People of Sikkim stand against Teesta hydel project

The proposed 520 MW Teesta Stage IV hydropower project in Sikkim is being opposed by the indigenous Lepchas, a local community in the state that worships mountains and rivers. The project that has been proposed by the National Hydro Power Corporation has been facing challenges from the Lepchas since its clearance in 2012. According to the locals, the government has given green signal to the project while ignoring the Khangchendzonga national park which is also a UNESCO world heritage site. If the project gets cancelled, this will be the fifth victory of the community against hydopower projects. 

Baba Seechewal gets Padma Shri for rejuvenating Kali Bein rivulet

Baba Balbir Singh Seechewal, an environmentalist and a resident of the Seechewal village in Jalandhar district, has received the Padma Shri for his social services and for rejuvenating the 165-km-long Kali Bein rivulet. Since 2000, Baba Seechewal has been cleaning the rivulet which was reduced to a filthy drain along with his followers without any government help. Moreover, his rejuvenation efforts have also become a role model for the ongoing Ganga revival project. Baba Seechewal has also been preparing around one lakh plants to distribute them free of cost.

TN to ban beverage majors from March 1

Tamil Nadu traders’ associations have decided to ban the sale of soft drinks, Pepsi and Coca Cola, manufactured by the multinational companies from March 1. The decision is in favour of farmers who are left with no water as the beverage giants are extracting water from Thamirabharani river in Tirunelveli for the production of the soft drinks. However, the companies are working out a solution with the traders’ associations as the ban would lead to a sales loss of Rs 1,400 crore a year for the two cola majors.  

Bhavani river water unfit, NHRC notice to TN

The National Human Rights Commission has issued a notice to the Tamil Nadu government over the supply of contaminated water to 1.5 residents of Mettupalayam and sought a detailed report on the matter in six weeks. According to reports, the Bhavani river water supplied to residents was unfit for consumption due to the presence of faecal coliform and high levels of turbidity and iron. The Bhavani river which was flowing freely since 2000 got obstructed due to the setting up of two barrages in the river to generate electricity. 

Overexploitation of groundwater leads to sinkhole in Andhra’s Chitravati riverbed

Groundwater overexploitation and the lack of good rains in the last six years has led to a sinkhole, a geological event, in Chitravati riverbed in Anantapur district of Andhra Pradesh. This is the second such sinkhole in the riverbed, with the first one occurring in the last week of January 2015. The officials in the region have confirmed that groundwater withdrawal for agriculture is quite high in the vicinity of the river.

This is a roundup of important news from January 23 - 30, 2017. Also, read the policy matters this week. 

Lead image source: SANDRP

Located about 27 km from the city of Pune, Sangrun in Haveli taluka is a unique village. Situated in the rocky terrains of the Sahaydri hills, the village is at the confluence of three rivers--Mose, Ambi and Mutha--often referred to by the villagers as the Triveni Sangam or a place where three rivers unite.

The village has 204 households with a population of 1254. The main occupation of the village is farming, largely paddy. The village gets adequate rain and derives its drinking water from a common well that is stored in tanks and distributed by pipes to each household. Pune is located downstream of this village and the Mutha river flows into Pune from the village.

Sangrun is unique not just for its location but also for the bold step the village has taken to make itself garbage and plastic free and keep its water resources free of pollution and waste.

Pune, the polluter of its rivers

This bold step is indeed commendable at a time when both the Mutha river that flows from Sangrun to Pune and the Mula that joins it from the opposite direction to flow with it are polluted and unusable, both individually and at their confluence.

A recent water quality report by the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB) has found the Mutha to be one of the most polluted rivers along with Pavana, Indrayani and Bhima rivers in Pune district. The Mula-Mutha river, too, has been identified as one of the 302 most polluted stretches in the country in a Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) report.

The quality of the river has undergone severe deterioration due to heavy loads of domestic sewage and solid waste entering the river, open defecation on the banks of the river and industrial wastes that continue to be deposited into it. A number of nallas and piped outfalls discharge untreated sewage directly into the Mula-Mutha river, turning it into a polluted drain.

Cleanliness drive by the village

The good news, however, is that the villagers of Sangrun got together two years ago to keep the Mutha river flowing through the village clean. The modus operandi was to get all the villagers (250-300 in number), with the women on the front line, together on Sundays to sweep, clean and separate the waste (plastic from other waste) to prevent it from entering the rivers.

Moreover, the waste generated every day is separated at the source by each household into dry garbage--that includes plastic of different kinds--and wet waste, which are then collected into different containers or bags. The plastic waste collected by the households is taken to the gram panchayat that records the amount of plastic generated from each household. On the 18th of every month, this plastic is sold to a Pune-based firm, Clean Garbage Management, at the rate of Rs 5 per kilogram. The money generated is distributed to the households.

Vilas Pokale of Clean Garbage Management says, “We collect around 250 kilos of plastic from the village which is segregated and reused to make plastic dustbins, pots and irrigation pipes for use in agriculture.”

Sunil Bhokare, a resident of the village and the main force behind this cleanliness drive says, “All this started when Vinod Bodhankar from an organisation named Sagarmitra in Pune visited us during an MKSSS meeting organised in the village and talked to us about the sad state of rivers in Pune. We then decided to do something about it.”

“The village did not look like this before,” he adds, “After the meeting, my friends and I initiated the cleaning process while others watched us. Gradually others, too, started getting involved after they realised the importance and benefits of cleaning their surroundings. Deepak Mankar, a resident of the village and now the corporator of Pune city also helped by initiating the first gram sabha and motivated people to support the effort.”

Other than plastic, all the remaining garbage that includes kitchen waste is collected from the village households on every Tuesday and Friday and taken in a tractor to an open grassland in the village for disposal. Plans are underway to use composting methods to change this garbage into manure. The villagers are also planning to direct the grey water, that now goes to the gutters, to be redirected to a soak pit.

“While starting this initiative, our main aim was to prevent the garbage, including plastic, from entering the river. Another problem we have in the village is the open gutters that pollute the environment. Recently, a private company named Cummins from Pune has come forward to help us as a part of its CSR activities and we plan to build closed gutter system in the village, construct soak pits, and install mechanisms to convert wet garbage to manure using this fund,” says gram sevak Abhay Nikam.

Vimaltai who regularly participates in the cleaning activity says, “It is also important that we teach our future generations about the need for cleanliness and good health. Many children eat chocolates, Kurkure and throw plastic bags here and there. We must also spread awareness through schools and our homes about the bad habit of littering and the ill effects of junk food.”

Spreading the message

The village has also become open defection free recently. While the toilet coverage in the village was only 40 percent in early 2016, it became 100 percent in the last seven months with every household in the village having a toilet now. The village was also selected among 113 talukas as the best village in cleanliness indicators such as good garbage management practices, freedom from open defecation, and more. The village now plans to compete at the district level to spread the message and gather funds in the process to help in the further development of the village.

"We are not the only village on the banks of the Mutha river. There are several other villages, too. If they all start discharging their sewage into the river, it will get polluted even here, before it enters the city of Pune. We decided to set an example for all the other villages. Some of the surrounding villages like Dondje, Kapare, Mandwi have already started taking up this initiative which is a very positive development,” says Sitabai Mankar, the sarpanch of Sangrun.

She adds, “Look at the state of the river near the villages in Pune such as Kondhwa, Nanded and Uttamnagar. The river has turned into a drain. The gram panchayats in these villages should also decide to do something about it.”

The village has around 50 families that depend on fishing for their livelihoods and the fish from the rivers are known to be fresh and tasty and are sold at the rate of Rs 400 per kilo in the cities. “There are many people who do fishing in the river water here. Imagine what could happen if the plastic and other garbage are eaten by the fish! It can affect the livelihoods of a large population in the village who sell fish to cities such as Pune,” says Mankar.

“We want to set an example for Pune city that sends all its sewage into the Mula-Mutha river that flows to Solapur where people are already complaining of ailments such as kidney stones because of this polluted water. We do not want to do that; we have a responsibility as the upstream village to send clean water to Pune city,” adds Bhokare.

Well, we only hope more villages and cities thought about its rivers like Sangrun does.

The much-anticipated budget this year treads largely on the path set last year with the rural sector receiving more allocation than its urban counterpart. On the surface, the budget indicates an increase in rural spending under the rural employment guarantee, sanitation, water resources and agriculture sectors and an unchanged outlay in drinking water despite its significance. Besides, there is a silence on unachieved outcomes of many rural sector schemes in the implementation report of previous year’s budget announcement. 

Sanitation stands to gain

The water and sanitation sector was in urgent need for funds to show results. The budgetary allocation for the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation has increased substantially in 2017-2018.

The budget has upped the allocation by 43 percent for the rural component of Swachh Bharat Mission or SBM, the government's flagship programme on sanitation while the budget for SBM (Urban) is the same as last year. Finance Minister Arun Jaitley in his budget speech says, “The sanitation coverage in rural India has gone up from 42 percent in October 2014 to about 60 percent now. Open defecation free villages are now being given priority for piped water supply.” The budget for the rural drinking water under the National Rural Drinking Water Programme (NRDWP) is marginally high at Rs 6050 crore which, as per a report titled Water: At what cost? The state of the world’s water 2016 by WaterAid, a water and sanitation nonprofit, is highly inadequate for a country which has the highest number (75.8 million) of people in the world without access to safe drinking water. While the WatSan sector has been prioritised in the country’s policy agenda, the lion’s share of the allocation has gone to sanitation at the cost of lesser allocation to drinking water. For urban India, the allocation for the programme--Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT), earlier called Jawaharlal Nehru National Urban Renewal Mission (JNNURM)--for water remains more or less stagnant at Rs 5000 crore.

