Faucets of the problem
Empty wells and year-long thirst
a tropical country, India has labyrinthine river networks and numerous water sources fed by the yearly rains. The country receives 400 mham of rain and snowfall. Another 20 mham flow in as surface water from neighbouring countries. These 420 mham provide India with river flows of 180 mham. Over 75 per cent of this constitute the annual Indian rains. And another 67 mham is available as groundwater. Still, for reasons unknown, India is short of drinking water. How did the country come to this?
The decentralised rainwater-harvesting systems that had ensured water supply for irrigation and had earned India the prestigious epithet “The land of gold”, are now as jaded as the epithet. Rulers who ruled the country through the ages, had deep faith in these systems, encouraging the masses to build these for themselves and their communities. As incentives, rulers would not levy taxes for a period of time on lands owned by someone who has built a tank. Dasabandhani inam or the dasavanda and the katu kodage were such incentives ancient rulers, like the Vijayanagara Kings of India’s south, granted to farmers who built water-harvesting structures.
It is not that the state and Union governments are disinterested now: in 1997-98 alone, they collectively spent some Rs 2,200 crore to create safe water sources, states N C Saxena. But India’s huge population still leaves a great many Indians thirsty. Theories and postulates have explained why water continues to be a luxury in India. In many areas, mineral and chemical contamination of groundwater is the cause. The experts identified the problems long back with their theories. However, nothing has been done to solve them. A bigger issue for planners is the spread of water-borne diseases. Case studies from nine areas living with drinking water-related problems show that unless there are comprehensive programmes for reviving India’s water resources, the vicious cycle of water scarcity and water-borne diseases will continue.
CHERRAPUNJI (MEGHALAYA)
Source:Rain and municipal services
Problem: Deforestation, run off
All rain, no water
A mong the chief causes for the water crisis in Meghalaya is deforestation which, in hilly regions, has led to formidable run-off of rainwater. Earlier, with forests dotting India’s hill states, this could be easily avoided. Though evident in many regions, Cherrapunji in the tiny Indian northeast hill state of Meghalaya, emerges as one such glaring instance of water scarcity following extensive local deforestation.
Once upon a time Cherrapunji enjoyed the distinction of enjoying the greatest amount of rainfall in the world. When it rains here, it pours. The region is used to an average annual rainfall of some 11,000 mm. So the fact that Cherrapunji is plagued by an acute water shortage half the year comes across as one of nature’s uglier ironies.
Student Gabriel Wangchung des cribes the torrential downpours the region is used to. “The sky becomes dark with rainclouds almost bursting at the seams,” he recalls fondly. “And then,” Gabriel continues, “massive claps of thunder follow very, very heavy showers.”
The local people, Swami Suprabhananda, principal of the Ramakrishna Mission Higher Secondary School in Cherrapunji, for instance, can understand the cruel irony that Cherrapunji is living with. He quotes Samuel Coleridge: “There is ‘water, water everywhere but not a drop to drink.’ Cherrapunji suffers from a severe water shortage crises six months a year.”
Even during the famous monsoons, there is often no respite from the water scarcity. Heavy deforestation has taken its toll: the rainwater disappears in no time, the six-inch supply pipes get blocked with silt and are prone to frequent bursts and leaks. The school has tried to solve the shortage by storing rainwater and is one of the few places where water harvesting is being attempted.
Cherrapunji is yet to dis cover rainwater harvesting, common and successful in hill states like Mizoram. While government officials manage to look after themselves, sourcing an artesian well from Mawsmai, a nearby village, not everyone is as privileged. A villager, 72-year-old B Tariang from Sohrerim tells his woeful story. “In the rainy seasons, we manage by collecting rainwater through gutters on the sloping roof-tops. But what do we do during the lean season?” he asks.
There have been no attempts to make artificial ponds and tanks or conserve rainwater here. The ponds that already exist need to be lined since the region’s rocks are so porous that water flows right through. When asked about water harvesting in specially-treated ponds using traditional methods, a contractor supervising a water pipeline project says, “That’s a new concept. It is yet to be adopted in the Northeast.” The site engineer, a government employee, sagely nods in agreement.
For Cherrapunji, this ignorance means six-month-long thirsts every year. The people have to learn the value of water. They are fortunate enough to witness rains in a country where many states go parched even during the monsoons. And only when Cherrapunji recognises water as a scarce commodity, it can hope for an end to its thirst.
