Although agriculture is the largest source of livelihood for people in India, its share in the gross domestic product (GDP) has been declining over time with deficit rainfall over the last two years having affected crop production and farmer's incomes.

This article 'Water management and resilience in agriculture' published in the Economic and Political Weekly examines water management strategies needed for drought mitigation and increasing climate resilience, including soil moisture management in India. It also sheds light on issues and policies for improving effectiveness in canal irrigation, water use efficiency, and strategies for climate resilient agriculture.

Reforms needed in irrigation

The article informs that India has invested significantly in irrigation infrastructure, particularly canal irrigation since independence. The Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchai Yojana (PMKSY), introduced by the present government, is in the right direction. However, the strategy in irrigation development has focused more on increasing water quantity and has neglected efficiency of use and sustainability.

The government heavily subsidises both canal water rates and the power tariff for drawing groundwater and much of this water is either used inefficiently or overused. Thus a number of reforms are needed in irrigation such as increasing and prioritising public investment, raising profitability of groundwater exploitation and augmenting groundwater resources, rational pricing of irrigation water and electricity, involvement of user farmers in the management of irrigation systems, and making groundwater markets equitable.

Efficient management of water resources

India has had successive droughts in the past two years. This year too, nine states such as Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Jharkhand and Uttar Pradesh have declared a drought. The article argues that there is a need for strategies in the short and long term to mitigate the adverse effects of droughts that include:

• Better and more efficient management of water resources to achieve “more crops per drop”
• A different approach for rain-fed areas and a paradigm shift in knowledge, policy and practice for rain-fed agriculture
• A shift from conventional “production per hectare” thinking to an approach that can integrate livelihoods (agriculture and rural non-farm), availability and access to food, ecosystems, and human health
• Investments in three components namely ponds, rural electrification, and drip irrigation to enhance water efficiency
• Promoting rainwater harvesting and drip irrigation for drought proofing

Encouraging climate resilient agriculture

Following changes can be introduced for effective climate resilient agriculture (CRA) in India for which:

• Diversified cropping systems in view of climate related risks need to be introduced
• Crop insurance can be used as one of the strategies for CRA. In this context, the recent introduction of Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana (PMFBY) by the central government is a great step forward
• There is a need for research that can lead to the development of climate resilient technologies and extension systems to promote these among farmers

The article ends by arguing that water management requires multiple levels of policy action. The problem is not a shortage of water, but the absence of proper mechanisms for its augmentation, conservation, distribution, and efficient use. Water management thus should be given number one priority in agricultural policy to prevent drought, minimise the risks due to drought and build a climate resilient agriculture.

A copy of the paper can be downloaded from below:

Kendrapara and Jagatsinghpur are among the most vulnerable districts affected by cyclones and climate change in coastal Odisha. In the last few decades, the coasts of Odisha have witnessed three major devastating storms. The Super Cyclone, Cyclone Phailin and the Cyclone HudHud all severely disrupted the livelihoods of communities in the region.

However, there are villages like Praharajpur in the coastal area of Kendrapada district, where the loss of life and property was less thanks to the mangrove cover.

In the context of India and particularly Odisha, recent studies have proposed that mangrove conservation could be an adaptive strategy for coastal communities, as it acts as a natural barrier, protecting the life and property of coastal communities from storms and cyclones and also providing a broad range of goods and services to the people.  

In the last 60 years, the total mangrove area in Odisha fell from 30,766 hectares (ha) to 17,900 ha between 1944 and 1999. However, per annual activity report 2014-15, Forest and Environment Department, Government of Odisha, total achievement under the coastal mangrove plantation component is 2,920 ha and the total mangrove area is still not more than 21,000 ha.

In February 2011, to build climate resilient communities and to reduce extreme poverty in Kendrapara and Jagatsinghpur districts in Odisha, the Regional Centre for Development Cooperation (RCDC) implemented the Paribartan project. The project was designed to increase mangrove cover in the area to mitigate the adverse effects of climate change. 

RCDC conducted a Community Risk and Vulnerability Analysis (CRVA) exercise in Jagatsinghpur district and found that Naupal village in the Kusupur Panchayat at Balikuda block of Jagatsinghpur district was the most affected village due to lack of mangrove cover.

A meeting was organised at Naupal, where the RCDC staff explained  why Naupal was among the most affected villages, and recommended the need for mangrove plantation in the area.

In 2013, the villagers of Naupal, procured and planted 4,500 mangrove saplings from local NGOs. Unfortunately, the saplings were adversely affected by Cyclone Phailin that occurred within a few months of the plantation activity. The saplings that survived did not grow well. The varieties planted were Sinduka and Bani. 

In the next phase of mangrove plantation, the villagers were more careful and decided to plant more saplings and grow the saplings locally. The idea of growing mangrove saplings locally appealed to villagers because it seemed sustainable, and would also open up new livelihood possibilities for the community.

Monitoring

A Gram Paribartan Committee (GPC) was constituted in the village to monitor mangrove plantations. The GPC identified five households in the hamlet of Naupal. The families that were selected had working experience of managing mangrove nurseries.

A female member from each of the chosen households was selected as a representative. For supervision, each household was paid Rs. 168 per day for 26 days of work in a month by the RCDC. One family member would supervise for 26 days in a month. As the project would pay all their input costs, the saplings would be the property of the project once they were ready for plantation.

The five households maintained 25 mangrove beds altogether. Each bed contained 5500 saplings. Out of 25 beds, 17 were devoted to Bani, six to Kaliachua and two to Rai, types of mangrove species available and flourishing in the area. 

Selection of nursery site

The selection of a site for mangrove nursery is the first important step in the nursery establishment. The location of the nursery influences the survival rate of saplings. Some important criteria to considered are as below: 

• Relatively flat land
• Closeness to fresh water sources
• Easy transportation access
• Good drainage (not waterlogged)
• Mechanisms to allow periodic inundation
• Access to good quality salt and fresh water
• Shade regulation
• Good quality propagation
• Proximity to the planting site

“Supervision of mangrove saplings is critical as crabs tend to eat the seedlings. It is necessary to do the weeding work regularly and also to ensure that the main and feeder canals do not get clogged”, says Gurupada Das, a resident of Naupal.

A similar process of mangrove plantation was simultaneously carried out in the Rajnagar block of Jagatsinghpur district which has resulted in raising 38,000 saplings.

Here, six households took care of the entire operations. In all 65,500 saplings have been planted in the project site and preliminary assessment shows a survival rate of 70% which is very encouraging. 

Work on the mangrove nursery continued for nine months since October 2014. It required three months to set up the nursery and then six months of supervision. The plantation work began in July 2015 and ended in August 2015.  

"Mangrove plantation work provided employment to the villagers, reduced migration and improved agricultural activities in our area," says Ms Jayanti Das, another resident of Naupal, in a jubilant mood.

Benefits of Mangrove cover:

• Mangroves also provide fuel wood and construction materials. They attract a variety of fish and crabs, presenting another livelihood alternative. Once planted, mangroves tend to expand on their own as the trees drop seedlings as they grow, which then constitute new forests. The seedlings that float away also become the source of forests in suitable areas.

These villagers now feel that only mangroves can protect them from cyclones and sea surges. Mangrove plantation can become a livelihood option for a section of the community members who are landless or have lost their cultivable land to sea ingress or salinity.  

(Jagannath Chatterjee is a Senior Climate Justice researcher working with RCDC, Bhubaneswar.The views and opinions expressed in this article are those of the author, and do not necessarily reflect those of India Water Portal.)

‘Jat’ reservation and the rampage on a canal

For over a month in early 2016, Delhi and Haryana thrashed around, trying to deal with the mess created after Jat protestors demanding reservation for the community in Haryana, caused a 200 feet breach on the Munak Canal near Sonepat. Waves of menacing men, over five thousand in all, blocked the canal and laid siege using shovels and even a heavy earth mover. The two Irrigation Department employees stationed at the spot fled while the security personnel passively looked on. The 102 km long Munak canal which brings 700 cusecs of water, about 70 percent of Delhi’s water from Haryana, was left high and dry.

 Later that night when the Irrigation Department managed to open the mechanically operated gates and release 100 cusecs of water to Delhi, the mob struck yet again, following which the Army and paramilitary forces were called in to secure the canal. This rampage ensured that seven water treatment plants in Delhi lay idle due to disruption in raw water supply from the Munak canal to Delhi. The damage to the Munak canal affected the production at the Dwarka water treatment plant, leading to a major water crisis in the metro’s sub-city. Water supply to most other parts of Delhi resumed within days but the 40-MGD capacity Dwarka water treatment plant remained dry for over a month. Delhi’s Water Resources Minister, Kapil Mishra termed the damage to the Munak Canal in Haryana ‘scary’.

This was partly a caste assertion to bolster the waning political and social might of the Jat community in Haryana. The violence also had an element of regionalism, with a view to ‘advance’ the causes of the region -- the contentious Munak issue between Delhi and Haryana being the face of the deep schism between regions.

The region where the violence played out was in Haryana’s stretches of alluvial plains of the river Yamuna, a river which has been at the center of a bitter dispute between Delhi and Haryana.

Prosperous agriculturists now faced with crisis

This is a region where huge public investments have gone in during the post independence period in terms of power distribution, irrigation facilities, roads and modern markets for agricultural produce. High-value, water-intensive crops are grown in the area. The “bulk of capital formation in agriculture, both public and private, has gone toward irrigation facilities” (1) here, through canal and groundwater development. The green revolution introduced water-intensive rice-wheat cropping system to the area, doing away with the less water-intensive crops suited to the region.

Sections like Jats, a hardworking community, have dominated the political life of the state for long. Over the years, following the accumulative path of commercial agriculture, these sub-state actors and ‘identity’ makers have become increasingly powerful. But off late, the many-sided agrarian crisis has fueled a sense of socio-economic-political deprivation that has left the region vulnerable. The commercial ‘viable’ farmer now lacked a guaranteed income should there be a crop failure, and also had no other employment options. Output growth in agriculture had declined, input prices had shot up, crop yield had stagnated, bank credit to farmers declined, irrigation infrastructure was failing and agricultural extension services had crumpled. Private investment in agriculture in the region was unable to make up for the decline in public investment. The present situation was a part of a deeper crisis.

Canal water dispute turns two states into bitter foes

The Munak Canal is a part of the larger 325 km long Western Yamuna Canal that takes off from the Hathnikund barrage, built on the upper stretches of the river Yamuna. Actually,  the Western Yamuna (Jumna) Canal is nothing new and dates back to the 14^th century (2). The canal was remodeled by the British during 1870-1882, when the famous barrage on river Yamuna at Tajewala with a supply of 16000 cusecs was built. It is only after the river’s five riparian states in the upper reaches (Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Haryana, Delhi and Rajasthan) signed the Upper Yamuna water sharing agreement during the 1990s, after which the Hathnikund barrage was planned with World Bank assistance, to replace the aging Tajewala barrage.

The Hathnikund barrage is located after the river traverses about 200 km through the hills. The barrage constructed just 3 kms upstream of Tajewala with a supply of 20000 cusecs became operational by end 2002. Thus Haryana, through the dam at Hathnikund and the extensive canal system is in a position to control how much water will flow downstream through the Western Yamuna Canal.

Haryana is especially at loggerheads with Delhi over water sharing and resents that Delhi is coercing it to part with its share. Haryana has for long argued that being the upper riparian state it has primacy of rights over Yamuna waters or canal waters flowing through its territory, even when the state does not have a single perennial river.