High budgetary commitments have led to better coverage but that does not necessarily translate to better usage because of several reasons. Very often the new toilets are poorly maintained or are not operational. The key policy focus of the government should have been on encouraging behaviour change in people to ensure better toilet use.

The budget has important takeaways from the standpoint of water quality. There is a national sub-mission to NRDWP to address the fluoride and arsenic-affected habitations with additional central funding. Jaitley, in his budget speech, says, “It is proposed to provide safe drinking water to over 28,000 arsenic and fluoride-affected habitations in the next four years.” But questions are being raised on how the figure of 28,000 habitations has been arrived at. If it is based on the NWRDP data, it is inaccurate especially given the quality of the dataset and lack of seasonal information. 

Sharp rise in allocations for irrigation and agriculture

The government has opened its purse strings for the rural sector with its strong focus on agriculture and irrigation. The new crop insurance scheme, Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana has an increased coverage of 40 percent now while agricultural credit to the tune of Rs 10 lakh crore has been announced. Commenting on the budget, food and trade policy analyst Devinder Sharma, in his blog says that it is a strategy to move from subsistence to corporate farming. About the rise in agricultural credit, he points to a lesser-known fact that the “bulk of the farm credit, for which an interest subvention scheme of three percent is provided if paid back in time, is availed by the agri-business companies. Roughly Rs 8 lakh crore out of the Rs 10 lakh crore will eventually go to the agri-business corporations in the name of farmers”.

Last year PMFBY received Rs 5500 crore in budget estimates and Rs 13240.04 crore was allotted after the second supplementary. The budget estimate for this year is substantially higher at Rs 9,000 crore. The programme aims to benefit farmers through lower premiums and higher sums insured. The progress so far has been slow and until mid-2016, barely a fifth of the farmers and 23 percent of the total cropped area in India had been covered under the crop insurance scheme. It is not clear as to how the insurance penetration among the farming community will increase in the coming year. There was practically no participation of non-loanee farmers in the crop insurance scheme till recently. This, despite the fact that the premium has been kept very low at two percent for kharif crops, one and a half percent for rabi crops and five percent for horticultural crops. The saving grace of the scheme was the loanee farmers for whom it was mandatory to take a loan. The challenge now is to bring even the non-loanee farmers under the scheme. The budget does not suggest what would be done to encourage the states which are reluctant to implement the scheme and whether the financial burden on the states is expected to be lessened by way of sharing the premium jointly with the Centre. Yet again, tenant farmers and sharecroppers have not been brought under the ambit of PMFBY.

In the rural sector, as a part of Mission Antyodaya, an ambitious plan to make 50,000 gram panchayats poverty free by 2019 has been made. Some other key takeaways from the budget which reiterates the plan of doubling agriculture income in five years are the institution of a dairy development fund, bringing more regulated mandis (markets) on the electronic National Agriculture Market (e-NAM) platform, commodity market reforms and assistance to set up soil testing in Krishi Vigyan Kendras, among others. Agricultural marketing reforms are being given a push while the government goes headlong with a model law on contract farming that would be prepared and circulated among the states for adoption.

There is a 45 percent hike in the budget for the Ministry of Water Resources--from Rs 4755.5 crore to Rs 6887 crore. A micro-irrigation fund with a corpus of Rs 5,000 crore is being set up under the National Bank for Agriculture And Rural Development (NABARD) while another Rs 20,000 crore has been allocated for the long-term irrigation that was set up last year.

Marginal rise in MGNREGA allocation

A lot is being said about the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA), a demand-driven employment generation programme which got an impetus this year with an allotment of Rs 48000 crore. However, the rise is marginal given the two supplementary allocations last year which took the total budget under MGNREGA in 2016-17 to Rs 47,500 crore. The allocation under MGNREGA as a percent of GDP has declined from 0.32 last year to 0.28 this year, as per an analysis by the Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability (CBGA), a Delhi-based think tank focusing on public policies and government finances. The work participation, too, has shown a decline with the average days of employment provided per household dropping from 46 in 2013-14 to 28 in 2016-17. This has huge implications on poor households who get to benefit most from the programme.

“The minister did announce an overall increase in rural spending within the agricultural sector but its relation with agricultural outcomes remains weak,” says Deepanshu Mohan, assistant professor of Economics at Jindal University in an article.

What seems missing from the budget is a comprehensive roadmap for farmers who were hit by demonetisation.

There was a time when the farmers of Yavatmal district depended completely on rainfed agriculture. That was before the introduction of Doha, a water harvesting structure by NGO Dilasa Sansthan in 2014. Farming changed drastically after that, something which Sitaram Kove, a 40-year-old farmer of Rajini village in the district, will vouch for. Once a distressed farmer like many in Vidarbha and Marathwada, he is now content with the productivity of his six-acre-farm that has doubled since the introduction of Doha.

Doha is a low-cost, eco-friendly water impounding structure built in a stream with no casting material used. "We deepen and widen the streams in sections of 300 metres each with a gap of 100 metres in between. This structure helps in storing water and recharging groundwater," says Mansur Khorasi, programme director, Dilasa Sansthan.

News reports suggest that on an average, 2000 farmers in India quit farming every day. Suicides among farmers are common, too. The parched land of Yavatmal has witnessed many suicides of distressed farmers in the last decade alone. Dilasa's efforts in improving the water situation in rural Maharashtra have inspired many civil society organisations to come forward and help these farmers in distress.

Improving and recharging groundwater

To improve the agricultural production and to solve the drinking water problem in the country, the condition of groundwater, which is the lifeline of rural India, needs to be improved. This can be done if low-cost measures like Doha is implemented in an efficient manner.

“Earlier we were dependent on rabi crops but now with the improved availability of water through Doha, we are also growing kharif crops. The water availability has improved not only my life but of the other farmers also. Many farmers of our village can now pay their loans off,” says farmer Vilas Hauso Maraskole of Rajini village.

Groundwater recharge is possible if the natural drainage systems are cleaned regularly and maintained in an efficient way. Most natural drainage streams in India are filled with silt or are encroached for development activities like construction of buildings. 

“During a land survey in rural Maharashtra, we found that in some drainage canals there were a few natural saucer-shaped water harvesting structures that stored water in it and have recharged groundwater efficiently in that area,” says Khorasi. The Dilasa team effectively used their field observations and developed a Doha model that can be used in parched farmlands.

Benefits of Doha model

• Low cost and eco-friendly water harvesting structure.
• Can recharge ground water tables even with 300 millimetres of rainfall.
• No land acquisition is required.
• Water storage below ground level, so no risk of side scoring.
• Water logging problem of nearby land could be reduced.
• Drinking water problems can be mitigated.
• Most suitable to 500 to 800 millimetres of rainfall zone.
• Replicable at any stream in any region of the country.
• Construction cost per tetra cubic meter or TCM (1000 cubic metre) of  Doha is very less as compared to the construction cost of government structures. For example, the construction cost for Doha is Rs 70000/TCM whereas the government estimate is Rs 1,50,000/TCM for the same work.

“During summer, the women of our village used to travel 1.5 km to bring drinking water because the hand pumps dry up in March. But since the last two years, the situation of drinking water is improving and the water availability in the hand pumps has also improved significantly after the construction of Doha in our village,” says 42-year-old Rukma Bai Tumri.

Dilasa built more than 600 Doha structures in eight districts of Vidarbha and Marathwada in the last four years. These structures created a storage capacity of about 300 crore litres which benefitted more than 20000 farmers through crop irrigation facilities. It has also helped more than 70,000 people by improving drinking water availability in 75 villages in summer.

Dilasa's low-cost Doha initiative has improved the lives of many marginalised farmers. It needs to be seen how the villagers take it forward.

See more photos here.

Ganga, Yamuna have been recognised as living entities

Following the footsteps of New Zealand, the Uttarakhand high court has recognised Ganga and Yamuna rivers as living entities. The first-of-its-kind decision has given the rivers entitlement to all rights available to humans as per the Constitution. With the new status of the rivers, even the environmentalists and locals are hopeful of their future as the judgement is going to have a positive bearing on the clean-up efforts of the polluted Ganga and Yamuna.

No relaxation of hydel norms: Environment ministry

The environment ministry has put off the proposal of the power ministry to relax norms pertaining to hydropower projects. In order to give a boost to the hydropower, the power ministry had proposed to let the regional officials grant forest clearances for hydel projects that have an area up to 40 hectares. Along with this, it has also made a request to change the prescribed norms for e-flows and reduce public hearing from two to just one. However, the environment ministry has refused to consider any modification to the rules. 

Centre launches ‘Har Ghar Jal’ scheme for arsenic-fluoride hit habitations

On the occasion of World Water Day, the ministry for drinking water and sanitation has launched the National Water Quality Sub Mission on Arsenic and Fluoride to provide safe drinking water to nearly 28,000 affected habitations in the country by March 2021 with an outlay of Rs 25,000 crore. The government is also planning to provide tap water on a sustained basis in every household by 2030 as per the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UNSDG).

Etalin hydel project in limbo

The environment ministry’s expert committee on forest clearances has rejected the green nod to the 3,097 MW Etalin hydroelectric project (HEP) in Dibang valley, Arunachal Pradesh. The committee has found major inadequacies in the environmental impact assessment (EIA) report of the Rs 25,296-crore HEP. The committee has shown concern towards the inadequate reporting of biodiversity in the area as the region is a biodiversity hotspot and has asked for multi-seasonal replicate studies on biodiversity assessment from an internationally credible institute. 