RAMANATHPURAM (TAMIL NADU)
Source: Ponds, rain
Problem: Salinity, falling water table
More thirst and no water
Water shortages also occur due to over pumping, lack of groundwater recharge and a gradual destruction of the local traditional systems of water harvesting.
Ramanathapuram, a heavily-populated district in Tamil Nadu, emerges as a classic example of such a case. In Ramanathapuram, over the years, people abandoned their traditional water harvesting systems for piped water promised by the government. But that has proven to be grossly inadequate. The district boasts of 2,127 villages, half of which have severely saline groundwater sources. Worse, these villages get 115.25 million litres of water per day (mld ) , less than a third of their actual demand: a massive 350 mld. Salinity coupled with a crippling water shortage: Ramanathapuram is unfortunate enough to suffer from both. “The water we drink is bad; it is very salty,” says Shanmugam N Gopal, executive engineer of Tamil Nadu Water and Drainage ( twad ) board, stateing the figures. “But now I am used to it,” he says. For the thousands of people living in Ramanathapuram, the problem of shortage of water grossly overshadows its salinity.
There are several opinions about the people’s woes. Some villagers, for instance, feel that their district is jinxed. “It seems the Ramanathapuram’s thirst will never end,” says Muthumani, an elderly villager. One of the poorest regions of the country, Ramanathapuram knows water scarcity well enough: the region experiences a drought once in every four years.
Even the numerous water supply schemes introduced by the Union and the state governments have failed to show results in Ramanathapuram. “People don’t have any confidence left in the government,” says an official. “We are completely dependent on the rain,” say the villagers, expressing helplessness.
With no dependable water supply system, the region relies heavily on tanks, drinking water ponds and ooranis (artificial ponds lined with excavated soil that collected rainwater). The people here have traditionally used these ooranis to harvest rainwater successfully. But lately, the government’s water schemes have lured the people from using ooranis. Further, indiscrimi nately-dug borewells have also taken their toll: overextraction of groundwater has eroded the patches of shallow aquifers. And this has led to water salinity. “Three decades back we used to get good water at shallow depths even during the lean summer months. But now, we can’t get good water even at depths of 90-100 metres,” says Michael, a resident of Ponnakeneri village.
Hundreds of borewells, fitted with handpumps and motors, have all dried up. Those that still work have nothing but extremely saline water to offer now. The Tamil Nadu state government has installed 17 desalination plants throughout the district to bring relief to Ramanathapuram. But according to residents, these do not work. The plants need electricity and maintenance, they explain. And sadly, both are in short supply here, they add.
CHENNAI (TAMILNADU)
Source: Pipeline, handpumps
Problem: Saline ingress from the sea
Salt of the seas
When overexploitation of groundwater causes water tables to fall, regions around the sea experience ingress of sea water. This leads to extreme soil salinity and saline water ingress. Take Chennai’s case. For over two decades now, Vijayalakshmi Vaidyanathan, living in the city’s south, has been using the “very sweet water” from a well located in the backyard of her house. She never felt the need for a municipal water connection. But of late, the water has started tasting odd. Whenever she boils it, a white layer forms in the vessel. “I do not know why the layer is formed. The water table, too, has gone down,” she says.
Chennai, not only faces a water crisis like other Indian cities, it even shares the same problems: over extraction of groundwater and ingress of saline water from the Bay of Bengal. The aquifers in Chennai’s Minjur, Panjetty and Tamaraipakkam, have fallen by 8-12 metres over the past 20 years. Over-extraction in Minjur, for instance, has led to an underground cone-shaped depression. The sea water has seeped into this depression some nine km away from the coast and has made the already-salty groundwater more saline.
The city’s rich, however, have no problems. They can afford to buy water from the hundreds of water tank-fitted trucks criss-crossing the city, carrying water from private borewells in faraway villages. One can buy a truckload, about 13,000 litres of water, for Rs 470. And while the rich buy their drink, the villagers suffer as the water table in their region goes down further.
The Chennai Metro Water Supply and Sewerage Board ( cmwssb) draws surface water from three inter-connected reservoirs. Groundwater that makes up one-fourth of its supply is tapped from 76 borewells, 35-40 metres deep. “There is no recharge of the groundwater,” says S Ramakrishnan, senior hydrologist of the board. For those who have a water connection, the cmwssb supplies 78 litres per day (lpd )