2025 -more than 50% urban population and by 2050 population to reach1.64 billion), food security (1.13 billion), phenomenal industrial growth and ever increasing population growth has witnessed extensive development of water resources. • Irrigation potential increased from 23 million hectares in 1951, since attaining independence to about 100 million hectares now. The production of food grains has increased from around 50 million tonnes in the fifties to about 200 million tonnes. Would need 450 million tonnes by the year 2050 A.D. • India’s finite and fragile water resources are stressed, while sectoral demands are increasing. • Per capita water availability has been falling drastically from 5,000 cubic meters per year in 1947 to about 2000 cubic meters per year at present and may decline to 1000 cubic meters per year in 2050

7. Annual Per Capita Availability Precipitation : 4,000 km3 Where are we leading to ? AdequateWater WaterScarcity

8. Deteriorating Ground Water Quality • Over-drawal and extensive use of pesticides and insecticides for irrigation have made the sources un-potable in many area; excess nitrate in 19387 habitations in 10 states( Rajasthan-7693, Karnataka-4077; Maharashtra-4552) • In costal areas saline water intrusion resulted in contamination of the potable ground water aquifers; 12425 habitations in 15 States (Rajasthan-4428) • Presence of high concentration of arsenic and fluoride in ground water based drinking water sources is attributed to anthropogenic and geogenic. • Studies in West Bengal show that arsenic in ground water is primarily due to leaching of arsenic bearing soil, which is geogenic in nature • Fluoride contamination affects people in more than 29030 habitations in 17 States and excess arsenic in 7067 habitations in 5 States. • Excess iron present in 104,477 habitations in 24 States(Assam-23,841; Bihar-21,540; Orissa -26,136)

9. Water quality affected habitations as on 01.04.2006

10. Increasing investment trend in RWS Sector State Government investments were higher than the Central Govt. investments till the XI Plan period.

11. THE CURRENT SITUTATION – RWS SECTOR Water Source Problems • High dependence on ground water (85%) • Over extraction of ground water for irrigation • Uncontrolled deforestation • Neglect of traditional practices and systems, including rain water harvesting • Inadequate integrated water management and watershed development • Emerging water quality problems

12. THE CURRENT SITUTATION – RWS SECTOR CONTINUED MANAGEMENT PROBLEM • SECTOR SUFFERS FROM GENERAL VICIOUS CIRCLE SYNDROME • ADHOC APPROACH ADOPTED IN DEVELOPMENT OF PROJECTS • EMPHASIS ON PHYSICAL COVERAGE ONLY • INADEQUATE FINANCIAL ALLOCATION AGAINST WORKS UNDERTAKEN • LACK OF PREVENTIVE MAINTENANCE FUND • INEFFICIENT AND BLOATED SERVICE INSTITUTIONS • LEADING TO GAP BETWEEN ASSETS CREATED AND SERVICE AVAILABLE. OUTLAY OUT PUT GAP

13. THE CURRENT SITUTATION – RWS SECTOR (CONTINUED) • UNWILLINGNESS OF USER TO PAY FOR SERVICE • UNABLE TO MAINTAIN SERVICES WITHOUT EXTENSIVE SUBSIDIES • LACK OF ADEQUATE PRICING LEVELS CHARGED TO CONSUMERS CONTRIBUTES TO THE FINANCIAL WEAKNESS OF AGENCY • FAILURE TO LEVY RATES PREVENTS EFFICIENT USE AND CONSERVATION OFWATER • MINING OF GROUND WATER FOR IRRIGATION (FREE POWER TARRIF) RESULTED LARGE NOS OF DW SOURCES DEFUNCT.

14. Coverage status of Habitations • Based on 1991-94 survey and revalidation figure of 1996 and subsequent coverage upto 2003 the coverage of rural habitations was more than 97% • Fresh survey in 2003 revealed that there are 55,067 habitations that are yet to be covered of the earlier survey • Alarming aspect is that 2.8 lakh habitations which were fully covered have become partially covered primarily due to failure of source. Reassessed figure is 3.31 lakh • 2,16,968 habitations have water quality problems • Thus total 6,03,639 habitations are to be covered during Bharat Nirman period (2005-06 to 2008-09)

15. Action initiated by DDWS • States are encouraged to take up water recharging structures, water conservation techniques and rain water harvesting structures to ensure sustainability of drinking water sources. Funds are provided for the same • Launched Community Based Water Quality Monitoring and Surveillance Program in which “sanitary inspection” is introduced. Districts Laboratories have also been sanctioned • Under Sub-Mission program special funds are provided to tackle quality affected habitations with major thrust on Arsenic and Fluoride • Launched CCDU for generating awareness and capacity development • Major emphasis is given to linking with other related activities i.e. watershed management, NREGP, prevention of pollution of surface & ground water etc. and empowering community in decision making

16. Actions needed • Move away from dependency on one source to a combination of sources • Greater emphasis on individual roof-water harvesting • Introduction of regular and systematic collection of hydro-meteorological, hydrological and hydro-geological data by all related Departments and analysis the Data by a single nodal agency • Supplement by introducing a system for processing qualitative and quantitative information for all types of water bodies. • Project future sector-wise demand including quality and type of user and develop National Water Master Plan for short and long term perspective. • Demand for water for different purposes should be estimated at different periods of time in conformity with respective State goal • The right of individual exploitation of ground water needs to be restricted both for economic reasons & for equitable distribution

17. Actions needed continued. • Strong Scientific inputs based on existing and innovative techniques in water resource development & management at the micro and macro level is required. • Regulation, monitoring and enforcement to prevent over exploitation and pollution of DW source through public and collective rights on local communities seems essential • For mitigation of quality problems steps have been initiated to shift from ground water based to surface water based schemes and also conjunctive use of ground water, surface water & roof-water harvesting • To bring this holistic approach of “Integrated Water Resource Management” there is need a to rope in services of Technical Experts to assist the State Governments in proper implementation of the programme.

18. Thank You