NGT notice to Karnataka government over Bellandur lake fire

The National Green Tribunal (NGT) has ordered the Karnataka government and its various agencies to file affidavits on the recent outbreak of fire in Bellandur lake in Bengaluru within two weeks. The tribunal has also sought details on the steps taken to rejuvenate the waterbody. The Karnataka Lake Conservation and Development Authority has filed its affidavit but the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB), the Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) and other agencies have sought two weeks to file theirs. 

This is a roundup of important policy matters from March 20 - 27, 2017. Also, read the news this week. 

A woman stands with a begging bowl and a placard strung around her neck. An old man shuffles along barefoot in the street at Jantar Mantar, the official site of a farmers’ protest in the heart of New Delhi. He finds his way through a group of farmers gathered at the protest site on a hot summer afternoon. Dressed in green loincloths, they are lying motionless on the road and the footpath exhausted after their meetings with the deputy speaker of Lok Sabha M. Thambidurai, MDMK general secretary Vaiko and Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi in the past few days.

These are farmers from Tamil Nadu on a protest which is in its fourth week. The drought situation on the Cauvery belt in Tamil Nadu has gone from bad to worse this year with the state witnessing the worst spell in 140 years from a poor northeast monsoon, as per the India Meteorological Department. The state government officially declared a drought in January 2017.

“The Centre has not announced a drought relief package yet despite our long-standing protest. The High Court of Tamil Nadu has issued directions to the state government to write off all agricultural loans. But we will not budge from here till the Centre hears us out,” says Sivaprakash, a farmer from Dindigul in Tamil Nadu.

Sivaprakash is a part of the group of over 100 farmers representing the ‘Desiya Thenidhiya Nathigal Inaippu Vivasayigal Sangam’ (National South Indian River Interlinking Sangam). They have been protesting at Jantar Mantar since March 14, 2017. “Hundreds of farmers have committed suicide given the drought conditions in the state which was preceded by the devastating cyclone Vardah. Even the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has sought a detailed report from the state government on this,” says Sivaprakash. Earlier in January, the NHRC had taken suo motu cognisance of the media reports on the suicide of 106 farmers in one month in Tamil Nadu.

Waiting for an ethical response

With the government unmoved by their protest, members of the Sangam resorted to skull protest to intensify their agitation. “Through our skull protest, where we are displaying the skulls of farmers who have committed suicide in the wake of the drought in the state, we are seeking a drought relief package from the Centre. The skulls we are using in the protest symbolise our fate if the state does not help us out. Debt relief is being provided to the wealthy people. What about us, the farmers who have toiled so hard?” asks P. Ayyakannu, president of the Sangam, who hails from the Tiruchirappalli district in Tamil Nadu.  

The state government had in February 2017 sanctioned a drought relief package of Rs 2,247 crore for 32 lakh farmers of the state. “The state government gave Rs 3,000 each as compensation for crop losses to those who depend on seasonal rain and Rs 5,465 per acre to those who depend on irrigation. How is that enough to make up for the losses we have faced?” Ayyakannu asks. “This is highly inadequate and we demand a drought relief package of Rs 40,000 crore from the Centre,” says Saravana Kumar Vasudeva, who belongs to a farmer family in Theni, Tamil Nadu. “We also want a waiver of loans, better support price for our produce, lower input prices and above all, solutions to water scarcity in the region," says Saravana.

Natarajan who has come all the way from Karur in Tamil Nadu says, “I lost my crops to this drought and have an outstanding debt of around Rs 5 lakh from a nationalised bank. How will I repay this? I have no money left. Why can’t the government extend the waiver for loans from nationalised banks like they have done for cooperative banks?”

“We wanted to make a representation to the prime minister about the agrarian situation in Tamil Nadu but even after 28 days, our representatives have not been granted an appointment. This only shows the government's claim that it is sensitive to farmers is hollow,” says Ayakannu. “Farmers would be forced to intensify their agitation unless the issue is settled,” he adds.

Catching the people’s imagination

The farmers from the Cauvery belt have been joined by farmers from the other states in the protest. “Our livelihoods have been destroyed. To drive home this point, we are using macabre elements in the protest like skulls, rats and snakes. We are carrying begging bowls, shaving half of our heads and staging mock funerals. We even stripped in front of the prime minister’s office yesterday. But other than the media, no one seems to be noticing us despite the gravity of the situation,” says Manohar Patil from Maharashtra who has joined in the protest.

Some of their demands include setting up of the Cauvery Management Board and interlinking of the national rivers to deal with the lack of water in Cauvery. “Why can’t the Centre force the Karnataka government to release water from Cauvery when the Supreme Court has directed Karnataka to do so as many as seven times? The Center talks so much about Ganga but nothing on Cauvery,” says Saravana.

“We are languishing here for days but the Centre has no interest in hearing us out. How do you think our families will survive with no income?” asks Natarajan. “Unable to repay our loans, we are left with no option but to rot in Delhi,” he says.

“Our crisis deepened this year because Karnataka, in spite of the Supreme Court order, refused to release Cauvery water to Tamil Nadu,” says Kuppuswamy, a farmer from Villupuram district of Tamil Nadu. Many agitating farmers are senior citizens and are also demanding a pension scheme where farmers over 60 years of age get Rs 5,000 each.

Whose fault is it anyway?

The Centre considers drought relief as the responsibility of the state. The state, on the other hand, has approached the Centre and sought an assistance of Rs 39,565 crore from the National Disaster Relief Fund for drought relief. Following this, a central team has visited Tamil Nadu to assess the condition and has submitted its report. Union Minister for Agriculture Radha Mohan Singh plans to take it up at a high-level committee meeting soon. However, it may be difficult for the Centre to waive off loans for the Tamil Nadu farmers alone as there are other states too which are in a similar situation. Tamil Nadu farmers may get some financial assistance but will that solve the current crisis of farmer debts and suicides?

Droughts are not just episodic in nature but are a structural problem. Drought or no drought, farmers will continue to fall in debt traps given their dependence on high-cost farming methods using fertilisers, pesticides, machinery and seeds. At the same time, crops are no longer fetching them remunerative prices from which they can profit. The answer to this crisis may be in adopting low-cost sustainable farming methods. Meanwhile farmers should be provided income security to wean them off the debt trap. Let’s wait and watch if the state responds well to the current crisis.

After becoming a human entity, Ganga river receives first legal notice

The Uttarakhand high court has issued the first legal notice to the Ganga river, which was accorded human status recently. The court has sought a response from the river for allowing construction of a trenching ground in its land in village Khadri Khadag without consulting the villagers. Along with the river, a notice has been issued to the union government, central and state pollution control boards and the Rishikesh municipality. The court has ordered the respondents to file a reply before May 8.

Water conservation programme for Bundelkhand launched

The water ministry has launched a water conservation programme for Bundelkhand for drought-prone areas in the region. Under the programme, the ministry has proposed to build thousands of percolation tanks, small check dams or nala bunds and recharge pits in both, the UP and MP regions of Bundelkhand. The programme aims to effectively improve groundwater conditions in stressed blocks of Bundelkhand, ensure sustainability of resource, participatory approach in groundwater management and institutional strengthening.

Jharkhand-West Bengal water-sharing dispute: Centre to intervene

An inter-state water dispute is arising between Jharkhand and West Bengal over sharing of water from four common river basins. The dispute is over the the 1978 water agreement which was signed between the undivided Bihar and West Bengal governments. While Jharkand has blamed its counterpart for not building dams on the river as promised, on the other hand West Bengal has refused to do so, citing the impacts the projects will have on its irrigation facilities. However, in order to resolve the matter, the central government will be helping the two states“re-do” the water-sharing agreement. 

Odisha government decides to withdraw land allotted to POSCO

The state industrial infrastructure development corporation (IDCO) has decided to withdraw the 1,880 acres of land allotted to POSCO to set up its 12 MTPA capacity steel plant and has also informed the South Korean company of the same. The state government and POSCO had signed an agreement to set up a steel plant worth Rs 52,000 crore but the project had to be stopped due to agitations from local villagers. However, there is news that the state government is planning to reallot the land to some other prospective investor.

Provide potable water to mining-hit village: HC to Goa government

The Bombay High Court has ordered the Goa government to ensure clean drinking water to villagers of Sonshi in North Goa's Sattari sub-district. Along with this, the court has also ordered the state to come up with a solution to pollution issues in the region caused by transportation of iron ore by trucks from mining leases. Earlier this month, the village was in the news after 45 residents were arrested for protesting against water pollution due to iron ore transportation.

This is a roundup of important policy matters from April 25 - May 1, 2017. Also, read news this week.

Pankaj Sekhsaria’s recent book Islands in flux--The Andaman and Nicobar Story is a collection of around 20 years of his writings on the environmental and conservation concerns faced by the indigenous tribal communities of the region. Unlike his previous book, The last wave, a factual fiction adventure story dealing with love, longing and loss, this one is a collection of contemporary developments in the islands. The book is divided into seven parts and several chapters each dealing with the societal and ecological facets of the islands. Issues related to the environment, wildlife conservation and development policies that threaten the island’s indigenous communities have been chronicled by the author who is a long-time member of the NGO, Kalpavriksh.

Alienation of islanders

The book begins with the section, Setting the context, in which he writes about the history of the alienation of the island communities living there for over 40,000 years. The author takes a dig at the history writers of the modern democratic Indian state who have left gaping holes in their writings by not sudying the ancient indigenous communities--the Great Andamanese, the Onge, the Jarawa and the Sentinelese. It is here that the author mentions “if the real and complete history of the islands is ever written, the British would not be more than a page and India could only be a paragraph”.

