A crisis that is slowly turning catastrophic (Live Mint)

Mains Paper 2 : Governance
Prelims level : Not much
Mains level : Niti Aayog report on groundwater extraction

Context

• India faces a water crisis acute enough to cause popular unrest as it slowly assumes calamitous proportions. Addressing it will require efforts in almost every sphere of life
• A 2018 NITI Aayog report puts the scale of the crisis in perspective: India has only 4% of the planet’s fresh-water for 16% of its population.
• This sets the country up for exploitation by water-tanker operators who profit by digging borewells, often illegally and under political patronage, to sell water at scandalous prices to the needy.
• The phenomenon is so rampant that the pace of groundwater extraction invariably outstrips the rate of aqueous recharge.
• If the rains play truant, the depletion of reservoirs accelerates.

Highlighting the NITI Aayog report

• According to the NITI Aayog report, India is the world’s biggest groundwater extractor.
• As things stand, it forecasts that 21 cities, including Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad, will run out of groundwater by 2020; also, 40% of our citizens will have no access to drinking water by 2030.
• As many as 600 million people are already estimated to face “high-to-extreme" water stress every year.
• This crisis had been in the making for decades, with ecologists who warned of development myopia brushed aside in favour of concrete signs of economic success.
• All manner of structures have encroached upon lakes and rivers with impunity, while industrial waste and sewage inflows render various water bodies toxic.
• The problem is compounded by the large-scale adoption of thermocol and plastic plates and glasses even in the countryside, the stuff of non-biodegradable waste that ends up killing rural pools of water that have traditionally served entire villages.
• Groundwater levels, meanwhile, have fallen calamitously.
• In the farm sector, blame has long been assigned to the practice of flood irrigation and switchovers to water-soaking crops such as sugarcane and rice, but water theft by tanker gangs does much of the harm.
• Given how dear this vital fluid is becoming to the masses, the Narendra Modi government’s aim of assuring every citizen piped water by 2024 is indeed laudable.

Conclusion

• However, far more challenges need to be overcome than can be listed here.
• Agriculture would need to conserve water through drip irrigation and other methods.
• Groundwater replenishment will have to be done in mission mode. Rainwater harvesting must turn voluminous.
• For now, perhaps tanker gangs could be put out of business by state water supplies.

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Prelims Questions:

Q.1) With respect to “Refugee”, consider the following statements:
1. According to the latest annual study released by the office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees, 70.8 million children, women and men were forcibly displaced at the end of last year.
2. Theme this year World Refugee Day is “Step with Refugees - Take a Step on World Refugee Day”.

Which of the statements given above is/are correct?
A. 1 only
B. 2 only
C. Both 1 and 2
D. None

Answer: C
Mains Questions:
Q.1) Describe the key highlights of the NITI Aayog data on groundwater status in India.