Mood of The Nation: Have water facilities improved under Modi govt? Poll says yes

How have the situation of availability of irrigation water and clean drinking water changed in your area in the last five years?

A farmer channels water to irrigate his wheat field on the outskirts of Ahmedabad. (File photo: Reuters)

Buoyed by a commanding majority in the new Lok Sabha and the tactical support from friendly opposition parties in the Rajya Sabha, the Narendra Modi government has been on a legislative overdrive; chasing goals to ensure sustainable growth is a tad easier. So even though not all measures are backed by budgetary intent, there is a perception that things have improved, especially in rural areas. The MOTN survey shows that this is especially true for the availability of potable water as well as for irrigation, power and the condition of roads. People say these have improved strikingly in the past two years.

The reconstitution of the water - related departments into the newly named Jal Shakti ministry displays a resolve to address the country's water woes. Prime Minister Modi has pledged to make water conservation a mass movement on the lines of the Swacch Bharat cleanliness campaign. To walk the talk on this is a daunting task, for the crisis lies in the indiscriminate splurge and mismanagement of water.

Per capita availability is on the decline but consumption by irrigation and industry, including water guzzling thermal plants, remains high. The area under irrigation has increased but still covers only half the sown area. That 24 million hectares is still to be irrigated reflects the failure of irrigation outcomes over the decades. The use of Artificial Intelligence and weather technology driven solutions, though still a nascent initiative, seem promising. The new push for Zero Budget Natural Farming is appealing to farmers but it is yet to prove its economic viability. Meanwhile, industry continues to guzzle water.

The warning bells are ringing. In a couple of years, 21 major Indian cities could run out of groundwater. Chennai is already there and Bengaluru and Delhi are not far behind. The Niti Aayog is working on a detailed plan listing various technologies that can be used in different states to desalinate sea water. The Jal Shakti Abhiyan targets at harvesting rainwater in over 1,590 water stressed blocks of 256 critically water starved districts. Har Ghar Jal to provide piped water to 190 million households is far more ambitious and is eight times larger than the Saubhagya scheme that promised connectivity to the electrical grid to about 25 million households.

Reduce and reuse' are still to emerge as the watchwords in water management. Also not clear is where the money for all these ambitious projects will come from. The decade old proposal for and Irrigation and Water Resources Finance Corporation is being revived, which holds promise. Water being a state also hampers sweeping reforms.Moreover, water is a state subject. The Jal Shakti Ministry will have to persuade the states to get their act together in terms of pragmatic solutions to water sharing and management issues. The Maharashtra Water Resources Regulatory Authority, in operation since 2005, is being showcased as a model water regulator for states.

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