The residuary flows are left to Delhi, a lower riparian state, along the lines of the 1994 MoU between the Upper Yamuna Basin states. Delhi believes that even though it is downstream it has as much right to the river as Haryana, which in any case is dependent on rainwater and groundwater, and receives water from upper riparian States. Delhi disputes that Haryana does not supply enough water to Delhi’s Haiderpur and Wazirabad water treatment plants, even when the latter is bound to do so per a 1996 Supreme Court order.

The other point of contention is the Munak canal, also known as ‘augmentation canal’ or carrier-lined channel (CLC), which stands out from the rest of the canals of the Western Yamuna Canal. The 69 km long canal was constructed to check seepage losses along the Western Yamuna Canal and to augment its supply. Delhi which draws most of its water through the canal had paid for its lining and had saved some 80 MGD of water. Delhi disputes that this saved water, now available to Haryana, rightfully belongs to it.

Water share propped up as the cause of agrarian distress

The real cause of the distress in agriculture was never taken up by the political parties or even civil society. That a canal, the Munak canal, was a source of their misery was drummed into the minds of the masses, as a part of a divisive propaganda. The matter of interstate share of waters was shored up as the most important cause of agrarian distress. As in the case of most river water disputes, here too, from regional chauvinist outfits to peasant organizations -- all chose to highlight the “issue of the inter-state distribution of river waters as the most important problem of the peasantry” (3). Here the interest of the caste and the region was asserted against another in a hostile way through the rampage on the canal and wide scale violence destroying infrastructure amounting to over 20000 crores.

There was a false counterposing of the interests of the large masses of people settled in Delhi, many of them migrants from the neighbouring States like Haryana struggling to eke out a living, often managing with meager access of ‘Haryana waters’ with the vast masses of agriculturists in Haryana struggling to deal with the present agricultural crisis. Stealing a plank of the agitationer’s platform, the harebrained response of the State Government in this case was one of competitive chauvinism. It decided to satisfy the demand of the protestors disregarding the fact that it went against a recent legal precedent.

In both Haryana and Delhi, a confrontationist posture on water distribution among States is immediately taken up while a stoic silence maintained as to which interest groups have how much access to waters within the State.

Further, in this case, the riverside villages have been ignored and run dry, as the river waters have been diverted through canals. One such village is Kanalsi, along the river. Only a few decades back the Yamuna flowed rapid and burly, sustaining the lives of millions of people. “But the river has now been reduced to a trickle in its stretches with all the water diverted through the canal”, point affected villagers. “Nothing is left of the mighty river as it was four decades ago and many riverside villages got excluded from the command”, says Anil Sharma of Kanalsi village, who heads a local river protection group in the area.

Haryana’s need for more and more water for agriculture and other sectors

Biases against demand management continue and per a study by Manoj Mishra et al “Water situation in the Yamuna river basin in the state of Haryana, currently threatened from poor management of surface water, over draft of ground water, water misuse, waste and pollution, can be improved through better understanding, appropriate policy, regulatory measures and necessary attitudinal change in the users” (4). Better irrigation practices that yield ‘more crop per drop’ can free water for uses like drinking and domestic use. Per an article in RUPE “in India, yields per unit of water consumed are 10 to 30 per cent lower in irrigated areas than in unirrigated areas”. (5)

Haryana in particular suffers from widespread waterlogging and salinity issues as it fights for its water share. Can the water supply in Haryana be maintained or even increased by improving its irrigation canals and water delivery systems below the outlet level, without reducing Delhi’s water share? While Haryana blames Delhi for the wastage and mismanagement of water resources, what about its own practices especially in agriculture, a major water user that utilizes about 94 percent of the state’s water supply?

While measures need to be taken up at the municipal level to conserve water – like rainwater harvesting or groundwater recharge, the issue of inefficient water use in agriculture gets neglected. It is high time that the point of an appropriate shift of cropping pattern suited to the region is taken up and steps put in place to ensure that irrigation water, be it canal or groundwater is not monopolized by a few.

The capital’s need for more and more water and the Munak canal

Per Sohail Hashmi’s impressive documentation, the city with its ingenious water management system did not depend upon the Yamuna waters just 100-years back. But today, Delhi with a population of 167 lakhs and a water need of around 1050 million gallons per day (MGD) depends on its upper riparian States from where it gets about 750 MGD of water. The main sources of water are Yamuna, Ganga and Bhakra Beas Management Board (BBMB), while the Upper Yamuna River Board makes the seasonal allocations (6). Apart from this, the city’s water utility – Delhi Jal Board draws around 100 MGD of groundwater through Ranney wells and tubewells. Some water is stealthily drawn by individuals, industry and water mafia. The city continues to have high transmission losses in its water distribution amounting to almost 42 % per a CAG report (2013) (7).

Delhi is rightly painted as a water guzzler and its per capita availability (8) of water at over 220 litres per capita per day (lpcd) highlighted. What is hidden is the variation across the posh and humbler parts of the city - - 29 lpcd in Mehrauli, 509 lpcd in Delhi Cantonment Board areas and 462 lpcd in NDMC area (CSE, 2012) (9). Per most reports the entire city is blamed for water ‘mismanagement’. The prejudice in distribution between various sections within the city went unquestioned for long and became a live political concern only during the last elections.

Water share

The 1994 MoU on the water agreement between States in Upper Yamuna Basin provides for creation of the Upper Yamuna River Board, primarily to regulate the allocation of available flows amongst the states of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh and Delhi and also for monitoring the return flows. Per this MoU, if the available quantity of water is less than the assessed quantity, drinking water will be first allocated to Delhi and the balance will then be distributed proportionally to sharing states of Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Himachal Pradesh. Agreement was also reached on maximizing the utilization of surface flow of Yamuna.

The share of Yamuna water for Delhi per 1994 MoU is 0.724 billion cubic metres (BCM), subject to construction of storage dams in the upper reaches. The share is received at two points – Hathnikund, carried through Western Yamuna Canal and Delhi sub-branch (381 cusec) and Wazirabad in Delhi (369 cusec). The losses from Hathnikund to Munak are 13 percent and from Munak to Haiderpur are 30 percent amounting to 80 MGD or 148 cusecs. The Delhi Government paid for concrete lining of the parallel lined canal (Carrier Lined Channel) at Munak to avail benefit of this water saving.

The canal is operational since 2012. “But Haryana has diverted water from the CLC to a regular canal, downstream of Munak, a little before Delhi-Haryana border. This is already in use by Haryana to carry its share of water to parts of its state beyond Delhi… Delhi government claims banking on this additional 80 MGD as its natural right as and when the Munak CLC is fully operational, and the DJB has already built WTP at Dwarka (40 MGD capacity) in west Delhi, Bawana (20 MGD capacity) in northwest Delhi and Okhla (20 MGD) in south Delhi. However, Haryana has refuted the claims.” (10) It also is objecting to Delhi’s unauthorized Munak cut that takes waters for Delhi’s Dwarka Water Treatment Plant. The matter was taken to the Upper Yamuna River Board by Haryana in 2011, which directed Delhi to close the gap till the time Munak CLC is completed., Delhi meanwhile claims that it receives 30 MGD less than its share.

Is there a way out of this?

A water dispute like this is not intractable, especially when there is an official mechanism in place to settle the dispute on Munak water share. But this is likely to take an inordinately long period before it is settled, and during this period the issue will continue to be whipped up by various interest groups.

Endnotes and references

SC directs Centre to prepare National Disaster Plan, implement MGNREGA, Food Security Act to tackle drought

As the drought affects 33 crore people across 256 districts, the impact of drought on economy has been pegged at Rs 6,50,000 crore. Taking note of the situation, the Supreme Court has ordered the Central Government to formulate a national plan on drought management at the earliest, till the end of 2016 and revise the current drought manual. Along with this, it has also directed the Centre and the States to implement the Mahatama Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) and the National Food Security Act.

Parliamentary Panel raps Environment Ministry over river cleaning operations

The Parliamentary panel has pulled up the Environment Ministry for not allocating adequate funds for cleaning rivers and water bodies, calling it a 'self-defeating' approach. Out of the allocated Rs 66.73 crore during 2015-16, the Ministry has been able to utilise only Rs 37.35 crore. Along with this, the Panel has termed the deadline set by Centre for converting polluting industries located along the Ganga into zero liquid discharge units as 'unrealistic' and has asked the Water and Environment Ministry to jointly revisit their targets and ensure they are achieved by March 2017.

World Culture Festival: NGT pulls up panel for delay

Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, Chairman of the Art of Living Organisation, has been served with two contempt notices for violating the orders of the National Green Tribunal (NGT) with regard to the World Cultural Festival that was organised on the banks of the Yamuna river in Delhi in March. Accepting the petitions filed by Manoj Misra and Anand Arya, the NGT will be hearing the case on May 25. The Spiritual Guru has violated the Tribunal's orders by first releasing enzymes into the Yamuna river without getting due permissions and second, flouted the court orders by terming the Rs.5 crore environment penalty imposed on him as "politically motivated".

Centre sanctions Rs 1,345 crore to Rajasthan to tackle drought

Following the review meeting between the Prime Minister and Rajasthan Chief Minister, Centre has allocated an additional amount of Rs 1,345 crore to the State to tackle drought and water scarcity. Under the National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF), an amount of Rs 911.64 crore has been released to the State. Also, in addition to Rs 827.25 crore released as Central share of State Disaster Response Fund (SDRF) for 2015-16, the first installment of Rs 434.25 crore has been released to the State under the SDRF for 2016-17. 

Karnataka Government gets strict with 26 engineers involved in Rs 34 crore irrigation scam

The Minor Irrigation Minister of Karnataka has suspended 26 engineers suspected to be involved in the Rs 34.35 crore scam in the development of minor irrigation tanks in Koppal and Kushtagi taluks. These employees have been charged with producing bills to claim money without executing work of dredging tanks. The Minister will be soon informing the State Chief Minister about the issue and will seek a CID inquiry into it. 

This is a roundup of important policy matters from May 10-17, 2016. Also read last week's news roundup.

Lead image source: Pushkarv via Wikipedia.

India escapes impacts of cyclone Roanu while it creates havoc in Sri Lanka and Bangladesh

Last week, the country was hit by tropical cyclone Roanu, Bay of Bengal’s first cyclone of the monsoon season. The cyclone brought heavy showers in Odisha, West Bengal and Andhra Pradesh, but did not have any severe impacts on the three States. However, it has created havoc in both Sri Lanka and Bangladesh, leaving behind a death toll of 64 and 23, respectively, caused by floods and rain-triggered landslides. But for the three Indian States, it has come as a boon for it has given an opportunity to farmers in these states to prepare fields for kharif paddy well in advance. 

Drought situation worsens in the country

Water levels in the country's major reservoirs has dipped to 18% of their storage capacity, which is well below their 10-year average. Out of the 91 major reservoirs, 85 have less than 40% water and most of these reservoirs are in the southern peninsula including Maharashtra and Gujarat. In Marathwada, the situation has gone so bad that the storage level in the region's dams has dropped to just 1%.

Set up task force to study the impact of drip irrigation: PM Modi

Prime Minister has ordered to set up a task force to study the economic impact of drip irrigation in Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat and Maharashtra on parameters like water saving and productivity. Also, during his latest monthly radio programme 'Mann Ki Baat', PM has urged for a mass movement to save forests and conserve "every drop" of water during the upcoming monsoon season. Along with this, he has asked Niti Ayog to study best practices on water conservation for their replication all over the country. 