The indigenous people have been systematically alienated from their resources by the British colonial policies and the post-colonial development-oriented policies of India. The Britishers set up a penal colony in the islands in 1858, the Japanese occupied the islands during the World War II, and during the post colonial period, thousands of settlers from mainland India were brought to the island. Though the islanders put up a fierce fight to defend their territories, the social fabric of the island communities has been violently torn apart and their populations decimated while the settlers outnumbered the original inhabitants. The region is witness to nation building exercises, hinduisation of ‘uncivilized junglees’ and even an attempt to rename the islands. The author calls this as an attempt to “reclaim what was never yours”. No effort has been made by way of scholarship or historical studies to take the islanders’ point of view.

Forestry is the chief source of revenue in cash in the islands but the system of forestry did not suit the region. The author quotes an official report by the Department of Environment, Government of India that argues that “the forestry system was leading to a preponderance of deciduous elements in the evergreen system that would eventually destroy the whole island ecosystem”. The carrying capacity of the islands has been long exceeded, the author says. Ill-conceived schemes like cattle rearing were introduced for a community that does not consume milk. Tourism is a concern in the islands which have been declared as ‘global biodiversity hotspot’.

The pristine forests and the Jarawa tribal reserve that cover half the island are under threat because of the ill-conceived Andaman Trunk Road that separates the reserve land from the rest of the island. The Jarawas for whom the forests have been home for ages have been reduced to begging around the Trunk Road that runs through the reserve. The road has been controversial due to the negative fallouts on the island’s ecology and the indigenous people. The Supreme Court had in 2002 passed an order to close it; the island administration chose to ignore it. Its closure was absolutely critical to protect the Jarawa community, the author says.

Islands turn colonies

The author chronicles the 'colonising of the islands' in a chapter of the same name and discusses how the settlers look down upon the indigenous communities. Tension continues between the tribal communities, especially the ancient tribal community of Jarawas, and the settlers over land rights and there is a lack of political will to ease this even as the population of the Jarawas has been reduced to a few hundreds. “There are opinions that the Jarawas should be assimilated into the modern world, but it is clear that it is exactly this contact with the outside world that is rapidly pushing them towards the brink,” the author states.

In the chapter, A brief history of logging, Sekhsaria provides an account of the timber operations in the Andamans. He notes how as a part of India’s colonisation scheme, mainlanders were settled here. This was done to strengthen India’s claim over the islands. Incentives were offered to settlers by way of land and royalty free timber. The timber-based industry was promoted and liberal subsidies offered. Forests were exploited to benefit settlers who had little stake in the islands or its natural resources. Timber offered for millions decreased after the 2002 Supreme Court order. The order was in response to a petition by three NGOs to stop logging. The Supreme Court orders that banned the cutting of naturally grown trees in the Andamans and Nicobar islands were welcomed by the environmental rights groups. But logging continued within the tribal reserve.

In the section, Environment, ecology and development, the author stresses the need for evolving sensible conservation policies. The author discusses the consequences of introducing exotic species into the island systems. This has led to an irretrievable loss of native species and ecosystems. “The Andaman and Nicobar islands are unsurpassed in their botanical wealth, and the ethnomedical knowledge of the tribals who live here is astounding,” he says.

In the section, December 2004 and its aftermath, the author discusses the turmoil caused by the tsunami of December 26, 2004, which killed around 3500 people in the fragile Andaman and Nicobar islands, the worst hit area in India. The tectonic activity due to the third deadliest earthquake of the world in the last 100 years caused a significant shift in the islands’ geography with a permanent average uplift of four to six feet while parts of Nicobar islands went significantly under, with the southernmost tip, Indira point on Great Nicobar island going 15 ft down. Apart from dealing with how the tsunami destroyed the island, the section also highlights how the people picked up the pieces and started all over again.

Leave them alone

The tsunami waters inundated large areas of the islands causing damage to its coastal and marine ecology. In the aftermath of this turmoil, ecologists have suggested ‘no intervention’ and that ‘leaving areas alone should be the preferred management option’. A disturbing facet of the islands in recent times is its water scarcity. The islands have been facing severe water shortages even during the pre-tsunami period but this got worse after 2004. Fresh water sources got hit by the tsunami.

Talking about the faulty development planning, the author discusses how the former president late Abdul Kalam in 2005 in the aftermath of the tsunami announced a grandiose vision for the development of the Andaman and Nicobar islands. This included ecologically perilous components like deep sea fishing, exploitation of bamboo, value-added coconut products and tourism.

A central thread of Sekhsaria’s book has been the neglect and acculturation of the Jarawas, and their losing scuffle with the outsiders. The book presented in a journalistic manner handles the issue very sensitively and the author exhibits a keen understanding of the history of the indigenous people and its ecology.

Following Ganga and Yamuna, Narmada river also gets living entity status

The Madhya Pradesh cabinet has passed a resolution declaring Narmada river as a living entity in order to control pollution, illegal mining on the river banks and to save the river from depletion. The conservation programme for the river has already been started and the government is planning to initiate the conservation of other rivers like Kshipra, Gambhir, Ken, Betwa and Kali Sindh with public participation soon. Also, considering the new status of the river, the state government will be drafting a bill for the Narmada river to ensure strict legal action against those polluting the river. 

Fine of Rs 1 lakh for dumping e-waste near Ramganga: NGT

The National Green Tribunal has announced a fine of Rs 1 lakh as compensation on those found dumping e-waste on the banks of the Ramganga river in Moradabad, Uttar Pradesh. A committee has also been constituted to immediately remove the waste lying on the river bank and to submit a detailed report within two weeks. Also, it has come to the notice of the tribunal that the Ramganga river which is a tributary of the Ganga carries a BOD (biochemical oxygen demand) load of 128 tonnes per day and is heavily polluted due to the discharge from various industries. Moreover, the officials have turned a blind eye to the river's pollution and no action has been taken against the violators. 

West Bengal government creates a hurdle to the success of Namami Gange

The Namami Gange project is facing a roadblock as the West Bengal's chief minister Mamta Banerjee has refused to attend meetings to discuss riverfront development projects in the state under the Centre’s flagship programme. So far, no work has been initiated towards the riverfront development of Gangasagar, Belur and Dakshineswar due to the non-cooperation from the state. Along with this, the state government has shown apprehensions towards the linking of Manas-Sankaosh-Teesta-Ganga rivers that aims to benefit Assam, West Bengal and Bihar in irrigation, drinking water crisis and flood control. 

Centre approves Eastern Rajasthan Canal Project 

The Central Water Commission (CWC) has approved the Eastern Rajasthan Canal Project worth Rs 30,000 crore that aims to utilise the Chambal river water for tackling drinking and irrigation requirements of 13 parched districts of the state. The 13 districts include Bundi, Kota, Bharatpur, Dholpur, Karauli, Swai Madhopur, Baran, Jhalawar, Jaipur, Tonk, Dausa and Alwar. Following the CWC approval, the state government is planning to prepare a detailed project report in the coming weeks and will also seek national status for the project.

SC notice to Kerala over maintenance work on Mullaperiyar dam

With respect to the maintenance work on the Mullaperiyar dam, the Supreme Court has issued a notice to the Kerala government for creating hurdle in the repair works. The notice has been issued following a petition filed by the Tamil Nadu government which has been given the right to maintain the dam while Kerala will take care of its security. The 120-year-old Mullaperiyar dam has been an issue of contention between both the states. In 2014, however, the Tamil Nadu government was allowed to raise its height to 152 feet after strengthening measures were taken on the dam.

This is a roundup of important policy matters from May 2 - 7, 2017. Also, read the news this week.

Women in drought-hit Karnataka takes on the task to revive lakes

In Mandya district, nearly 3000 women across 31 villages are on a mission to revive lakes, ponds and irrigation tanks to tackle the water scarcity in the region. These women have even fought the administration to give them designated work under the Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act. Through protests, these women have also forced the authorities to pay on time and let them continue with the work. Due to crop failure, the women were devoid of any work and the task of lake rejuvenation has provided them an apt solution to this as well. Also, the movement is being spread to other districts and work has already begun in Kolar district. 

Maharashtra's rivers are dirty, thanks to its industries

With more than 75,000 manufacturing units in the state, Maharashtra's rivers are the filthiest with Pune-Chinchwad region having the worst offenders. Between 2011 and 2016, the state pollution control board has issued notices to over 5,200 industries, out of which 65 percent of the factories have been served a red-category notice for heavy pollution. The reason for industries violating the norms is the lackadaisical attitude of the state pollution control board; it has issued directives to erring units but had not taken any legal action against them.  

Assam is under the grip of fluoride contamination

According to the Assam Public Health Engineering Department (PHED), the fluoride levels in water in 11 districts of the state have been found to be above the permissible limit of 1 mg/litre putting an estimated 356,000 people at risk. Also, more than a thousand children under the age of five have been crippled in fluoride contamination in Hojali district. Moreover, due to the increase of groundwater usage in the recent years, the risk of fluoride contamination has also increased in other parts of the state.  

Despite farm crisis, record national harvest predicted for Tamil Nadu

Thanks to the worst northeast monsoon in 140 years, Tamil Nadu is going through a farm crisis. Despite the situation, however, the agriculture ministry has predicted a record national harvest of foodgrain--an increase of about nine percent in the crop year 2016-17 ending June. Moreover, the state government has claimed that only 82 farmers have committed suicide since October 2016 but according to farmers' representatives, as many as 106 farmers have died in January 2017 alone due to the prevailing drought conditions. 

