New Delhi: With water scarcity across the country already threatening to touch alarming proportions, even the Centre has acknowledged that there is a progressive reduction in levels of the precious mineral in terms of per capita availability.
According to the official data of ministry of water resources, from 2001, when the average annual per capita availability of water in the country was 1,816 m3 per year, it had significantly reduced by 15 per cent to come down to 1,545 m3 per year by 2011.
More worrisome is the fact that from the 2011 levels it is expected to further fall by another 13 per cent to 1,340 m3 per year by 2025. By 2050, these levels could further decline by 15 per cent to stand at around 1,140 m3 per year.
Top officials in the ministry said that ground water levels in various parts of the country are declining because of continuous withdrawal due to reasons such as increased demand of fresh water for various uses, vagaries ofrainfall, increased population, as well as industrialisation & urbanization.
According to the assessment of Dynamic Ground Water Resources-2013, carried out by Central Ground Water Board (CGWB) jointly with state governments, the net annual ground water availability in the country is 411 BCM (billion cubic metre), whereas, annual ground water utilisation is 253 BCM.
Domestic and industrial sectors accounts for approximately 10 per cent (24.71 BCM) of the annual utilisation, according to the data.
This sinister scenario is in addition to the grim picture which government think tank Niti Aayog had painted, when in its composite water index released earlier this year, it had forecasted that 21 cities including Delhi, Bengaluru, Chennai and Hyderabad will run out of groundwater by 2020, affecting 100 million people.
According to the water index, by 2050, there will be an approximately six per cent loss in GDP owing to depleting water levels. Also the demand for potable water will outstrip supply by 2030 if urgent remedial steps are not taken.
The index had also pointed out that around 600 million Indians faced high to extreme water stress and about 2 lakh people died every year due to inadequate access to safe water.
Apart from this, critical groundwater resources that accounted for 40 per cent of India’s water supply are being depleted at ‘unsustainable’ rates and up to 70 per cent of India’s water supply is ‘contaminated’, the index had further noted.