WII launches conservation program for the Gangetic Dolphin

The Wildlife Institute of India (WII) has launched a conservation program for the Gangetic Dolphin which is on the verge of extinction. Under the program, WII will conduct a status survey and long-term monitoring of the species, develop protocols and procedures and restore critical habitats of the dolphins in the country. The Centre has already sanctioned Rs 23 crore for the conservation of the aquatic mammal.   

UN report reveals threat to 40 million Indians from rising sea levels

Per the UN environment report, titled 'Global Environmental Outlook (GEO-6): Regional Assessments', nearly 40 million Indians will be at risk from rising sea levels by 2050. Moreover, the report has mentioned that people in Mumbai and Kolkata will be exposed the most to coastal flooding in future due to rapid urbanisation and economic growth. India is being followed by Bangladesh, China, and the Philippines. Also, the report claims that seven of the 10 most vulnerable countries worldwide are in the Asia Pacific region.

This is a roundup of important news updates from May 18-23, 2016. Also read last week's policy matters update.

Lead image source: NASA WorldView via Wikipedia.

A number of Asian countries are going through environmental crisis. Nowhere is the impact felt so seriously than in India, where the crisis threatens to affect survival. It is also impacting biodiversity, ecology and livelihoods. In this context, it becomes important to understand how nature and the current environmental crisis are being addressed in policy discourses.

This book, 'Business Interests and the Environmental Crisis' edited by Kanchi Kohli and Manju Menon and published by Sage publications, dwells on these pertinent questions. It argues that the current development discourse has been borrowed from the economic principles, leading to the commodification of nature and its resources, turning them into products with costs assigned to them.

Commodification of nature and the role of big businesses in conservation

Why has conservation assumed importance then? This has to do with the rising involvement of private players in businesses involving natural products and the market value assigned to them. Natural products are becoming increasingly scarce, threatening the existence of huge businesses that harness them for profit. This is forcing the private players, as well as the government, to take measures to conserve natural resources.

Big businesses have now assumed the role of leaders in solving the environmental crisis. Concerned about their own business prospects, several large corporations are supporting the stand taken by international organisations on conservation. The book informs that the formal dialogues organised by international conventions and global congregations on the environment now involve not just the affected parties, but private organisations as well. The mediators of the conflicts at these congregations are often scientists, policy makers, economists, legal experts, NGOs, environmental activists, indigenous leaders and heads of state. 

Parallels between environmental dialogues and business negotiations

Environmental dialogues have assumed the form of negotiations, similar to business agreements, where the vested interests of the corporations are passed off as philanthropic initiatives for a better world or a greener planet. These business-like agreements raise a number of ethical, legal dilemmas and controversies as they are often found to blur the boundaries between public and private, choice and obligation, production and consumption, benefits and costs and legality and corruption.

The book talks about these 'experts' of environmental problems who can be found everywhere--in villages and cities, in courtrooms, government chambers, corporate boardrooms and international conference halls--where scarcity of nature is looked at as nothing more than economic loss. The discussions in these meetings view nature's goods as commodities to be priced, owned, exploited, controlled or regulated by a few at the cost of the others.

The language of economics and outcomes of these business-led solutions

Do these solutions for business interests result in sustainable, equitable outcomes? The book presents a collection of essays that addresses this question. The essays are organised into two separate sections. The first section includes four chapters that highlight how the policy discourse, based on economic principles, creates new definitions of nature. This essentially leads to the commodification of nature and the alienation of local communities from their knowledge, resources and livelihoods. The next section includes four chapters that deal with the politics of participation, where alternative views are discussed to democratise the discourse for equitable outcomes.

Section I: Examining nature in business

Chapter 1: Bringing liquidity to life, markets for ecosystem services and the new political economy of extinction
This chapter highlights how scientific and ecological discourses have gradually adopted the language of economics to accomodate reigning economic doctrines; how financialisation has gradually led to the rise of market-based conservation policy and its frameworks.

Chapter 2: Claiming benefits, making commodities
Naturally occurring bioresources often do not have territorial limits and local communities play a major role in maintaining and sharing them at the local level. This chapter highlights how global and national regulations have changed this, leading to not just the commodification of bioresources and people's knowledge, but the setting up of markets where they are traded, leading to loss of voice of local communities and unequal means of benefit sharing.

Chapter 3: The abstract nature of building
This chapter presents the examples of three large infrastructural projects in Indian cities and demonstrates how the nature and the socio-ecological spaces in nature have been commodified and transformed into spaces that cater to the needs of national and international businesses while robbing the marginalised communities of their livelihoods.

Chapter 4:  Coal accounting: The story of fuel kept cheap
This chapter looks at how the politics of natural-resource accounting has led to coal being portrayed as the nation's fuel even when it has been found to cause huge environmental and social losses, wastage of public funds and violation of laws.

Section II: Democratic governance of nature

Chapter 5: Value as a justification in water resource development
This chapter highlights how commodification of natural resources has led to placing value on every aspect of nature. This has also led to considering something of no immediate use to humans as useless. The chapter gives examples of how this approach has influenced our idea of rivers and the belief that any water that cannot be taken up for human use is waste. The chapter argues for the need to democratise the concept of value in water-resource development.

Chapter 6: The effectiveness and equity of payments for reducing forest loss
Although efforts have been made in the past years to design PES and REDD+ schemes that can be more equitable and socially just, these are based on assumptions that individual actions are mainly driven by financial incentives and that forests can be commodified, privatised and commercialised. However, it has been found that individuals or traditional communities have restored forests for a number of reasons other than financial and these schemes might marginalise the communities further.

Chapter 7: Selling nature: Narratives of coercion, resistance and ecology
This chapter looks at the historical process that changed the forest landscape in Northern Bengal in the 19th and 20th centuries at great economic, social and ecological costs and how it led to the commodification and the destruction of forests and the exploitation of local communities in search of cheap labour. It traces the forest policies in the post-colonial era, the beginning of forest movement in North Bengal that argued for the need to have institutional mechanisms that looked at the social, ecological and economic needs of forest communities and the impact of the latest wave of neoliberal commodification of forests on the movement.

Chapter 8: Putting peoplehood at the centre of the green economy
This chapter attempts to solve the central problem of green economy by answering questions on the limits of commodification and the nature of a property by dwelling on the dominant assumptions around personhood and the nature of the markets. 

The book provides a very timely commentary on the current scenario where natural resources and habitats are increasingly becoming scarce, a number of conflicts between marginalised communities and big corporations have brought some serious issues--of development and displacement, natural and tailored environments, the right to natural resources and the control over it--to the forefront. It questions the very idea of business-led, mechanical solutions to the current environmental crisis that threaten to destroy the environment at the costs of the local, marginalised and poor communities and their livelihoods.

Through these chapters, the book aptly points at the inadequacies of these business-led solutions to find sustainable, inclusive, localised and appropriate alternatives and the political and ecological limits of this business-oriented approach. The book does not provide any easy solutions, but questions the very idea of regulation and the control of nature as a resource and the various ways in which this brings up ethical, legal dilemmas that one will need to deal with in the future.

A copy of the book can be bought from this site

Ramesh Mali, a farmer in his late thirties, looks at his farmland nervously. It has been 13 days since the Simhastha Maha Kumbh festival, 2016, concluded. The district administration had acquired his four bigha land (approximately 0.64 hectares) for the festival. The barricades and the concrete left on his land give us the idea that the land is not fit for farming this season. He does not know what to do with his farmland when the monsoon arrives.

The district administration was bound to return his farmland in the same condition as it was before the festival within one week of Simhastha. But, it seems that the government and the district administration are working at a snail’s pace. It is tough for a poor farmer like Ramesh to continue his farming if the situation on his soil does not change. His loss amounts to Rs 2 lakhs.

The festival and after

The Simhastha Maha Kumbh festival, the religious extravaganza that happens once in every 12 years, was held in Ujjain from April 22-May 21, 2016. Almost five crores of pilgrims across the world took a holy dip in the Kshipra river during this period.

The government had acquired 3277 hectares of agricultural land from more than 3500 farmers to construct 40,000 toilets and facilities to provide water for drinking as well as bathing, parking, and more.

The government claims to have returned the farmland to 60 per cent of the farmers.  But according to farmer Ratanlal Mali, not even 10 per cent of the farmers have got their land back in a condition that they had handed it over to the government for the festival.

Chagan Lal Mali, another farmer from Gaughat, received Rs 7000 as compensation for his four bigha farmland in the last week of May this year. The loss incurred by him is more than Rs 2 lakhs. He is the only earning member of his family of five. He is now worried about his family’s sustenance in the coming months.

“The farmers of Ujjain have to bear a loss of Rs 3-3.5 lakhs per hectare, which amounts to more than Rs 100 crores. What the government paid us is just peanuts. We have to invest Rs 60,000 to Rs 1 lakh per hectare to bring our land to its original condition. Who will pay for this additional burden?” asks another farmer, 65-year-old Dhara Singh Mali.

Destruction of the land and animals

It’s not just the farmers and their families who are suffering; even the livestock in Ujjain are bearing the brunt of the government’s apathy. There are more than 8000 domestic animals like cow, ox and goats in Ujjain.  More than 70 per cent of these animals are milch. But all the grass had been removed from the land in Ujjain for Simhastha and the farmers had to bear the extra cost of Rs 200-300 per day to feed their animals. Some of the farmers in the area, like Ramesh Mali, could not even afford to feed his cow daily resulting in the death of one cow from starvation. 

Go around this area and you will see thousands of collapsed toilets, its debris, human waste around the toilets and plastic waste everywhere. Seeing what the government mismanagement has left of Ujjain, it seems like a paradox that this is the same city that the government had touted as one with the potential to be a smart city.

“During Simhastha, Ujjain Municipal Corporation has appointed more than 4000 cleaning workers to clean the city, but after the event, the overall responsibility was shifted to just 200 employees. It is not possible for us to clean the entire town in a week with the current workforce. Go and ask higher authorities to clean this mess now,” says a cleaning worker of Ujjain Municipal Corporation, Vijay Bali.

The Kshipra river, on the banks of which the religious extravaganza was held, too is suffering. The water from Narmada was pumped into Kshipra to keep the water clean during the festival. Now, the Narmada river no longer cleans Kshipra. The sewerage from the Khan river and other drains of Ujjain is once again going into Kshipra. When contacted, the government officials did not show any interest in responding to the critical queries related to the financial irregularities during the festival. Recently, the leaders from the opposition party demanded a white paper on the irregularities during Simhastha and alleged that the government rules were overlooked during the construction work in Ujjain. The amount of money spent on Simhastha and the poor construction work done are raising doubts of a big scam.

During Simhastha, all the ghats were flooded with people waiting to take a holy dip in Kshipra. But, within 15 days of the festival, the water quality of Kshipra has deteriorated. It now has a stench and is not even fit for bathing and other domestic use. 

“Would the chief minister or any other minister like to take a holy dip now?” asks an agitated resident of Ujjain, Ramesh Gosar.

See the impact of Simhastha:

See more pictures here.

Power firms’ loss due to water shortage is Rs 2400 crore this year: Greenpeace

According to the new report by Greenpeace titled, Water demands of coal power plants in drought affected regions of India, the country has lost almost seven billion units of electricity causing a revenue loss of Rs 2400 crore to the power firms in just the first five months of this year. The losses are attributed to the water shortage from the drought that has affected nearly 330 million people across 19 states. The worst affected coal-power plants have been the National Thermal Power Corporation at Farraka, Adani Power at Tiroda, GMR at Warora, Mahagenco at Parli and the Karnataka Power Corporation at Raichur. These power plants had to suffer repeated shut downs and cuts in electricity generation due to the lack of cooling water. 