Maharashtra eases Karnataka's water woes

To tackle the prevailing drought in Karnataka, the Maharashtra government has released 2.65 TMC water from Koyna dam. This is the second time that the latter has released water. Karnataka is reeling under drought for the past three years and this year only 20 percent water is left in nine of its 12 dams. Also, the available live storage of water in the reservoirs has touched an all time low. 

This is a roundup of important news from May 8 - 14, 2017. Also, read the policy matters this week. 

Centre urges states to gear up for possible monsoon failure

The agriculture ministry has ordered all the states and union territories to prepare themselves for a possible monsoon failure and operationalise their drought mitigation strategies. For this, the states and union territories have been permitted to earmark 25 percent of funds under centrally-sponsored schemes as flexi-funds for using them for the mitigation of natural calamities. Also, the ministry has allowed the states to expand the coverage of the Pradhan Mantri Fasal Bima Yojana in order to tackle loss of production in the event of a disaster.  

Government rejects funds to Gujarat's SAUNI yojana

On technical grounds, the Central Water Commission (CWC) has rejected the request to fund the Gujarat government's Saurashtra Narmada Avtaran Irrigation Yojana (SAUNI). As per the CWC, the detailed project report for the scheme lacks key details in relation to technical feasibility. Along with expressing concerns about the Gujarat government's failure to consult Narmada Control Authority (NCA) and other concerned states, the CWC has also raised questions over the water storage calculation for the project. However, after getting rejected by the Centre, the state government has decided to fund the project on its own. 

Ramgarh dam encroachment: HC notice to Rajasthan government

The Rajasthan high court has issued notice to several authorities in the state against the encroachment on the catchment areas of the Ramgarh dam in Jaipur. In 2004, the court had ordered the state authorities to demarcate the catchment area of the Ramgarh dam and declare it a no-construction zone. Further to this notice in 2012, the court ordered to remove the encroachment on the catchment areas but no action has been taken in this regard; even the demarcation of the catchment areas is yet to be done. 

Telangana to tackle its water crisis using four waters concept

Telangana Water Resources Development Corporation (TWRDC) has launched the Jal Doots programme in which 50 volunteers of various NGOs will educate farmers, members of small help groups and gram panchayats across 600 villages in the state on various recharge and water harvesting structures. The basis of the programme is the ‘four water’ concept (ground, surface, soil moisture and rainwater) that aims to conserve each drop of water. The programme will encourage farmers to build soak pits at home, farm ponds in field and adopt various conservation methods like tank renovation, silt application and drip and sprinklers for irrigation.

India ambitious to mine mineral wealth of the oceans

The Ministry of Earth Sciences has decided to embark on the ambitious Deep Sea Mission. The project, worth Rs 10,000 crore, aims to explore and mine mineral wealth beneath the ocean floor. The project is expected to begin by the year-end in 2017. According to the ministry, the project would be beneficial to the country as it will provide deep ocean energy, deep sea fishing and minerals. 

This is a roundup of important policy matters from May 8 - 14, 2017. Also, read the news this week.

Rampura, situated in Bulandshahr district in western Uttar Pradesh, is one of the 1,200 villages on the banks of the 300-km long East Kali, a tributary of the Ganges. The river is named after goddess Kali who, according to the Hindu mythology, is fierce and fights evil by ingesting it.

Till the 1980s, the river was a symbol of purity. Things have changed now with the river turning into a nullah brimming with industrial effluents. “We used to drink its waters when young. Today, it's so toxic that forget drinking, I dread touching it,” says Devendra Kumar Sharma, a resident of Panwadi, a village in Meerut district. The river’s toxic water now symbolises death and not life.

Foul flows in streams

As per a study by Neer Foundation, a Meerut-based non-profit working on environmental issues, as the river is polluted, the groundwater of the area which gets replenished by the river too has turned into a receptacle for toxic waste. Unsuspecting people, however, continued to draw water through the handpumps till recent studies rang an alarm bell.

The study conducted in 2015-16 reveals that in Rampura, the groundwater recorded a total dissolved solids of 1760 mg/litre, way above the permissible standard of a maximum of 500 mg/litre for drinking purposes. Soil stratum was harmed as iron and lead contamination spread from river water to aquifers (underground reservoirs that hold groundwater) that are recharged by it.

Lead is recognised as highly toxic, and damages the nervous system in humans while iron is therapeutic in low doses but lethal when present in excessive quantities.“This toxic water gets distributed and is used for drinking and irrigation purposes in rural areas. This has a severe health impact on us and our animals. The outfall of water from nullahs to the river must stop,” says Satish Kumar, a farmer from Jalalpur village in Meerut district.

The water from handpumps has shown iron concentration measuring up to 0.35 parts per million, which is enough to cause water to turn reddish brown in colour. Lead concentration too was high at  0.5 parts per million in Rampura. According to Indian standard drinking water specification 1991, the highest desirable limit of lead in drinking water is 0.05 parts per million. “The possibility of geogenic contamination i.e., naturally occurring contaminants in the water, too cannot be ruled out. The Central Ground Water Authority is studying these aspects,” says Atulesh Yadav, regional officer, Uttar Pradesh State Pollution Control Board, Meerut.

Rampura is one of the several villages of the eight districts of western Uttar Pradesh where people’s lives at one time depended on the river water for everything--from drinking to irrigation. The village that once boasted of lush green guava orchards has no original water left in its river. The prime villains in this regretful story are the ceaseless discharge of industrial wastewater and municipal sewage into the river.

“The three main cities of Meerut, Hapur and Bulandshahr through which the East Kali passes have several sugar mills, allied alcohol manufacturing distilleries, paper industries, dairies, tanneries and textile mills that discharge their effluents into the river,” says Raman Kant, director of Neer Foundation. The effluents from the sugar and paper mills are highly toxic and these two industries are enlisted among the 17 most toxic waste releasing industries by the standards provided under the Environment Protection Rules, 1986.

The pollution load in the river is unmanageable and it can barely assimilate the pollutants. Dilution with freshwater isn't a viable treatment option any longer. In most villages--right from Antawada in Muzaffarpur where the river originates, to Kannauj, its confluence with the Ganga--the water, laced with industrial toxins, is lifted from both the river and under the ground for irrigation. “Water flows from the underground caverns in the forest adjacent to our village forming a river that used to collect rainwater. Once a life-giving force, the river is dry at its origin and gets polluted by industrial effluents a few kilometers downstream,” says Bilam Singh, a farmer from Antawada. “The effect of this on our food is mostly unknown. It is possible that some of the most toxic chemicals like cancer-causing dioxins and organochlorines released by factories are present in the water that is irrigating the farms,” says Raman Kant.

In 2001, Neer Foundation tested the water quality in government accredited laboratories which showed the presence of persistent organic pollutants or PoPs in the two samples near Saini village, downstream of Nanglamal sugar factory. PoPs are known for their impacts on human health and the environment as they are resistant to environmental degradation. “Farmers knew of the contamination but continued to irrigate from the river,” adds Raman Kant.

“It is only on the river’s downstream stretch as it crosses the city of Aligarh that its pollution level declines as freshwater is added to it from the upper Ganga canal. Besides this, industrial wastes are not added in the river’s stretch between Aligarh and Kannauj,” says Raman Kant.

The green court takes note

Many civil society groups have raised the issue of river clean-up. Come monsoon and stretches of the effluent-laden river turn red as it passes through industrial sites. An otherwise seasonal river has now turned into a perennial one, thanks to the discharge of industrial and municipal wastewater into it. For years, this has been a concern as villagers were left with no option but to drink this contaminated water. The union environment ministry had in 2012 directed the Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) to monitor the quality of the river water and the major wastewater outfalls. “The Uttar Pradesh State Pollution Control Board too does regular monitoring of the river waters,” says Yadav.

Yet small pockets of industries are polluting the waters of the predominantly rural catchment that is largely dependent on the untreated water from the river as well as the ground. This is leading to the spread of cancer and various other life-threatening diseases. Seeing the impasse, Raman Kant put up a public interest litigation (PIL) which was heard by the principal bench headed by Justice Swatanter Kumar, chairperson, National Green Tribunal (NGT). Neer Foundation had two demands--the Environment Protection Rules, 1986 that prescribes the standards for effluent discharge is followed and municipal authorities who are responsible for managing municipal wastes adhere to the Municipal Solid Waste Rules, 2016.

“The industries not only abstract large volumes of water during their manufacturing processes reducing dilution of pollutants present within the surface water bodies but also contaminate the river by draining their effluent wastes into it,” the PIL states.

The NGT has, in an order dated May 24, 2017, asked the Uttar Pradesh State Pollution Control Board to test the groundwater along the course of the East Kali river. The order is applicable to districts of Meerut, Muzaffarnagar, Hapur, Bulandshahr, Kasganj, Aligarh, Kannauj and Farrukhabad through which the river passes. The NGT has directed the authorities to test the water immediately and seal those handpumps that supply contaminated water. The PIL also says the Kali clean-up is a prerequisite to cleaning the Ganga. The green tribunal’s order has come as a temporary respite for thousands of villagers living along the river. They are nonetheless waiting for the government to establish long-term policies to resolve the crisis. This could be in the form of a comprehensive action plan for cleaning the East Kali river.

