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Participatory water management requires the involvement of millions
Vanarai
Bunds, erected at virtually no cost by using empty cement bags across
nullahs and rivulets, have proved most effective in watershed management,
writes Mohan Dharia. Around 36,000 such bunds have been constructed
in Maharashtra by local communities since the monsoons of 2002.
The
development target set by the UN Millennium Assembly and also by the recent
Johannesburg Summit is to halve by 2015 the proportion of people living in
extreme poverty, suffering from hunger or unable to reach or afford safe
drinking water. It will not be possible to achieve these goals unless
governments realise that water is fundamental to almost any kind of
development and human activity and that it is not water that should be
managed, but in fact the people who depend on and make decisions about
freshwater. Water is not an issue for experts. Water is everybody's
business.
If the
wars of the future are indeed going to be fought over water, the
conservation of every drop and its judicious use is essential and urgent.
Several states in the country have been facing drought virtually every year.
Though it appears to be a natural calamity, to a great extent drought is a
man-made calamity.
Since
Independence, our country has emphasised major irrigation projects and big
dams to conserve water. After investing thousands of crores of rupees,
hardly 32% of our land is perennially irrigated through various reservoirs.
In spite of all efforts not even 70% of the lands in command areas have so
far received irrigation facilities. Besides, over 20 million hectares of
irrigated lands have become saline or waterlogged in several parts of the
country. Even additional investments will only make it possible to
perennially irrigate 40-45% of the total area through canal irrigation. Thus
55-60% of India will always be dependent on rains. Scientific
micro-watershed development to conserve every drop of water, wherever and
whenever it falls, and preventing soil erosion are the only solutions.
Besides it may be possible to provide water for seasonal crops,
horticulture, agro-forestry etc or to save kharif crops whenever rainfall is
erratic. This approach must also be applied in all catchment areas of big
dams to prevent soil erosion and save water reservoirs from further
siltation.
It
will never be possible to introduce watershed development programmes all
over the country without the involvement of millions of people and without
participatory watershed development with effective management. The recent
guidelines of the Government of India have made it very clear that the
watershed development programme will be a people's programme and not a
government programme and that state governments will work only as
facilitators to implement this programme.
Conserving
every drop of water and its further management should be the responsibility
of the local people. By and large a village or cluster of villages forms a
watershed unit covering 400 to 700 hectares. The Gram Sabhas of these
villages, according to Schedule 11 of the Indian Constitution, are
responsible for watershed management. According to the 73rd Amendment and
the 11th Schedule, 29 programmes including soil and water conservation and
water management have been transferred to the Gram Sabha. Thus it is the
constitutional responsibility of each Gram Sabha to implement this programme
by involving the local people.
In
view of the scarcity of water faced by various villages and drought
conditions in several parts of the country, a massive programme to conserve
water with low-cost technology is unavoidable. Especially when state
governments don't have adequate funds, emphasis should be laid on low-cost
technologies prevalent in the country for hundreds of years. Temporary bunds
on nullahs, rivulets or small rivers erected by using empty cement bags,
popularly known as Vanarai Bunds, have proved most effective. At minimum or
virtually no cost, they have been yielding maximum results. In Maharashtra,
after the 2002 monsoons, more than 36,000 Vanarai Bunds were erected by
local communities, administrations and college students. Commendable
initiatives were made by the CEOs and Collectors of several districts. This
has helped in solving the problem of drinking water, bringing some lands
under rabi crops and generating employment opportunities.
Vanarai
bunds are low cost structures which are useful in checking and retaining the
run-off rainwater towards the end of the monsoon season. They are also
extremely simple to construct - empty cement sacks are filled with locally
available soil and are arranged in a row to form a small bund. On an average
200-300 empty cement sacks are used to build a single bund. The average life
span of a Vanarai bund is slightly more than a year.
In
Maharashtra 36,000 such bunds have been constructed by local communities
since the monsoons of 2002. Out of these, 2125 were built in Raigad, 1030 in
Wardha, 1701 Buldhana and 1414 Thane district.Voluntary labour worth Rs 250
crore has been utilised in the construction of these bunds.
Along
with conservation of water, scientific and judicious use of water is equally
important. The existing system of providing unlimited water to lands has
created serious problems of salination and waterlogging. Besides, the
extensive use of fertilisers and pesticides has affected soil texture. Those
who use surface or underground water to irrigate crops should use sprinkler
or drip irrigation systems in their fields. Crops that require considerably
greater amounts of water should be discouraged. R & D centres should be
established to bring down the use of water in all sectors in co-operation
with the existing National Laboratories and Agricultural Universities.
Similar restrictions should be placed on industries and municipal bodies.
India
has not so far paid adequate attention to the recycling of water for
domestic or agricultural purposes. Similarly there is no compulsion to treat
the water polluted by industries or by municipal bodies. Treating polluted
water and recycling used water whenever possible should be made obligatory.
To
ensure that every drop of water is properly utilised, beneficiaries in rural
or urban areas should be reasonably charged on the basis of the quantity
used. Cooperatives or participatory associations of the beneficiaries of
water should be encouraged all over the country.
Pumping
out water without recharging aquifers is perilous. After scientifically
assessing the underground level of water the permissible number of borewells
or wells in a watershed unit should be prescribed with necessary
restrictions. The Gram Sabha of a village should be authorised to lay down
such restrictions and introduce efficient water management.
Evaporation
of water is a challenge for all the countries in the world. Scientists have
invented appropriate technologies to cover water reservoirs and to save the
evaporation losses. Though costly, it has become essential to use new
methods to prevent the losses of water from evaporation.
Mohan Dharia is president of Vanarai and a
former minister of the union government.
Courtesy InfoChange News &
Features, April 2003
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