ADB okays irrigation loan to TN and Odisha

The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has approved loans of $100 million and $120 million to improve the irrigation and water management infrastructure in Tamil Nadu (TN) and Odisha respectively. In TN, the investment programme will focus on six major irrigation water channels in Vennar sub-basin of Cauvery Delta, while in Odisha, the selected areas are the Baitarani, Brahmani, Budhabalanga and Subernarekha river basins and parts of Mahanadi delta. In Tamil Nadu, the project will support both physical improvements and stronger water management of the Vennar irrigation network that is no longer able to meet the coastal community needs. In Odisha, the loan will be utilised for improving irrigation in over 1,00,000 hectares and strengthening of Water User Associations (WUAs) and the institutional capacity of Odisha's Department of Water Resources. 

Delay of Ken-Betwa project national crime: Uma Bharti

Terming the attempt to delay the ambitious Ken-Betwa project as a ‘national crime’, Union Water Resources Minister Uma Bharti has threatened to go on a hunger strike if the river-linking project is further delayed. The minister is firm on not reducing the height of the dam and has claimed that the project is going to benefit 70 lakh people in Bundelkhand and Marathwada while affecting just 7,000 people. She has also ascertained to save the tigers and the other animals of Panna Tiger Reserve along with the project-affected people if the environment nod is given to the project. The Ken-Betwa river-linking project was to take off in December last year. It got delayed as it is awaiting the wildlife clearance. 

CSIR all set to find groundwater hot spots

The Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) is planning to take up a National Water Mapping Programme. The objective of the exercise is to find groundwater hot spots, map the structures, and measure salinity and other characteristics. Such a mapping exercise using helicopter-borne transient electromagnetic technologies has already been conducted by CSIR-National Geophysical Research Institute (NGRI) in six regions across India. As per the NGRI chief scientist, mapping of all the aquifers across the country will cost around Rs 12,000 crore over the span of 10 years. Post the mapping, a real time tracking of groundwater sources can be done which will help in preparing 3D map structure to show up to 300 metre beneath the surface. 

Vembanad sediments loaded with mercury

The investigation conducted by the Kerala University of Fisheries and Ocean Studies (Kufos) has found alarming levels of toxic heavy metals like mercury in the sediments on the floor of the Vembanad lake near the industrial belt in Kochi. The study that was confined to the northern arm of the lake at the Periyar region has revealed presence of mercury to be 20 times higher than the permissible limit at one of the survey points. The data, however, indicated that the mercury levels went negligible when proceeding towards the southern region. The experts have warned that the entry of heavy metals into humans through fishes can pose severe health hazards.

This is a roundup of important news updates from May 31-June 10, 2016. Also read last fortnight's policy matters update.

Gajanand Sharma is excited about the monsoon this year. He is building an anicut on the small stream that runs through his farm. “After the rain, the land will be filled with water and then I will sow wheat and reap record production in this area,” he prophesises. This forecast doesn’t come from his knowledge of astrology, but that of geology, gained over the years.

Anicut is a cement wall erected perpendicular to the natural flow of a river or a stream. The excess water overflows the walls while the water it can hold, gradually seeps down the earth, raising the groundwater level and replenishing wells. The water also brings fertile silt from upstream, enriching the land beneath it. This monsoon, Sharma’s farm at Ghewar village on the southern edge of Sariska Tiger Sanctuary in Alwar district of Rajasthan will witness this. The anicut will also recharge over a dozen wells downstream; the reason why the neighbouring farm owners too have chipped in with labour and finances.  

Besides anicuts, the region has several johads (ponds), medhbandhi (farm bunds) and a rich forest, that turn 20 villages in a radius of 160 square kilometres water surplus. The most evident indicator of the ecological wealth here is Nanduwali, the river which had gone completely dry once, but filled up again after the water table rose and seeped into its channels.  

When it was worse

There was a time when these farmers believed that crops grow only with the rainfall on their farms and in wells. They had little knowledge about the underground movement of the water and how that can be enhanced.  

“We were heavily dependent on rain and were reaping very little harvest. Only one third of the land could be cropped. Wells would dry up frequently forcing us to migrate to earn a living,” recalls Sharma who spent five years in Delhi doing odd jobs.

The condition of the lower caste families was worse. They either had no land or an infertile patch allotted from the common land belonged to the village. The women would walk 2.5km to Nandoo village, which had more upper caste families, who gave them butter milk in return for managing animal waste. Men would work on others’ farms and get a small share of whatever grew in the good monsoon year. Those with fields and livestock also saw difficult times forcing them to sell their buffaloes because they could not afford to feed them. Huge money had to be spent on the transportation of fodder. Many families replaced the buffaloes with goats.

Today, Ghewar is dotted with pucca houses, good strength of livestock and abundant vegetable farms. A tourist resort has also come up on the outskirts offering rural life experience to the city bred looking for a break from the urban life. Water is available at 40-50 feet despite the monsoon deficit of over 40 per cent last year. 

But it’s not just about the water-harvesting structures or the wealth attained that make Ghewar and surrounding villages unique. Had it been so, many regions in Rajasthan have seen a spurt of watershed-management activities and subsequent growth in agriculture. But the real test takes place when these structures break down and the financial support withdrawn. 

Beginning of a change 

Brothers Kunj Bihari and Satish Kumar from Nandoo village wanted to make their region water surplus. But the weak local economy and a divided society were the biggest barriers to their aspiration. 

“Despite being a local, it took me one year to gain the confidence of the people. Even though johads are heritage of this region, the loss of traditional wisdom made people doubt if building johads and conserving the forest can assure more water in the wells. The real task was to make all castes sit and work together,” says Kunj Bihari. 

Another challenge was to make the villagers self-reliant. Sambhaav Trust, which supported the work initially, was clear that the society has to partly fund the rejuvenation work. The villagers did not have money to contribute, but they chipped in with labour as part of their 25 per cent share. 

The good result yielded from the first johad built in Ghewar village helped. “In the first year, the water level of a well near the johad went up by 50 feet. This was real evidence of what we had been trying to explain. Once they started trusting us, all social boundaries were broken because everybody wanted to prosper. They were ready to meet all conditions,” Kunj Bihari says. 

The brothers also depended a lot on the knowledge of the elderly, who recalled the systems once prevalent to connect the society with nature. In the past, the full moon and the new moon days were always kept for volunteer work which included strengthening johads or tree plantation. “We revived these traditions along with physical work. After all these years, everybody has realised the connection between social unity, ecology and farm production,” Kunj Bihari says.

Reconnecting with tradition

New red leaves are sprouting out of Dhaak (Butea monosperma/ flame of the forest) trees but the canopies of Kadam (Neolamarckia cadamba), Dhonk (Anogeissus pendula) and Khejri (Prosopis cineraria) are mature enough to merge and shield us from the harsh summer sun. Peacocks raise a ruckus as we drive towards the Hanuman temple in Jahaj region, north of Nandoo. The unmetalled road, full of rocks and shrubs, give way to moistened earth until it merges with water. This is the point of origin of Nanduwali river, which nourishes the farms and the wells of several villages in the region. Around 20 small streams join the river in its onward journey towards Manglasar dam. 

It’s difficult to imagine today that the whole stretch was once dry, but easy to comprehend why it’s flowing again. There was no plan to revive Nanduwali, but nature responded positively to the conservation efforts of the villagers.

In bygone times, the region used to have forests and grazing areas demarcated for specific purposes. If Dev Bani was a sacred grove never to be damaged, Rakhat Bani, a protected forest area, was to be used only during droughts. Kaankar was a forest area that separated the two villages and Charagah was the area for pasture. Dharadi pratha was another custom in which every caste had a sacred tree species. “Our caste has Khejri as its dharadi. We would pray to it on auspicious occasions, plant and nourish more of it and won’t allow anybody to harm it in front of us,” Kunj Bihari says. 

In these villages, all these traditional practices were revived and special forest -protection committees were formed which penalised those who disobeyed the rules. This put a halt on the corrupt forest officials who allowed the villagers to cut trees in exchange for grains and ghee. 

Thankfully, nature responded very well to such efforts. Today, there is little revenue land which is not covered by trees. Pipalvani is a stretch with hundreds of young pipal trees protected by the villagers. “More than plantation, it’s the protection from grazing that has helped with the green cover. Once villagers recognised the connection between forest, water and farming, they were willing to work with nature,” Kunj Bihari says. 

A credible indicator of this transformation is that while the out migration has stopped, the in migration has started. Many people from villages as far as 50km, are taking fields on lease here. “Now only youth go out for higher education or jobs. It’s different from compulsive migration for survival 20 years back,” Kunj Bihari says.

There are 15 families of Raika community in this area. Raikas are nomadic camel herders  at the bottom of the caste hierarchy living on whatever they get through occasional selling of camels. But they are now settled here and grow vegetables, wheat and mustard on 20 bigha of land which fetch them good money. “The land had no irrigation source earlier, but the construction of a johad nearby raised the water table. Now we have wells which irrigate the crops throughout the year,” says 30-year-old Jai Singh Raika. Buffaloes have replaced the camels and the community has pucca houses now.  

The resilient society

Gradually, when water conservation improved the agriculture production, the locals took over the financial responsibility. For the last three years, Sambhaav Trust has not spent money on the anicuts and johads that are being built. 

The locals build and maintain these structures and protect forests on their own while Kunj Bihari acts as a technical guide whenever the need arises. “Everybody is an engineer here. They not only know about the surface and the underground trajectory of water, but also the components of structures that can be built,” Kunj Bihari says. 

This knowledge has also led to better monitoring of government works as villagers are aware of the discrepancies in accounts and engineering. “Many times, the work done under the rural job scheme is of bad quality. Once we started objecting to that, not much work gets sanctioned for our villages. We are happy with that. At least public money is not being wasted,” says Sharma.

The success story has travelled far and wide. Today, both Satish and Kunj Bihari are guiding the neighbouring regions in similar efforts. Just like Nanduwali nourishes the fields and the lives on its course, the people living on its banks are empowering others with their knowledge. 

Former Delhi CM Sheila Dikshit to be probed in water tanker scam

Lieutenant governor Najeeb Jung has approved to take up the Anti-Corruption Branch (ACB) probe against the former chief minister of Delhi Sheila Dikshit for her alleged role in Rs 400 crore water tanker scam. The decision has been taken on the demand of the Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal seeking registration of case against the former CM. In June 2015, the Aam Aadmi Party government had formed a fact-finding committee to investigate the irregularities in hiring about 385 stainless steel water tankers by the Delhi Jal Board during Sheila Dikshit's rule in 2012.

Maharashtra wakes up to its water crisis
The Maharashtra government is planning to interlink all major dams in Marathwada to tackle the water crisis of the drought-hit areas of the state. Jayakwadi, Ujjani, Terna, Vishnupuri, Manjara, Yellara and Siddheshwari are the dams that would be interlinked under the project, worth Rs 2500 crore. Also, in Pune, the civic authority has decided to make treatment and recycling of wastewater mandatory and proposed strict penalty in case of violation, to cope with the water stress in the city.

Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana back with water ministry

The water ministry has once again become the nodal agency of the Pradhan Mantri Krishi Sinchayee Yojana (PMKSY) as most of the big projects and dams are executed under the ministry. The water ministry was initially the nodal agency of the scheme but then the responsibility was shifted to the agriculture department. Also, in a related development, a panel has been constituted to study the status of irrigation development and PMKSY in Meerut and Muzaffarnagar districts.