“The Supreme Court had in 2014 transferred a public interest litigation by noted environmental activist M.C. Mehta, pending since 1985, to the green tribunal. It deals with issues of the river Ganga, especially those involving discharge of domestic sewage and other sources of pollution in the Ganga. This is the larger case which is being heard on a daily basis by the tribunal. As a result, some of the prayers of the petitioner in the case of Kali river were not heard separately,” says advocate Adarsh Srivastava, one of the applicants on behalf of the petitioner.

“We hope to get an official assessment of the water quality in the riverside villages as per the present order on the East Kali river soon. However, since we have been working on the river’s revival, we look forward to the tribunal’s orders on the Ganga pollution case. The court is likely to give directions on strict measures and penalties to prevent hazardous materials and pollutants from being dumped into the rivers,” says Abhishek Tyagi, secretary of Neer Foundation.

Without this, it is hard to tell whether the issue of pollution will be resolved in the near future.

India's groundwater crisis: Gujarat's solar irrigation cooperative embarks on a solution

The world's first Solar Pump Irrigators’ Cooperative Enterprise (SPICE) has been formed in Dhundi village in Gujarat's Kheda district. Members of the enterprise have not only made a switch from diesel to solar pumps but are also selling power to the local electricity utility, thereby creating a parallel revenue stream. The project has been initiated and partly funded by IWMI-Tata Water Policy Program. By December 2016, the six members had together earned more than Rs 1,60,000 from the sale of surplus energy to the local power utility.

Storage capacity of Karnataka reservoirs lost to siltation

With the accumulation of silt in Karnataka's 11 major reservoirs, nearly 10 percent of the storage capacity, that can annually cater to at least five cities as large as Bengaluru, is being lost. The loss of storage is primarily in the reservoirs of north Karnataka. The worst affected is the Tungabhadra dam which witnesses nearly 17 days of overflow due to high siltation levels. To tackle the issue, a proposal to construct a dam that will hold 30 tmcft of Tungabhadra water is made. 

Wetland panel formed in Gujarat

The Gujarat government has finally formed a 23-member state wetlands conservation authority under the Wetlands (Conservation and Management) Rules. Apart from government officials, the committee has representatives of Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), Bhaskaracharya Institute For Space Applications and Geo-Informatics (BISAG) among others. The aim of the committee is to examine wetlands, review conservation activities and make suggestions to the central government and financial agencies for various conservation projects.

Centre adopts two villages along the Ganga river

The Ministry of Drinking Water And Sanitation, in collaboration with Global Interfaith WASH Alliance (GIWA), has adopted two villages along the bank of Ganga river to make them model Ganga villages. The two villages are Veerpur Khurd in Dehradun and Mala in Pauri Garhwal. With the help of various stakeholders and ministries involved, these two villages will be provided with solid and liquid waste management facilities, drainage systems and groundwater recharge. 

Odisha blames Chhattisgarh for providing wrong information on water

The Odisha government has blamed the neighbouring Chhattisgarh government for giving wrong information on the flow of water to Hirakud reservoir in the downstream of the Mahanadi river. As per the claims, the latter is operating the gates at Kalma barrage in an improper manner to intentionally restrict the water flow to Hirakud. The matter will be taken up with the Central Water Commission to ensure the free flow of water in Mahanadi river through Odisha.  

This is a roundup of important news from May 29 - June 5, 2017. Also read the policy matters this week. 

Over the last few months, we saw protests by distressed farmers of Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and other states over farming crisis and farmer suicides. In what seemed like a knee-jerk reaction, many state governments announced farm loan waivers without thinking if it would actually help the farmers. 

Are loan waivers enough to improve the situation of farmers? Experts think otherwise. They believe that certain core issues of farming have been left unaddressed and need urgent consideration.

What do farmers have to say about the increasing crisis in agriculture and rising suicides? This article titled Lives in debt: Narratives of agrarian distress and farmer suicides published in the Economic and Political Weekly discusses the findings of a study on farmers’ experiences from two districts with high suicide rates in the country--Yavatmal in Maharashtra and Sangrur in Punjab.

The article argues that farmer suicides need to be understood in the context of the broader crisis in agriculture. It is not only indebtedness but a number of core issues related to faulty agricultural policies and practices that contribute to the distress among farmers.

Glaring signs of the crisis in agriculture

• The contribution of the agricultural sector to India’s GDP has been declining steadily. Nearly half of the workforce in the country, however, is involved in farming.

• There has been a steady increase in the percentage of farmers having small landholdings. Small landholdings do not support mechanisation and irrigation. Moreover, the absence of land records in many cases prevent these farmers from accessing formal credit, government benefits or crop insurance.

• A large number of small farm holders are accessing credit mainly from informal sources.

• Indebtedness among farmers is on the rise with 52 percent of agricultural households in the country being plagued by it.

What causes distress among farmers in Yavatmal and Sangrur?

Although Yavatmal and Sangrur are very different in terms of socioeconomic backgrounds, crop patterns, agricultural practices, the underlying reasons for distress are found to be similar.

• Flawed cropping patterns aggravating water scarcity

In Sangrur and Yavatmal, where paddy and cotton are grown, the crop choice is not harmonious with the agroclimatic features of the region. BT cotton is very sensitive to the timing and intensity of rainfall. Growing it in Yavatmal that has unpredictable rainfall and no alternative source of irrigation is unsuitable for the region.

As much as 2,000–4,000 litres of water are required to produce one kilo of rice. The high water demand makes rice unsuitable for a place like Sangrur which is highly water stressed with falling water tables due to severe depletion of groundwater resources.

• Rising input costs

Farmers in both regions complain of rising input prices (seed, water, electricity, fertiliser, pesticide and land rent) and the absence of a proportionate increase in minimum support prices (MSP). In Yavatmal, BT cotton producers are barely able to meet the costs of production, while traders and middlemen make profits at the cost of farmers who are not able to store the harvest and wait for the right price. Farmers in the study question the instability of prices and demand an enhancement of the loan amount from formal credit sources so that they can cover input costs and make farming viable.

In Sangrur, in addition to the high input prices needed for farming, dependence on paddy cultivation increases the demand for water, forcing farmers to spend huge amounts on digging borewells in an area that suffers from severe depletion of groundwater resources.

• The unending cycle of borrowing, non-repayment and the shame of debt

Rising input costs force farmers to borrow. Since the bank loans are insufficient to meet these high input costs, farmers are compelled to access informal sources of credit. At times, farmers prioritise repayment of loans taken from informal sources over bank loans due to high rates of interest and to retain their rapport with the moneylender to remain credit-worthy. Also borrowing from different sources to repay bank loans to stay within the banking system further pushes farmers into the spiral of debt. This, coupled with crop failure, worsens their situation.

At times, farmers are forced to borrow from their close relatives when other avenues of borrowing such as moneylenders have been tried and exhausted. The shame associated with one’s inability to repay is immense in village society and it is worse if money is borrowed from relatives, which forces many farmers to commit suicide.

• Rising aspirations and absence of alternative sources of income

Recently, rising aspirations have also led to farmers taking huge loans for non-farming activities such as marriages, ceremonies, cars, gadgets, contributing to their financial burden as many do not have any other source of income.

What is the way out?

The article suggests some fundamental changes to alter the situation.

• Moving towards cropping patterns that are suitable for the agro-climatic zones and encouraging indigenous patterns of farming that are less cost intensive.
• Modifying the institutional credit disbursal system by introducing the option of repayment in instalments.
• Introducing a proportionate loan–land ratio which would enable the farmer to retain his rights for the rest of his landholdings, which can then be used as a source of liquidity.
• Introducing specific farming credit policies for dryland and rainfed areas.
• The introduction of cashless loan components to avoid diversion of crop loans towards non-farm expenditures.
• Restructuring of loans against localised crop failures where specific and targeted compensation packages take extreme weather events or natural calamities into account.
• Introducing land reforms, correcting the terms of trade that work against farmers and providing them with alternative sources of livelihoods.

A copy of the paper can be downloaded from below:

Vasant Baburao Parkale, a 52-year-old farmer, has become a role model for many farmers in the drought-prone Marathwada region. His determination and the will to excel in life have helped him to transform his dreams into reality.

In 1984, he was just another labourer working for Bhagwan Yashwantrao Shirsagar, a wealthy farmer in Kadwanchi village in Jalna district. In 2006, Shirsagar built three farm ponds in the village with the help of the government subsidy. Vasant aspired to become a farmer like Shirsagar and was interested in building a farm pond. When he informed Shirsagar about this, he was discouraged from doing it. Unperturbed by this, Vasant went ahead with his efforts and started meeting government officials for the farm pond subsidy. The officials supported his initiative and provided him with the subsidy.

In 2006, he made his first 24x24-metres-farm pond. Through his two farm ponds, he harvests one crore 15 lakh litres of water annually. His grape production is flourishing with efficient water management practices. He owns 8.3 acres of land now and has properties worth Rs 1 crore. 

The video tells his success story.

Govt says out of 445 river stretches, 275 are polluted

The environment ministry has informed that out of the 445 rivers monitored by the Centre, 275 are polluted stretches. With 49 polluted river stretches, Maharashtra has topped the list, followed by Assam and Madhya Pradesh. The ministry, however, has also stated that it is supplementing the efforts of the state governments in pollution abatement in identified river stretches under the National River Conservation Plan (NRCP). 

Treated sewage to fill up Bengaluru's dry lakes

The Karnataka government has launched a project worth Rs 883 crore that envisages filling up of 65 dry lakes in Bengaluru Urban, Bengaluru Rural and Chikkaballapur districts with treated sewage water from the city. This is a first-of-its-kind project in India and is expected to make available 2.7 tmcft of water. Under this project, nine lakes in the Devanahalli taluk of Bengaluru Rural district, 12 in Bengaluru Urban district and 44 in Chikkaballapur district will be covered.

