Using water sensibly

Come drought and there is talk about drought management. Come floods and the attention shifts to flood management. What the country really needs is efficient water management that will blunt the menace of recurring drought and floods, besides making the available water go farther.

India is fortunate in that it gets a whopping 4,000 billion cubic metres (bcm) of water every year through rains and snowfall, which should be enough for everyone's needs. But, in the absence of adequate storage, much of this flows down wastefully, leaving hardly a fourth""1050 bcm (690 bcm surface water and 360 bcm groundwater)""for use.

In fact, the unhindered run-off of this magnitude amounts to more than just wastage. It also causes soil erosion, leading to the silting of riverbeds and reservoirs, which in turn restricts their water storage capacity and causes floods. This apart, thanks to the uneven geographical distribution of rainfall, water availability differs widely in different river basins""being the maximum in the Brahmaputra and Barak basin and the minimum in the Sabarmati basin.

This apart, the indiscriminate exploitation of the available water, unmindful of the rate of recharge, has compounded the water woes, especially concerning groundwater. And though the national water policy of 1987, as also its revised version of 2002, calls for water conservation and water pricing to reflect its scarcity value, precious little has been done.

As the country reels under the simultaneous effects of both drought and floods, the question is how to cope. The answers are well known. One way is to link surplus river basins with deficit ones, as the Vajpayee government ordered. The practicability of this is doubtful, as it will create many new inter-state water sharing disputes, besides environmental dangers.

Another approach could be to declare water as a national asset and bring it under the direct control of the Centre to avoid inter-state skirmishes. But that, too, does not seem practical because it will require an amendment of the Constitution, and the states are unlikely to agree. Large dams were once considered a viable option, but after the endless disputes over the Tehri and Narmada projects, no one seems to have the appetite for these any more.

The most viable approach under the circumstances seems to be in situ water conservation on a watershed basis, which has the potential to preserve enough water to meet local requirements. Such an approach has, traditionally, proved successful in solving the water problems of even arid areas, including the Thar desert. This option has the additional advantage in that it need not be a wholly government-sponsored effort. Both official and non-governmental organisations can take up watershed development work in collaboration with local stakeholders by organising them into water users' associations. Once the physical work is over, the operation and maintenance of systems, including water distribution and collection of water charges, can be left to the user bodies.

This also obviates the need for populism by the ruling political parties through low irrigation charges. Moreover, it is an environment-friendly approach that will, over time, lead to improved ecology in the treated regions.