Environment ministry gives legal definition to ‘forests’ 

The environment ministry has legally defined forests under the Forest Conservation Act 1980 (FCA). So far, the FCA has laid down the provisions for protection of forests; however, no definition was given to them. The new definition has classified states into two--one where cadastral surveys were completed before the FCA came in to being and land records were settled for the entire state while another where this process was not completed and the confusion remains over what is a forest land. 

No time frame to assess black-necked crane habitat in Tawang

The environment ministry has dropped the time-frame of 45 days for conducting a study on black-necked crane habitat, located on the site for the proposed 780 MW Nyamjang Chhu hydropower project in Tawang district, Arunachal Pradesh. Earlier in its April order, the ministry had directed the Dehradun-based Wildlife Institute of India (WII) to conduct the study on the wintering habitat of black-necked crane within 45 days. However, after the opposition from the activists who doubted the possibility of conducting the study within 45 days, the ministry dropped its stipulated time frame. 

This is a roundup of important policy matters from June 11 -17, 2016. Also read last week's news roundup.

Vikram Patel, a 71-year-old farmer in Chidavad village of Dewas district in Madhya Pradesh is one of the first farmers to have embraced the idea of farm ponds to increase the groundwater level in his farm.

“For the last two decades, the Chidavad village in the Tonk Khurd block, was one among the parched villages in the Malwa region. The women of the village walked more than 3-5km just to bring drinking water home. The traditional water-harvesting practices had almost vanished from this region. The villagers had started migrating to other places in search of livelihood and the farmers were getting caught in debt traps,” says Patel. In 1984, when Patel took the initiative to build his first farm pond, nobody believed that it would reap benefits for him. But it did. 

The idea, however, found no takers until Raghunath Singh Tomar--another farmer from Tonk Khurd block--dug a farm pond in Harnavda during the acute water crisis in 2005. That year, he earned double the amount he spent on the farm pond from his farm.

The idea picks up

Since then, many farmers have taken the initiative to build farm ponds to improve the groundwater situation. There are more than 5000 farm ponds in the Tonk Khurd block now which have substantially improved the groundwater table in the area.

During the water crisis in the recent past, the farmers of Chidavad dug more than 1000 tube wells in their 250 acres of farmland in search of ground water, out of which, only 50 per cent was found to have the capacity to yield water. The farmers then decided to construct farm ponds around those tube wells that had water. “When we built farm ponds near the tube wells, we found the groundwater table to improve considerably,” says Baoji Daya, a farmer in his mid-40s. Chidavad village now has 200 farm ponds. 

These incidents prompted the Dewas district administration to encourage the farmers to build farm ponds as a solution to the water crisis in the area. As a result, the farmers constructed more than 10,000 farm ponds since 2006, but it is only in the Tonk Khurd block that the groundwater recharge has been a major success.

A different story

It’s not providence but its terrain that has favoured Tonk Khurd. The entire district stands on basalt rock. The basalt terrain is hard and water can enter the rock only through fractures. The water that seeps through these fractures gets collected in the void of the rock called aquifers. 

“The specialty of the Tonk Khurd terrain as per groundwater experts is the many fractures on the basalt rock beneath it. Due to these fractures on the rock, the land is pervious, enabling the water to seep through the fractures easily. Building farm ponds in such a terrain proved beneficial to the farmers as compared to the other blocks of Dewas with impervious landscape. After three to four years of building farm ponds in the Tonk Khurd area, the farmers have seen significant improvement in the groundwater availability,” says hydrogeologist Sunil Chaturvedi.

Going by the district groundwater information booklet of Dewas in 2013, only the Tonk Khurd, Bagli and Kannod blocks of the district have the groundwater level in the safe zone. In the Khategaon block, the groundwater is in semi-critical condition and Sonkatch and Dewas blocks are the most critical areas.

In 2012, Manthan Adhyayan Kendra--a non profit organisation in Barwani, Madhya Pradesh--working on water sector and policy issues in India published a case study on the privatised industrial water supply project in Dewas. It concluded that the industrial water needs and the drinking water needs of the people in Dewas were not adequately met even after procuring Narmada's water from a distance of 128km. The Dewas district and the adjoining areas of the Malwa region in Madhya Pradesh are facing water scarcity due to the withdrawal of large amounts of surface and ground water for industrial, agricultural and urban needs. 

The success of the improvement of groundwater table in Tonk Khurd cannot be entirely dedicated to the farm ponds. In addition to the ponds, the  farmers have adopted ways of recharging groundwater like drainage channels around the farm ponds and aquifers, soak pits around tube wells, rooftop harvesting, and more. 

The Dewas district is a good example of the fact that when it comes to solving water crisis, one size does not fit all. The groundwater recharge depends on the geomorphology of an area. Every village should develop its own groundwater recharge security plan. 

To manage groundwater, a two-fold approach is required:

•Large scale community participation

•Better groundwater governance by implementing smart regulations and legislations

"The Aquifer Management Programme by the government is an excellent initiative to help understand groundwater through aquifers. Collaboration on ideas and community partnerships hold the key to the success of groundwater management in India,” says groundwater expert, Dr Himanshu Kulkarni of Advanced Center for Water Resources Development and Management (ACWADAM), a non-profit organisation in Pune.

“Farmers should identify cropping pattern according to the availability of the groundwater, surface water, rainfall and the geographical terrain. The problem with most of our farmers in the country is that they are moving more towards water intensive crops like cotton, sugarcane, etc. and paying less attention to the alternatives which suit the climatic condition and the geographical terrain,” says Bhagawan ZagguKengar, a farmer in Yavatmal district in Maharashtra which is reeling under severe water crisis.

 In his seven-acre-farm, Vikram now grows fruits like mango, sapodilla (cheeku), pomegranate and vegetables like guard-bottle, scallion (green onions), etc. He earns a profit of Rs 1000 per day from his farm. He uses drip irrigation method to irrigate his field and uses water effectively without wasting it.

You can read about the benefits of farm ponds here.

Rural India walks too far to quench their thirst

Going by the 2011 census data, 63 percent of rural India does not have a source of drinking water at home and they walk more than 500m daily to get drinking water. The data has revealed that households in rural Odisha take the longest average walking time to reach a water source and once filled, their water jugs weigh nearly 20 kg. Even in urban areas, about 20 percent of household spend more than half-an-hour to reach the water sources.

Skeletal fluorosis takes away 36 lives in a Jharkhand village

In Garhwa’s Pratapur village in Jharkhand, 36 people have lost their lives to skeletal fluorosis, a disease caused by excessive fluoride in groundwater that accumulates in bones and weakens them considerably. It has been found that the water in the village has seven times more fluoride than the permissible limits which is the highest contamination in the state. Moreover, out of the 12 hand pumps in the area, only two of them are fixed with fluoride filters. 

Even the treated water of Yamuna is unfit for any purpose: Study

As per the study published in International Journal of Engineering Sciences and Research Technology, the water of the Yamuna river is so toxic, even expensive water treatment technologies are incapable of treating its polluted water. The river water has been found unsuitable for any use and its pH varies from 7.5 to 11.8 at different sampling points as against the prescribed limit of 7.4. However, the water quality was found to be good along areas where the river enters Delhi before the Wazirabad barrage.

App launched to monitor the water sources of Jharkhand

The chief minister of Jharkhand Raghubar Das has launched an app named Irrigation Source Monitoring System (I&SM) for monitoring the construction work of small irrigation sources. The app developed by Jharkhand Space Application Centre of Information Technology and the state’s e-governance department will update informaion on the irrigation sources through data and geo-tagged photographs. The state has set a target of constructing small ponds for the restoration of the rainwater. 

Karnataka’s 15 major rivers highly polluted: CPCB

According to the report of Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB), 15 major rivers in Karnataka are highly polluted at some stretches. Out of the samples collected from 61 locations of 25 rivers, water at 38 locations of 15 rivers was found to be highly polluted. Following the revelation, CPCB has ordered the Karnataka State Pollution Control Board (KSPCB) to take strict action against the pollution in the rivers and stop the release of effluents and sewerage from towns and cities into the rivers.

This is a roundup of important news updates from June 18 -24, 2016. Also read last week's policy matters update.

Floods grip many parts of the country

Heavy downpour in Maharashtra and Rajasthan has caused 10 deaths while thousands have been affected due to floods in Madhya Pradesh and Assam. In Uttarakhand, the water level in Ganga has risen considerably and people have been restricted from stepping down at the Ganga barrage. Also, a flood alert has been issued in low-lying areas in Bagalkot and Belagavi districts of Karnataka after Maharashtra released excess rain water into the Krishna river. 

Indus Water Treaty: Another issue of conflict between India and Pakistan 

Pakistan has warned India that it will move the International Court of Arbitration (ICA) against India over the construction of two hydropower projects on Jhelum and Chenab, the two rivers assigned to Islamabad under the 1960s Indus Waters Treaty. The two hydroelectric projects are 330 MW Kishenganga project on Jhelum’s tributary and 850 MW Ratle project on Chenab. However, India has pointed out that Pakistan’s decision to move the court of arbitration is in violation to the provisions of the Indus Water Treaty.

Rs 670 crore allocated to TN for water projects in Cauvery basin 

The Asian Development Bank has sanctioned a loan of Rs 670 crore to India for water projects at the Cauvery delta in Tamil Nadu. The aim of the project is to improve deteriorated infrastructure for farmers and to provide flood protection to residents. The loan will be utilised to strengthen embankments of six major irrigation water channels in the Vennar system and rehabilitate 13 irrigation pumping schemes at the Cauvery river basin. 

Jharkhand's small water bodies turn bane for locals

The small water bodies that were dug to enhance the irrigation potential of the state have become more of a disadvantage to the locals as they are turning death traps. Several incidences of drowning in these water bodies have been reported from the state. So far, the government has dug nearly 1,75,000 farm ponds across the state. After these casualties caught attention of the government, an advisory has been issued to the people to stay away from these water bodies and also to put a red flag near them to alert the passer by.

Glory brought back to 400-year-old stepwells in Hyderabad

The 400-year-old Badi Baoli in Qutb Shahi tombs has been brought back to its full glory, thanks to the efforts of Aga Khan Trust for Culture (AKTC). Three years ago, in 2013, the western wall of the Badi Baoli had collapsed from heavy rains, but after three years of consistent efforts, the step well has been brought back to life. Now the revived baoli can collect 10 lakh litres of water in this rainy season. Out of the six step wells in the premises of Qutb Shahi tombs, three have already been restored, while the remaining three will be revived soon. 

This is a roundup of important news updates from July 9 - 16, 2016. Also read last fortnight's policy matters update.

Take the roads of Punjab during the monsoon and you will find most fields turned into pools of water. It’s mainly the water pulled out from the underground vault to support the kharif crop of paddy. Neither a native plant nor suited to the agro-climatic region, paddy has pushed out maize and cotton, which were common in the pre-green revolution era. From 2,27,000 hectares in 1960, the area under paddy rose to 26,12000 hectares by the year 2000. A growth rate of 1,050 percent!

Last year, Punjab contributed 93.5 lakh tonnes of rice to the central pool, which was around 30 percent of the total stock. This, however, required 48,105 million cubic metres of water. In fact, estimates by the Commission for Agricultural Costs and Prices suggest that to grow one kilogram of rice, 5337 litres of water is required, which is double the figure for West Bengal (2605 litres), a natural habitat for the crop.