Report claims ONGC's activities harmed soil, water in Tamil Nadu

According to a report by the Coastal Resource Centre (CRC), the Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) and the Chennai Petroleum Corporation Limited's (CPCL's) hydrocarbon operations have contaminated soil, groundwater and surface water in Thanjavur, Thiruvarur and Nagapattinam districts in Tamil Nadu. Moreover, the report claimed that the gas corporation has failed to observe international best practices in responding to the June 30 oil spill and has even ignored repeated requests from farmers in the region to clean up the contamination.

Maharashtra all set for $1 billion funding for drought proofing

In order to address the water crisis in the state, Maharashtra government is adopting a multi-stakeholder partnership approach to raise a fund of $1 billion for drought proofing. For this, the World Bank will provide a loan of $480 million, $270 million grant will be given by the Green Climate Fund, Maharashtra will fund $200 million, and $200 million will come from the farmers, corporate foundations and financial markets. The initiative is expected to benefit the Jalyukta Shivar Abhiyan the most. 

IMD predicts normal rain in the second half of the monsoon

According to the India Meteorological Department (IMD), the second half of the monsoon season is expected to receive normal rainfall. However, the period from June 1 to August 7 has recorded an overall deficiency of minus three percent, following which several parts of the country have witnessed drought-like conditions, especially in the southern peninsula while the states such as Gujarat, Rajasthan and several parts of the northeast have witnessed floods. 

This is a roundup of important news from August 8 - 14, 2017. Also, read policy matters this week. 

Till about a year ago, 52-year-old Kisan Jite would often wake up to his wife Sarla and other village women squabbling over who would fill their buckets first from the only well in Golegaon village. This fight would then proceed to the three water tankers allotted by the zilla parishad for the entire village with a population of 2750 people. Some days, Jite himself would queue up behind the tankers.

Not anymore. Golegaon village in Aurangabad district, one of the severely drought affected areas in the Marathwada region of Maharashtra, has learnt to work around the water situation in their village. They have come up with the novel idea of a water budget for each household. “Every household draws up a budget of their income at the start of the month where they break down money to be utilised for various chores and bills. A water budget works the same way,” says Santosh Joshi, the sarpanch of the village who came up with the idea in consultation with Uday Deolankar, sub-divisional agriculture officer from the region. 

This effort was made to cope with the severe drought situation that was persisting in the village since 2012. Joshi knew well that the solution lay in conserving the existing source of water and reducing wastage. 

The budget lists out how much water should ideally be used by each of the 453 households in the village. The aim is to make optimum use of the 755-millimetre rainfall the area receives of which at least 50 percent was estimated to be going waste. Both Joshi and Deolankar collected data from each household with details of where and how the water was being used. 

How the budget works

With a team of youngsters to help them, they would visit each household and collect information like the number of family members in the house, the number of cattle or any livestock owned by each one, the size of the house, the number of vehicles owned, average usage of water for washing clothes, vessels and bathing. “We drew up two tables--one for the households and the other for farms. This was then compared to the water resource available in the village and an adequate breakdown was drawn for every house and farm,” says Joshi.

They further measured the rainwater that goes waste in the village and compared it with the price of the bottled water (available at Rs 20 per litre) to gauge the enormity of the financial loss involved in wasting rainwater. “When villagers compared the water they utilised with the price of bottled water, they realised the real value of the water they wasted,” says Joshi.

“I would always try to make people aware of the need for water conservation and how we can waste less water in our day-to-day chores. The villagers would keenly listen but to get them to implement any step was very difficult,” he adds.

The team drew up campaigns to spread awareness about the problem of dwindling water resources and how they could conserve it. “We tried to show the villagers how much natural water they wasted by comparing it with bottled water price. A household water budget was the only way to get close to a figure,” says Deolankar.

Post the awareness programme, of the 453 households, only 55 complied and submitted the data. Though not all villagers participated, Joshi and Deolankar could see some progress in their behaviour.  

Village gets competitive

Despite the lack of enthusiasm from the villagers, Joshi was not the one to be disheartened. The announcement of Paani Foundation’s Satyamev Jayate Water Cup gave his effort the impetus it needed. An initiative by actor Aamir Khan and his filmmaker wife Kiran Rao, the not-for-profit Paani Foundation was organising a competition, called Satyamev Jayate Water Cup, between villages to see which village could do the maximum work for watershed management and water conservation in a prescribed period.

The first edition of the competition was held during April 20 - June 5, 2016. About 116 villages took part in the competition to make their villages water-sufficient. As a result, 1,368 crore litres of water which is equivalent to 13,68,000 tankers of water worth Rs 272 crore was saved.

The first edition of water cup was a pilot project but with its success, the second edition was launched between April 8 and May 22, 2017. A total of 1300 villages from 30 tehsils took part in the second edition. Golegaon was one of them.

The competition required each village to work out a water budget for the village. Joshi, who was already working on this, hoped that enrolling in the competition would make his villagers more enthusiastic about water conservation at least for the sake of winning a competition.

The gram sabha endorsed the decision to take part in the water cup and in December 2016, a workshop was conducted at Khultabad. Paani Foundation also helped them in the process. As part of the workshop, the participants from the village were taught about the importance of watershed management and a film and a power point presentation were screened to create awareness. Later, around three training sessions on how to use water judiciously and effectively were conducted in the village through a mobile van. Villagers interacted with experts through video conferencing.

Thus, the gram sabha set the ball rolling for a systematic rainwater utilisation over a defined period of time by the village. Sarpanch Joshi and four members of the agriculture department--Uday Deolankar, Ashok Pathade, Ganesh Hange and Sunil Kolambi formed the core team of the water-budgeting project.

Joshi says that in Khultabad, they also learnt about changing crop patterns. “Farmers are still dependent on traditional farming. But with changing weather patterns, we needed to rethink ways of farming. One of the ways is to change the crop pattern of the village,” he says. Wheat, cotton and sugarcane are some of the crops grown in Golegaon. However, now farmers have been suggested to shift to less water intensive ones like vegetables and fruits, and also practise floriculture. 

The water budget for the village, which now hangs outside the gram panchayat office, was made with the help of a software provided by Paani Foundation. “The software is a simple one like the data entry software and a village graduate has been appointed as the computer operator. The villagers come with details like their land papers, household information and family information and this is fed into the system,” says Joshi. The software analyses the information, breaks it down to water utilised for various purposes, accounting even the water lost through evaporation.

Villagers change with time

A markable change has been noticed in the behaviour of villagers who, though reluctant to comply with the rules initially, have made it a habit to follow water budgeting regularly.

Jite and Sarla say they conscientiously measure each bucket of water they use. “After we submitted our household data to the gram panchayat office, they suggested some changes in our water use. So, now instead of using two to three buckets of water to bathe, we use just one. We also noticed that to wash vessels, we would initially use at least four buckets of water. We brought this down to only two small tubs of water,” says Jite.

Another villager, Ajinath Jadhav (45) says that his family realised how much water gets wasted when clothes are washed daily. “Earlier, we would wash our clothes daily, irrespective of whether it was summer or winter and even when there was not much sweat. We stopped this practice and now wash clothes only once in four days and some clothing items like jeans or night clothes are washed after three to four wears,” he says. The villagers now clean their tractors only by wiping it with a wet cloth instead of using a hose pipe as they were used to.

Jite says he noticed the change when the 70-litre water drum in his house needed refilling only after two days. “Earlier we had to fill it every day but now it has come down so drastically,” Jite says. The wastewater from the kitchen and from washing cattle are not wasted and sent to farms for crops.

Other ways of conserving water

Jadhav says that they were also educated in rainwater harvesting and how they could incorporate the method with the Shet Tale scheme by the Maharashtra government which provides a subsidy to build farm ponds for the conservation of water in the farm. “Golegaon has decided to construct 70 such ponds with 15 ponds already done,” says Joshi.

Here are some other steps being taken by villagers to improve the water situation:

• Constructed Nanded pattern soak pits where the wastewater generated from every household is discharged into the pits allowing the water to percolate to the ground
• Created plantation pits where the runoff water is collected to increase the water for various crops
• Built soil and water conservation structures
• In-situ soil treatment is done by way of bio venting
• Dug recharge wells

While Golegaon did not win the water cup, the results of which were announced on August 6, the villagers have incorporated these methods into their day-to-day lives. “Water Budget is just like any other budget, be it for home, village, city, state or nation. With the budget, we have a direct comparison of supply and demand of water. Every household, village, town, and city can prepare water budget. It is the need of the day,” Joshi says.

Water availability in the village as measured

• Water collected by rain: 769.77 crore litres
• Water flowing to rivers/nullah: 269.42 crore litres
• Water lost through evaporation: 230.93 crore litres
• Humidity in the soil: 115.46 crore litres
• Groundwater: 153.95 crore litres
• Water in various dams: 87.43 crore litres

Water requirement for the village

• Water for drinking and other use: 3.59  crore litres
• Water for cattle: 3 crore litres
• Water for agriculture: 429 crore litres
• Water for construction: 2 crore litres
• Water for business: 2 crore litres

Final water budget of village

• Total water collected: 356.85 crore litres
• Water required: 440 crore litres
• Water deficit: 83.15 crore litres

(Aarteeshymal Joshi is an independent journalist and a member of 101Reporters, a pan-India network of grassroots reporters.) 

