WATER CRISIS IN INDIA

  • India is water-stressed due to changing weather patterns and repeated droughts And the worst sufferers of this crisis are mostly women.
  • Water scarcity in India is expected to worsen as the overall population is expected to increase to 1.6 billion by the year 2050.

Important points:

  • Although India has 16% of the world’s population, the country possesses only 4% of the world’s freshwater resources.
  • In recent times, the water crisis in India has become very critical, affecting millions of people across India.
  • As many as 256 of 700 districts in India have reported ‘critical’ or ‘overexploited’ groundwater levels according to the most recent Central Ground Water Board data (from 2017).
  • Three-fourths of India’s rural families lack access to piped, drinkable water and must rely on unsafe sources.
  • India has become the world’s largest extractor of groundwater, accounting for 25% of the total. Some 70% of our water sources are contaminated and our major rivers are dying because of pollution.

Causes:

  • There is insufficient water per person as a result of population growth.
  • The total amount of usable water in India has been estimated to be between 700 to 1,200 billion cubic meters (bcm)
  • A country is considered water-stressed if it has less than 1,700 cubic meters per person per year.
  • Water in most rivers in India is largely not fit for drinking, and in many stretches not even fit for bathing.
  • Poor water quality is the result of insufficient and delayed investment in urban water-treatment facilities.
  • Moreover, industrial effluent standards are not enforced because the state pollution control boards have inadequate technical and human resources.
  • There is dwindling groundwater supplies due to over-extraction by farmers.
  • Deficient rain in some areas is also depleting ground water.
  • Wells, ponds and tanks are drying up as groundwater resources come under increasing pressure due to over-reliance and unsustainable consumption.
  • Unequal distribution of water, contamination/depletion of local water bodies due to pollution and no proper water treatment facility augment the water crisis in India.

Way Forward

Addressing women’s water, sanitation and hygiene requirements is a critical driver in attaining gender equity and unlocking the potential of half of the world’s population. The water crisis is a women’s issue and feminists need to talk about it.

SOURCE: THE HINDU,THE ECONOMIC TIMES,MINT

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