The conventional method of rice cultivation requires flood irrigation (730 mm per hectare) as it helps check the growth of weeds. This is why paddy was traditionally grown mostly on floodplains of rivers and around drains in Punjab. Expansion of irrigation canals and accessibility to groundwater through pumpsets meant more area could be brought under this crop. Allowance of free power to operate these pumpsets furthered the cause even though it came at the cost of receding groundwater table. As many as 81 percent blocks in the state are either overexploited or critical.

At present, the state has around 14 lakh tubewell power connections. In 1970, there were only 1.92 lakh tubewells.

How we plant

In 2009, Punjab passed the Punjab Preservation of Sub-Soil Water Act fixing the date for transplantation of paddy as June 10. Punjab government often extends the date by five days. This is done to take maximum benefit of monsoon rains for irrigation and to reduce pressure on the groundwater table. It has been found that the plantation done post June 10 reduces groundwater consumption by over eight percent while further shifting of plantation date by 10 days can reduce the consumption by more than 26 percent. 

“The transplantation date can also be fixed region or block wise depending on the groundwater situation there. Reducing the power supply to tubewells after one month of transplantation may also force the farmers keep the fields moist instead of flooded all the time,” says Dr Shergill.

A direct dilemma

The state government also promoted direct seeding of rice (DSR), which involves sowing the seeds instead of transplanting saplings. Baldev Singh of Talwandi Bhangeria village in central Punjab district of Moga practises DSR on 20 acre, saving on labour and fuel used to power pumpsets when power supply is erratic. “I have got a machine that drills the seeds in the soil. The only issue with DSR is that you have to take extra care for one and a half months as weeds may flourish due to less water. I get around a quintal more rice per acre than other farmers,” he says.

But DSR does not work everywhere. “It needs good loamy soil. Also, farmers are wary of this technique as they are more in groove with the conventional practice. Infestation of weeds requiring regular monitoring is another reason that DSR got restricted to few pockets,” says Dr Rangi. 

Same was the experience of Palwinder Singh who tried DSR on his fields at Suhari village in Gurdaspur district of northern Punjab. “I found the crop to be weak as the roots did not go very deep. It mainly works with heavy soil,” he says. Palwinder now practises system of rice (or root) intensification (SRI), which has many takers across the world. 

The system of roots

SRI involves plantation of saplings 10-12 days old instead of three weeks in a grid pattern with space of eight inch on all sides. The idea is to get better nourishment for the roots which can support a strong plant. The soil moisture is maintained through irrigation every four to five days instead of keeping the fields flooded all the time. 

“The weeds are removed every 10 days in the first month. The yield we get is three quintals per acre--more than normal despite having lesser saplings due to wide spacing,” says Palwinder Singh. Farmers in Bihar have set world records using SRI but Punjab is yet to make a significant headway. One issue is related to labour as more care is needed for transplantation of younger, thinner saplings. “It takes more time. We would spend Rs 3500 on labour per acre as compared to Rs 2000 per acre in conventional transplantation method, but we save on water, fertilisers and pesticides which are not required with SRI,” Palwinder says.

Rajesh Saini, who has also tried SRI, feels the need for a machine which can help with plantation. “Farmers in Punjab love machines not only because it saves time but also due to shortage of labour here. Preparation of organic manure, which is essential to get good results in SRI, also demands more effort,” he says.

May be that’s why SRI is mostly taken up on small farm lands. “Only small farmers can spend that much time on SRI. On big farms, everything is done quickly with machines. They don't have the patience for planting and caring for such small saplings,” Palwinder says. Small farmers make up only around 34 percent of the total farmers in Punjab.  

Whatever be the water situation, it doesn’t look like paddy’s popularity as a crop is going to diminish anytime soon. There is economics to back it.

The economics of it

If better water availability pushed paddy, assured procurement made it stay. The green revolution, introduced in India in 1960s, came with high-yielding varieties of wheat and paddy meant to make the country self-sustaining in food production. Assured procurement of these two crops by government agencies for distribution to other states fetched better prices for farmers. Over time, paddy dovetailed well with wheat, a major winter crop of Punjab. Consequently, machinery was also specifically designed for wheat-paddy cycle, which further pushed the combination. 

“Today, Punjab’s farmers have specialised in paddy cultivation which makes it difficult for them to shift. And why should they, when it’s fetching a good price?” asks Dr H. S. Shergill of the Institute of Development and Communication. Dr Shergill has done a study on paddy cultivation in the state claiming that there is no suitable alternative to paddy in the kharif season. In 2010-11, net return per hectare from paddy was Rs 19,826 while Bt Cotton fetched Rs 16,700 and sugarcane gave Rs 13,331. Maize was the worst at Rs 7136 per hectare. “Paddy also has the lowest yield instability among all these crops. Why would farmers move away from paddy and reduce their income? In fact, more area is bound to shift from cotton and maize to paddy,” Dr Shergill says.

"Punjab’s farmers have specialised in paddy cultivation which makes it difficult for them to shift. And why should they, when it’s fetching a good price? Paddy also has the lowest yield instability among all these crops." 

His prediction is based on the fact that southern Punjab, known for cotton production, is increasingly facing problem of water logging, which is more suitable for paddy. In addition, the massive assault of whitefly insect on cotton last year has made farmers wary. This year, the area under cotton reduced by 40 percent from last year. “Labour shortage also sits well with paddy as its harvesting is completely mechanised. That too, at a low cost because the same machine is used to harvest the wheat crop as well,” says Dr Shergill.

Dr P. S. Rangi,  consultant with the Punjab Farmers’ Commission pinpoints the vicious circle. “Even if farmers go for crops like maize, they are not going to get the right price. Around 85 percent of the maize is sold below the minimum support price because there’s no procurement agency. Farmers also want to save water because they are spending money to deepen the borewells every three years, but what’s the alternative to paddy?” he asks. Various attempts of the state government to make farmers diversify from wheat-paddy cycle have failed, mainly due to lack of marketing for other crops.

Basmati rice, which emerged as a good alternative, has also lost steam. The long, aromatic variety requires less water, can be sown late and usually fetches high returns through export. But international demand has crashed while sowing area has increased resulting in huge carryover stocks. The area under Basmati last year dropped by 13 percent over 2014-15.

Dr Shergill believes that instead of blaming paddy for groundwater depletion, state government should stop supplying free power for pumpsets. “Free power means farmers don’t monitor the quantity of water going in each plot. Also, they tend to plant paddy even in sandy soils which require much more water than loamy soil,” he says.

However, the fact that Punjab government released 1.5 lakh more tubewell connections recently shows that paddy will gain more ground, thanks to political compulsions.

Small islands in southern Kerala lakes sinking

The small islands--formed by the backwaters of Ashtamudi lake and Kallada river--in Kerala are sinking due to the rise in sea level and erosion. The saline water has started invading the localities, resulting in people migrating from these shrinking tiny islands. To save these scenic areas, the local authorities have sought assistance from global conservation organisations. They are also planning to plant mangroves around the islands to conserve them.  

Lost Saraswati to reappear by the end of this month

The Saraswati Heritage Development Board (SHDB) has proposed to discharge water into the route of the lost Saraswati river on July 30. The plan is to pump water through the Dadupur feeder into the river route that covers Yamunanagar, Kurukshetra and Kaithal districts. Sixty nine institutions have been involved in the revival of the Saraswati river. In the long run, there are plans to construct a dam at Adi Badri, considered the origin of this Vedic era river. 

Polavaram receives Rs 3000 crore funding

The union government has agreed to release Rs 3000 crore to the fund-starved Andhra Pradesh government for the Polavaram irrigation project. The water resources ministry, however, has objected to it and demanded a share of 90 percent from the Centre. The Polavaram project was allotted only Rs 100 crore in the current year’s budget, but due to the national importance of the project and its timely completion, the Centre has agreed to release more funds to this project.  

Jalyukt Shivar taps 3960 TCM water in Nashik villages

Jalyukt Shivar has shown a significant impact in Maharashtra’s Nashik district as the 15 talukas in the district have been able to tap 3960 thousand cubic metre of water through the scheme. Under the programme, the government had carried out deepening of nullahs, weirs, check dams, cement plug dams by removing silt from these structures. In Nashik, the scheme resulted in the extraction of 39.61 lakh cubic metre of silt which is expected to double the collection of water through these structures. 

Indian fish species facing extinction threat in Bengaluru lakes: Study

As per the study conducted by Bengaluru University, as many as 12 indigenous Indian species of fish found in Bengaluru’s lakes are under the threat of extinction owing to pollution and climate change. The study taken up in 10 lakes, between Bengaluru and Melekote, have found that out of the 12 species, five are under the vulnerable category and the rest are endangered. The study further states that even the exotic fishes, that can tolerate high pollution and static water levels, are finding it difficult to sustain themselves. 

This is a roundup of important news updates from July 17 - 23, 2016. Also read last fortnight's policy matters update.

Water crisis is a reality in most of India. After the summer of droughts come the monsoon floods. Take Maharashtra, for instance. If at one time it is desperately searching for drinking water, at another time, its capital, Mumbai is wading through knee-high water. How do we overcome these annual crises? Unfortunately, the answers are not so easy to find. 

The most common solutions suggested include rain water harvesting, groundwater recharge, efficient use of water at domestic, industrial and farm level and recycling and reusing water. Then, there are the solutions suggested to curb wastage of water in agriculture--crop rotation or replacement, usage of  sprinklers and drip irrigation, laser-levelling the land and no free electricity to farmers to control its consumption. Though these suggestions do the rounds every year, not much has materialised on the ground to mitigate the crisis. When the drinking water crisis escalates in hot summer months, particularly in urban areas, the cries get louder. The problem is forgotten when the monsoon arrives. 

In a news report appeared on The Tribune on May 1, 2016 titled Water Wars, a very gloomy, yet factual picture was painted about the ongoing crisis. A pertinent question was raised at the end of it--What have we done to conserve and preserve water? That prompted me to share some of the attempts by the NGO, Society for Promotion and Conservation of Environment (SPACE), in this area in the last 10 years. These projects, however, oscillates between success and failure.

An initiative in Aravali hills

Our operational area was 35 water-stressed villages in the foot of Aravali Hills of Tijara block of Alwar district, Rajasthan. The challenges included the barren Aravali hills denuded of its character from the grazing and fuel-wood extraction; Meo-Muslim community with large family sizes; wastelands used only for livestock grazing; literacy which is only five percent in women and 20 percent in men and poverty and drudgery of women beyond description.  

As the pastoral economy shifted to settled agrarian economy, the flat lands in the valleys were levelled where irrigation expanded at an alarming rate, disregarding the inhospitable environment like low rainfall and sandy soil. We selected 35 contiguous villages along the hills, starting from Bhiwadi to Tijara. The area around Bhiwadi came under intense industrial growth since 1995. As a result, the factories and builders started exploiting the already sparse groundwater. As the surface and sub-surface flow of water is from Tijara towards Bhiwadi, more extraction by industries lowered the water table in upper areas. A corporate company, SRS pvt ltd, which had established a plant near Bhiwadi, came forward to spend a part of the earnings on social welfare activities. They funded our project.

It is good that barren Aravalis, with 500mm of average rainfall, produce heavy runoff in five to six flood-producing storms a year which could be harvested to recharge ground water. We constructed 205 earthen dams to harvest rainwater from the Aravali hills. Financial support was provided to farmers to level 1500 hectares of privately-owned wastelands in the foot of the Aravali hills. The best agricultural practices to increase the income of 6500 poor farmers were promoted. We also planted three lakh trees on field bunds and raised 50000 fruit trees.