Marathwada in Maharashtra is an arid region with rainfall of less than 750 mm per year. Most villages in the region face acute water scarcity. Kachner in Aurangabad was no exception. 

This meant that only rainfed agriculture was possible when the rains were good. Most of the year, and particularly in summer, there was a scarcity of water even for basic needs of its 339 households. This lack of water and no agriculture resulted in migration. Almost all families left their homes and migrated to wherever they found work--any work, to survive. Only unskilled labour on marginal wages was possible here. Who can think of education when the stomach is empty and the throat is parched? The story of Kachner was a story of a vicious circle of water scarcity, migration and poverty. 

The people of Kachner wanted to break away from this. So in 2007, they approached Pune-based Watershed Organisation Trust (WOTR) to solve their problem. 

WOTR aids villagers

WOTR’s Wasundhara Approach was aimed at addressing issues of land degradation, water scarcity and distress migration through Participatory Integrated Watershed Development. This approach demands that the village communities should spearhead their own quest for development. Interventions and activities are crafted according to the needs and choices of the village which would be implemented, adhering to the guidelines. 

The greatest challenge WOTR faced was trying to unite a village that had been so used to being divided on the basis of caste, class and gender. In addition, villagers found it difficult to stomach the ban on tree felling and free grazing of cattle, which they depended on for firewood and fodder, respectively. The ban was required for the regeneration of trees, grasses, and biomass--a non-negotiable requirement of WOTR's Watershed Development approach. 

So, although WOTR and the committees were not surprised by the scepticism and reluctance of many villagers to participate and comply with the rules, they had to work very hard to overcome the initial roadblocks to progress.

The situation today, however, is different. The improvement across all wealth ranking categories is visible. Prior to WSD, when the land was degraded and water was scarce, the households held the land jointly. Then, 29 percent households were medium to large landowners; 58 percent households were small landowners and 13 percent were landless. 

Today, there are 25 percent medium and large landowners; 65 percent small landowners and 10 percent are landless. During the project and following its implementation, large- and medium-sized farms (which were jointly owned earlier) were divided among the sons in the family and a number of landless households were able to purchase land (from the earnings of WSD), while a few began cultivating patches of forest land. Health and hygiene interventions have created awareness and have motivated families to adopt good sanitation practices. 

Improved living conditions

Today 35 households have their own toilets as compared to the pre-project stage where there were no toilets. Besides this, the drainage water that flowed from the homes and onto the settlement roads is controlled by 41 soak pits that were constructed as part of the project. This indicates that the change has seeped into the mindset of the people. The project has contributed significantly to providing water for domestic purposes to homes. 

Before the project implementation, the majority of households (215) fetched water from wells owned by others. There were no private tap connections in the households. With community contribution, the project installed pipelines in two villages where 109 households were provided with private water taps. Additionally, as part of the project, 98 water purifier units were provided on a subsidy basis (based on wealth ranking) to the villagers. Thus, project interventions have contributed to the provisioning of safe drinking water. 

Since its inception in 1993, WOTR has expanded its operations to over seven states including Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Odisha, Telangana, Andhra and Maharashtra. 

WOTR gets recognition

It was this kind of integrated and large-scale work that has earned WOTR the prestigious Land for Life Award 2017, awarded by the United Nations Convention on Combating Desertification recently. WOTR was one of the three organisations on a global level to win the 2017 Land for Life Award. 

Its unique strength lies in its “on-field” experience and the systems-based participatory approach that WOTR adopts. WOTR was initiated to support a large-scale multi-actor, multi-level, multi-sectoral, community-led watershed development programme for poverty reduction called the Indo-German Watershed Development Program (IGWDP). It was launched in Maharashtra by Fr Hermann Bacher, co-founder and chairman of WOTR, and Crispino Lobo, co-founder and managing trustee. 

WOTR has been active in mobilising vulnerable communities in the semi-arid and resource fragile regions to come out of poverty by harvesting rainwater wherever it falls and regenerating the ecosystems they live in. It has now expanded its work to 13 thematic areas. Women’s empowerment, sustainable livelihoods, agro meteorology, climate change adaptation, disaster risk reduction, sustainable agriculture, water budgeting and water use efficiency management are its key focus areas.  

Besides its sustainable land management (SLM) approach, water budgeting and micro irrigation have benefited at least 355,832 people. In addition, WOTR’s works have contributed to the reduction of rural to urban migration and have created substantial local employment opportunities in rural areas.

It has trained over 380,000 people from India and various countries across the world in natural resources management and watershed development. WOTR works not only in land restoration, poverty reduction and climate change adaptation, but also leads in capacity building, empowering vulnerable communities and women, and advocating its WSD approach at the state and national levels.

In the context of the award, Crispino Lobo says, “Scaling up and achieving sustained impact require active collaboration of multiple stakeholders from across the governance, public, private and civil society sectors working on all levels, from the village upwards to the provincial, state, national and even international levels.”

He adds, “The union government has set an ambitious target of doubling farm income by 2022 but this will be impossible to achieve without combating land degradation. Around 57 percent of land in India suffers from desertification. Hence, we need to teach farmers how to catch rainwater across landscapes, recharge groundwater aquifers and improve soil health. In India, 60 percent of the population depends on the land and forests. Water is essential not only to agriculture but also to other livelihoods.”

(This article is provided by the communications team at WOTR.)

Committee rejects UP's plan for a religious hi-tech smart city 

To safeguard the Ganga river, the environment ministry panel has rejected Uttar Pradesh government’s proposal to develop the country’s first “religious hi-tech smart city” in Garhmukteshwar. With an aim to inculcate a unique mix of technology and religion, the state government had proposed to develop a new city spread over 7,395 hectares inside Hastinapur wildlife sanctuary and on both banks of the Ganga river. The proposal, however, has been rejected as it has the potential to change the morphology and the hydrodynamics of the Ganga river and could kill approximately 7 km of the river in the state.

Bellandur lake frothing: NGT pulls up the Karnataka government

Bengaluru's Bellandur lake frothed again following the record rainfall on August 15 and 16. Post the frothing, the National Green Tribunal has pulled up the Karnataka government for failing to address the issue. The tribunal has also sought information from the government on how many stormwater drains it has cleared, how much solid waste has been collected from the lake, where the collected waste has been taken and what preventive steps were being put in place to ensure that the frothing does not continue.

SC raps Maharashtra government over pollution in Ulhas and Waldhuni rivers

Taking note of the absence of coordination between the authorities to protect the Ulhas and Waldhuni rivers, the Supreme Court has rapped the Maharashtra government for letting the two rivers get degraded due to the increasing pollution. The principal secretary, the state environment department and the member secretary of the Maharashtra Pollution Control Board (MPCB) have been ordered to be present in person during the next hearing on September 18.

HC orders J&K government to demarcate wetlands in the state

The high court has ordered the state government to demarcate the wetlands and take measures to conserve water bodies in the Valley. The commissioner secretary, forest, has been asked to act as the nodal authority and ensure that the demarcation will be carried out with geographic information system (GIS) technology. The court has also ordered the commissioner secretary of the irrigation department to convene a meeting and submit an action plan for building interconnections between wetlands and rivers in the next hearing. 

Completion of North Koel Reservoir Project gets approved

With an estimated expenditure of Rs 1622.27 crore, the union cabinet has given its approval to complete the balance works of the North Koel Reservoir Project in Jharkhand and Bihar. The project aims to provide irrigation to 111,521 hectares of land annually in the most backward and drought-prone areas of Palamu and Garhwa districts in Jharkhand and Aurangabad and Gaya districts in Bihar.

This is a roundup of important policy matters from August 16 - 21, 2017. Also, read the news this week.

Census of India captures data on varied topics, one of them being rural water access. Many researchers use this data to understand the regional variations in water sources as well as its quality. But one needs to be cautious while analysing this data as there are few discrepancies and certain nuances that influence the data being collected. The article titled Data Discrepancies: Interpreting Rural Water Data in the Decadal Census published in the Economic and Political Weekly on July 15, 2017, highlights the key aspects of the Census data that needs to be considered while using it as a data source.

First, there is the discrepancy in data present in the house-listingdata set and that in the village amenities data set on village water sources. The house-listingdata set which consists of data collected from households seems to be more reliable than the village amenities data set which is collected from the village accountant. Second, the data on "access to taps" present in the house-listingdata set is generally taken as a proxy for "access to piped water supply". The crux of the data on "access to taps" collected by the census is that, census collects data only on drinking water sources.

In rural areas, households may access different sources of water for potable and non-potable purposes in times of water scarcity or when they are supplied with bad water through taps. For instance, when the gram panchayat borewell fails, or when the motor is under repair, households access water from other sources such as the tanker or from borewells of neighbouring farms. Also, if the gram panchayat borewell water is salty or muddy or of poor quality, then households access water from the nearby farm borewells or from the water purification units which are installed by the government. Thus, just the fact that people are accessing other sources of drinking water does not imply that they do not have access to piped water supply. They may be using the piped water supply for a non-potable purpose. Thus, "access to taps" of the census cannot be used as a proxy for "access to piped water supply".

Finally, the data on "access to treated water" is not a correct indicator of access to safe water since households are unlikely to know if their water is treated according to the norms stipulated by the government. They may only be able to judge the quality of water in terms of its brackishness and odour and may not capture the actual quality of water supplied. Since the gram panchayat is the major provider of water in villages, if the water supplied to a village by the gram panchayat is actually being treated, then most of the households in a village should report "treated water supply". Further investigation is needed when households in a village report both treated and untreated water supply.