We constructed 205 earthen dams to harvest rainwater from the Aravali hills. Financial support was provided to farmers to level 1500 hectares of privately-owned wastelands in the foot of the Aravali hills. 

All reclaimed lands were sprinkler irrigated and rubberised pipes were used to transport water to avoid high seepage loss in the sandy soil. We formed 170 self help groups of women who were federated at the block level. These federations were linked to banks for flow of credit for livelihood activities. Even the landless were provided support for goat rearing. The farmers started planting fruit trees like kinnow and guava which had good market value and vegetable crops on the field bunds. The water resources were created for the livestock near the grazing area. 

A farmer earned Rs1.23 lakh for the first time from an acre of kinnow orchard. The profit included Rs 25000 by selling kinnow juice in the village. One woman farmer sold 200 mature aruneem plants after six years of care for Rs 1 lakh. When asked what she did with that money, she said she purchased one Murrah buffalo for half the money and spent the rest on fixing marriages of two of her seven sons. The major part of the income was invested on farm development, house construction, children’s education, purchase of Murrah buffaloes and bikes. 

These are our success stories; but failures are as many. 

Our dilemma

Thanks to the proximity of these villages to Gurgaon and Manesar, the vegetables-- especially chilli and onion--fetched good income. The traditional bajra (pearl millet) needed no irrigation and mustard needed not more than two irrigations, and that too, with only sprinklers. Chilli and onion needed nine and 11 irrigations respectively. The result? In one of the villages which was part of our projects, there are 128 borewells now, when in 1970, they had just two. Fifty new borewells were installed on the reclaimed land. Sixty percent borewells have been converted to submersible motors. 

The traditional bajra needed no irrigation and mustard needed not more than two irrigations, and that too, with only sprinklers. Chilli and onion needed nine and 11 irrigations respectively. 

In spite of 40 water-harvesting dams in a big village Gualda, 60 new borewells have come on the reclaimed land. Water table goes up in monsoon because of the harvested runoff and then start going down as wheat and vegetable crops are irrigated. The downward spiral continued for five years with net drop of 5.5 metres in ground water. We have no paddy, vegetables fetch good income but consume lot more water. 

The lands were levelled and bunded for more production but this resulted in in-situ rainwater conservation and soil profile recharge. But runoff from such levelled lands did not reach the storage reservoirs resulting in lesser groundwater recharge when dams were constructed around privately-owned lands which were levelled subsequently. The Punjab story was repeated in Rajasthan. We harvest rainwater but water table continues to go down.

The farmers should have continued with bajra and sarson (mustard) for the sake of groundwater. Unfortunately, there is no profit in bajra or sarson. Promoting the agro-industry based on indigenous products seems to be the only way forward.    

The author is former director of regional station of Punjab Agriculture University, Ludhiana and president, SPACE

Farmer Ravikant Deshmukh (40) is a much worried man. He lives in Kudari Dalli in Balod district in Chhattisgarh, a village that would get affected adversely if Mohar reservoir project takes off. The project, once realised, is estimated to submerge the agricultural land and houses of 1200 villagers in Kudari Dalli.

The Mohar reservoir project is proposed across the confluence of river Dangarh and Dalekasa with a catchment of 143 square km. The gross command area of the project is 1100 hectares. The proposed project is expected to irrigate 800 hectares of Kharif paddy and supply 1000 million cubic (1 TMC) water by feeder canal to Kharkhara reservoir for 500MW power plant of NSPCL in Bhilai.

PIL gets filed

On behalf of the nine villages affected by the project in Balod district, Shailendra Kumar Deshmukh, a government employee from the affected village Hucchetola, filed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) in Chhattisgarh high court in May. As per the PIL, more than 70 percent of the proposed water will be used for NSPCL’s power plant. The project will submerge more than 1000 hectares of land in Balod and Rajnandgaon districts. It will totally submerge Kudari Dalli village and partially submerge eight others--Maraskola, Hucchetola, Mangchua, Bharritola, Kartutola, Kudari, Karregaon and Dumatola village--ostensibly to provide 800 hectares of irrigation to six villages. 

Mohar reservoir project was granted administrative clearance and a grant of Rs 22,822.75 lakh for construction. “Despite the administrative clearance for industrial purpose, the project has been masked as a minor irrigation project to avoid environmental impact assessment, public hearing and having to seek permission from the Central Water Commission,” says 53-year-old Punam Kumar Deshmukh, a resident of one of the affected village, Maraskola.

The PIL says, “It has been claimed by the water resources department that the Mohar reservoir project did not require clearance from the Central Water Commission since it was a minor irrigation project for the tribal area.” The villagers allege that the land acquisitions in Balod district had been carried out without prior gram sabha consultation which is mandatory in the scheduled areas under the state government notification dated 31.01.2000. For that reason, the project should be considered illegal and void.

Inadequate compensation to villagers

To provide compensation to the villagers, the district administrations of Rajnandgaon and Balod have followed two different ways. One was in accordance with the amended industrial and rehabilitation policies in Rajnandgaon district where the affected villagers were provided compensation at the rate of Rs 6 lakh per acre for barren land; Rs 8 lakh per acre for non-irrigated land; and Rs 10 lakh per acre for irrigated double-cropped land that was acquired for industrial or commercial purpose. And the second was at an old rate of Rs 2 lakh per hectare for agricultural land (dhanha land) and Rs 1.69 lakh per hectare for barren land (bharri land),” says Gyan Singh Sahu Patel of Kudari Dalli village. It is still not clear to the villagers why the administration has set two different criteria for compensation.

Gyan Singh also says that the Rajnandgaon district administration followed the legal process very well and provided compensation to all the three affected villages of Rajnandgaon whereas the Balod district administration has paid compensation to only six out of nine affected villages and that too, at an old rate. The government officers of Balod have not correctly followed the rules and regulations related to compensation and rehabilitation. 

The work in progress related to paying compensation to villagers in Balod is moving at a snail’s pace and villagers are still waiting for the appropriate compensation for their land and property. 

The water use projected in the project proposal--28.18 Mcum (1 Million Cubic Meters (Mcum)= 220.23 million gallons per day) out of a total of 40.04 Mcum (70.4 percent)--is predominantly for industrial purpose. On the other hand, the proposed water use for irrigation is only 4.36 Mcum (10.8 percent) and the projected evaporation loss is 7.50 Mcum (18.7 percent). 

“The project is mainly for industrial purpose. To avoid environmental clearance and adequate compensation to villagers as per the industrial and rehabilitation policy norms, the project has been projected as an irrigation project. If not, why is it that the project meant for irrigation is consuming only 10.8 percent of water, even less than the projected evaporation losses. What kind of hypocrisy is this? ” asks 48-year-old Gautam Singh Salame of Maraskola village.

“The Balod district authorities have mentioned in one of the corresponding document that there are no trees and vegetation in the affected village, which is factually incorrect. There are more than 5000 trees and about 315.66 hectares of forest land that will be submerged,” says Jhumak Lal Sahu, a resident of Kudari Dalli.

“We are not aware of the PIL filed by Mr Deshmukh in the Bilaspur high court about the compensation and other issues related to Mohar reservoir project. But, I can tell you that we have not violated any of the government rules related to the land acquisition. But, if there are any shortcomings, we will rectify it and will act as per the government procedures,” says Alok Pandey, Sub Divisional Magistrate (SDM) Balod district.

“There is one more dam project of 1.5 km being proposed on Maraskola and Bharritola village border. This dam is to divert the backwater of Mohar reservoir to save Narsutola, a hamlet of Maraskola, from partial submergence. But the government authorities have not assessed the gradient and topography of Maraskola properly. If the second dam is made, then the water in the rainy season would affect the Narsutola community adversely, and the entire habitation would be converted into an island. Where would people go then?” asks 68-year-old Champuram Gurasia, a resident of Maraskola village.

The villagers of Balod demand adequate compensation, rehabilitation, employment opportunities, agricultural land and other facilities if the project displaces them. As I write this, none of the demands of the villagers of the Balod district have been adequately met and their struggle for their rights is going on. 

Champa Devi has been working as a sharecropper on a two-acre farm at Nilothi village in west Delhi. Until a few years ago, the water she used for irrigation came from the Najafgarh drain that empties into the Yamuna river. This form of cultivation using waste water was a norm in the area till sometime ago. A study by Winrock International, a non-profit organisation working on environmental issues, indicates that sewage-based farming is cheap and reliable; the high nutrient value of sewage ensures less use of fertilisers, making it a popular choice among farmers like Champa Devi.

A kewat by caste, Champa hails from Barah village in Patna, Bihar. Kewats are known to be skilled at vegetable cultivation. Champa migrated to Delhi and has been working at the farm for the last 10 years, growing vegetables like potato, onions, spinach, brinjal and cabbage through the year and mustard in winter. There is a ready market available for her produce and she directly sells the vegetables in the local market at Nilothi and the nearby locality of Nangloi.

“The path leading to the farm I work on was lined with green fields of mustard on either side till a few years back. But soon, with urbanisation, the landscape changed,” she says.

Change in scene

It is not just the landscape, but the farming method has changed, too. The farmers do not use waste water for irrigation any longer. This shift in tradition is largely due to judicial intervention. The increase in consumer awareness has played a part, too.   

Following a petition by Yamuna Jiye Abhiyan, a Delhi-based voluntary group, to free Yamuna of pollution, the National Green Tribunal (NGT) banned cultivation on the Yamuna bed. The NGT feared that the vegetables grown there were highly contaminated and its consumption could lead to many ailments like cancer. Thousands of farmers who were growing edible crops or doing fodder cultivation on the riverbed and its floodplains took the brunt of the court’s decision.

"The changing local tastes and stricter regulations have made most farmers switch to groundwater for irrigation,” Champa says. She did that, too.

But not all farmers were ready to accept change. Bibhuti Singh, the president of the farmers’ organisation, Delhi Peasants Multipurpose Society, that challenged the court’s order in 2015, says, “The decision is hasty. We should have been given more time.” Over 10,000 farmers cultivating on the Yamuna bed are a part of this group. The court had refused to entertain the plea of the society in this case.

The land that farmers like Raunak Singh were cultivating had been allotted to them by the government in the 1960s. “We should have been informed well in time and assistance provided in shifting us to ‘cleaner’ cultivation, free of pesticides, runoff and metallic contaminants from the fields,” Raunak adds.

Other farming options like sericulture, horticulture and floriculture were suggested as alternate options to the farmers. “Shifting to floriculture, horticulture and sericulture, as permitted on the Yamuna bed by the NGT, is not going to be easy,” says Raju Yadav, another farmer cultivating in the Madanpur-Khadar floodplain. “We are not at all familiar with these new fangled forms of cultivation. Cultivating vegetables was our only means of survival and we do not have enough capital to invest in newer cropping methods,” he adds. “Our livelihoods are at risk and thousands of farmers from faraway states like Bihar are in jeopardy because of this move," he says.

The problem with the sewage

Though many farmers like him are angry, the reasoning behind the court’s decision is compelling. A study by Winrock International notes that only about 47 percent of sewage gets treated in Delhi before it empties into the river. Another study by International Water Management Institute says that though tier I and II cities are putting efforts to treat waste water, at an aggregated level, the efforts amount to only 30 percent in the country. This means that our nallahs and rivers are carrying mostly untreated sewage, which affects our crops. Bhim Singh Rawat of South Asia Network on Dams, Rivers and People says, “The farmers in Noida have been using Yamuna's polluted water for irrigation without complaint. In contrast, the Delhi farmers say that the vegetables grown with polluted water turn dry, stale and tasteless in a few days which, they claim, is not the case with vegetables grown with fresh water.” 

The court had noted the pollution of Yamuna, its impact on soil and groundwater in the area and had ruled against cultivation on the riverbed. A study in 2012 by The Energy Research Institute (TERI) points out the ill effects of waste-water use in agriculture. “Levels of nickel, manganese, lead and mercury were above the permissible international standards in agricultural soil along the river in Delhi,” it says. More generally, a 2010 study by Consumer Voice, a Delhi-based consumer rights NGO, had found that Delhi's fruits and vegetables contain high levels of pesticide residue. Despite the high court getting involved, not much has changed since. Taking cues from international standards, the pesticide residue limit was sought to be reduced.

The more pressing need, however, was to encourage and incentivise farmers to alter their farming practices but not much has been done towards it. Vishwanath Srikantaiah of Biome Environmental Solutions, a Bangalore-based design firm focusing on ecology says that the judgment was both arbitrary and impractical. “It is the city and not the farmers who are polluting the Yamuna. Why should the farmers be punished?” he says. 

A report published in The Indian Express quotes the Delhi Development Authority as saying that many of the farmers were encroachers. “It was important to minimise the pollutants in the river and contribute to a cleaner and safer environment,” a DDA official was quoted as saying. Disagreeing with the claim that the health risk for irrigators and communities far offset the loss of livelihoods, Vishwanath points out that there are “no epidemiological surveys to prove that farming is adding to the toxicity or getting affected by the toxic waters”.

Treating sewage

But all the same, what is the way out? For sure, more and more investments in creating waste-water treatment capacities are not an answer. “Sewage, after treatment, is perhaps the best water for farming purposes. But only if it is sewage that has not been mixed with toxic pollutants from industrial sources. Unfortunately in our urban areas, what flows in our drains is a toxic cocktail, full of dangerous heavy metals mixed with the rest. And there lies the key problem with use of such water for raising edible farm crops,” says Manoj Misra of Yamuna Jiye Abhiyaan, a Delhi-based river conservation group.

He adds that ideally “rainwater in open storm drains, sewage in closed sewage pipes and industrial effluent in closed effluent pipes should be disposed off separately”. Rawat adds, “Non toxic urban waste water can be used in farming not as main source of irrigation but to supplement the primary sources. The ratio of fresh water and waste water should be worked out. It may vary from crop to crop.”

Should we have better standards for using waste water and proper oversight of its reuse? Vishwanath says that a sensible approach is to use World Health Organization’s sanitation safety plan (SSP). SSP systematically identifies and manages health risk along the sanitation chain. “Decentralised treatment and reuse of municipal and industrial waste water are better options, as it will do away with the problem itself. This way, the waste water does not reach the main drain and the river in the first place,” says Vishwanath. He also suggests that steps should be taken at the end of farmers, sellers and consumers to clean the vegetables properly to deal with the problem. 

Malguzari tanks were ponds made for water harvesting by the Malguzaars, who were zamindars or tenants in eastern Vidarbha, Maharashtra two centuries ago.These tanks provided water for irrigation and also increased the availability of fish for local consumption.

Before 1950, the Malguzaars constructed, owned and maintained these water tanks but things changed after that when the Malguzari/Zamindari system was abolished. The state government took ownership of these tanks and started collecting water tax on whichever lands they irrigated. This angered the Malguzaars and prompted them to file a case in the Supreme Court saying that they were the rightful owners. The Supreme Court agreed with them but didn’t lay down conditions for who should maintain these tanks. More than 1000 tanks in the Vidarbha region bore the brunt of this decision and went unmaintained since then. 

In 1983, an independent committee ruled that the tanks, which were of great significance to modern irrigation projects, were indeed the government’s responsibility to maintain. But no one took heed of this and the tanks remained unmaintained until 2008 when Shirish Apte entered the picture.

Shirish Apte, an Executive engineer of Minor Irrigation division of Bhandara also belonged to a Malguzaar family. He had always had a great interest in water conservation and decided to initiate the process of rejuvenating these tanks. With monetary support from the government, he started this work. 

The first tank that was restored in 2008 was the Janbhora Malguzari tank located 35 kms away from Bhandara. The first step was to desilt the tank to remove the fine sand and earth that is carried by moving water and deposited as a sediment. The community got together and desilted the tank. After the desilting was completed, the boundary wall of the tank was strengthened. The work was fully finished in 2009 - 2010. This rejuvenation work has resulted in recharging groundwater levels and has also increased agricultural output and fish production in the area. Employment levels have also increased because of this. The benefits of the Jambhora Malguzari tank to the region has prompted the district administration to restore another 21 Malguzari tanks in Bhandara.  

Bigger isn't necessarily better. The revival of the Malguzaari tanks has shown that there are cheaper and simpler methods for water conservation than the construction of big dams. Smaller projects such as this aren't as expensive to implement and more importantly, the buy-in from the community and the ownership that the people feel can't be replicated with bigger state-run projects.

The video below, shot in Vidarbha, gives a brief overview of the initiative to rejuvenate the Malguari tanks undertaken by the district administration in the area.

You can view the entire photo set here.

The small town of Navalgund of Dharwad district in Karnataka with a population of 25,000 has been the epicenter of farmers’ protest demanding water from the west-flowing river, Mahadayi. On July 30, 2016, the state of Karnataka woke up to the shocking news of police brutality on farmers, including women and children, who had gathered to demand their share of water.

For decades, both Goa and Karnataka have been dependent on each other for their economic and social growth. But in the last few years, these south Indian states have been locking horns over the sharing of water from the Mahadayi river. The long-pending water-sharing dispute has now taken a political twist with all the parties getting involved in the blame game. But the real sufferers are the poor farmers of north Karnataka and the sensitive Western Ghats.

What is Mahadayi water dispute?

The Mahadayi river, also called Mandovi in Goa is essentially a rain-fed river that is shared between Karnataka and Goa for their water needs. The river flows 35 km through Karnataka and then 52 km through Goa, before flowing into the Arabian Sea. Goa, considering its geographical location, has an upper hand on its water. The river is a mere cluster of spring at its origin, Bhimgad in Karnataka. It forms into a river at Degaon village in Khanapur taluk of Belagavi district. The regions of northern Karnataka, along with the bordering areas of Maharashtra and Goa, have been depending on the Mahadayi river basin for all its water needs. 

The Mahadayi water diversion was first planned in 1970 by engineer S.G. Balekundri. The plan was to feed Malaprabha river and store the water in Navilatirtha dam in Dharwad district. This dam, built in the 1970s, has not been filled to its capacity, barring three or four times. Hence the Karnataka government was keen on diverting the water from Mahadayi to be stored here. Thanks to the increasing water scarcity during the summer months followed by unpredictable monsoon year after year, the water needs of people in north Karnataka could no longer be met with the water the state is currently getting. That is when Karnataka started demanding diversion of the river. 

The present controversy around the Mahadayi river has Karnataka wanting to divert a meagre 7.56 tmcft water from its contribution to the Mahadayi basin to Malaprabha dam to take care of the acute water shortage of Hubballi and Dharwad and about 180 villages near the dam. After necessary approval from the water resources ministry in 2002, Karnataka announced its plans to build two barrages on Mahadayi’s tributaries, Kalasa and Banduri. Goa, however, objected to the plan and approached the Supreme Court in the same year to put a stop to it. Goa believes the proposed water diversion would not only affect the water needs of the people, it would also affect the sensitive ecology of the Western Ghats. Mahadevi Water Dispute Tribunal was set up in 2010 to look into the issue. The recent flare up in north Karnataka was triggered by the Tribunal’s rejection of Karnataka’s request to divert the water.

The water situation now

The construction work of the barrages at Kalasa-Banduri site for water diversion has affected the catchment area of river Malaprabha in Khanapur taluk. It has been reported that the wells around the birthplace of the Malaprabha river are going dry. This can also be attributed to the prolonged drought in the region which has aggravated the farmers’ agitation.  

For the last one year, four districts of north Karnataka-- Dharwad, Gadag, Belagavi and Haveri--have been affected by repeated strikes called by the agitating farmers and pro-Kannada activist groups. Besides huge economic loss, the protests help only to frame a wrong picture about Karnataka before the Tribunal, feel the experts in the region.

Goa’s nature concerns

On the other hand, Goa is backed by a strong group of ecologists who have come under the banner--Mahadayi Bachov Andolan--and been opposing any kind of diversion of the river. Ravendra Kumar Saini, one of the petitioners from Belagavi points out that about 43 percent of drinking water needs of Goa is met by the Mahadayi river and any change in the river system of Mahadayi or Kalasa, which is the major tributary of the river, will affect the drinking water needs of the state.

“Apart from drinking and irrigation, it plays a big role in the fishing industry. The construction of a dam upstream will change the salinity of the river near its estuary. Even minor variations in the salinity will affect the unique aquatic bio-diversity,” he says. Regarding Karnataka’s idea of diverting the water and storing it in the dam, he says, “Water availability in Kalasa, Banduri or Haltara tributaries is very less. So, how much water can actually reach the dam? The construction of 100-feet-deep canals at these sites has already destroyed the ecosystem of Malaprabha river at its very origin,” says Saini.

The Goa government has also pointed out that the economy of Goa depends on the tourism and water scarcity will affect the tourism adversely. According to the government, the project will also affect the wildlife sanctuary of Bhimgad, where over 700 hectares of forest will be submerged and about 60,000 trees destroyed.

Karnataka asks for its share

Vikas Soppin, convener of Kalasa-Banduri Horata Samanvaya Samithi, an organisation that has been holding protests against the decision, disputes the claims of Goa and the ecologists. “The project is not demanding large scale forest destruction. Both the tributaries which need to be joined with Malaprabha are located few miles (6-8 km) away from the river and with gravitation alone, the water can reach Malaprabha. The Malaprabha dam was constructed in 1972, but till today some of the villages on the borders of Belagavi and Dharwad district do not have drinking water. Tankers supply water in many villagers throughout the year,” he says.

He says that no studies have been conducted to prove that the diversion of these tributaries will have an adverse effect on Mahadayi. “The Goa government says the tributaries are water deficit and cannot be diverted, which was rejected by the Tribunal. We demand that the share of water which is rightly ours must be spared. Meanwhile, the state government must create a situation to convey the water scarcity situation in north Karnataka. The dialogues can be initiated with the Goa government so that a solution can be found out of the court. People are losing hope over Tribunal as Krishna and Cauvery water disputes are continuing for many years with never-ending legal battles,” he explains.

Dr T. V. Ramachandra, head of Energy and Wetland Research Group, Indian Institute of Science (IISc) cautions that the river catchments are very essential to ensure water flow throughout the season or most part of the year. “The rich tree cover and the panoramic landscape hold the rain water beneath it which is used during the drier seasons. And once the catchment area at the river’s origin is destroyed, it’s difficult to restore it. As it is, the catchments of Kalasa and Banduri are in bad shape due to afforestation and the implementation of projects with no consideration for the environment,” he says.

Destruction of catchments can cause the rivers and wetlands to dry. “Several perennial streams feeding the Sharavati river were going dry before the summer season, but later it was found out that the streams were being diverted for agricultural needs,” he says. He says that instead of thinking of quick-fix measures to pacify the agitating farmers, the government must protect its natural wealth so that water is available for future generation, too," he adds.

This is not the first time that the states in India are fighting for water. Equally contested are the waters of Krishna and Cauvery. If these water disputes are not solved at the earliest, the situation could turn ugly in the near future.