Their approach to the crisis is superficial. It is irony that none of them preferred to go deep down and take head on the challenges. The present chief minister Raghubar Das is also not an exception. What he said on January 14 clearly underline that he too has been simply resorting to gimmick. He stressed on the need for water conservation and said his government was working on a policy framework to preserve this precious natural resource in the state.

Das’ remark came in the wake of Jharkhand High Court's order in a PIL filed over scarcity of drinking water and drought-like condition in several parts of the state. Hearing the petition the double bench of Chief Justice Virender Singh and Justice PP Bhatt had sought a report from the government on the fast depleting ground water level in the capital and other parts of the state. The court also directed the state to furnish by February 17 short- and long-term plans to deal with this imminent crisis.

Incidentally Das’s remark did not correlate to the queries from the judges. It reflected utter lack of knowledge on the part of the chief minister about the reasons for the crisis. His observation was merely an attempt to minimize the intensity of the crisis. He had also said: 'A large amount of rainwater runs away due to lack of planning and initiative. We can tap this water and tide over the crisis. Conservation of water tops the priority of the government'. Das further said that discussions were on with various stakeholders, including PHED, water resources, irrigation and urban development departments, ground water directorate and civic bodies, to prepare a foolproof plan in this regard.

It is really surprising that Jharkhand, a state having rivers, number of rivulets and ponds, was facing the water crisis. In most parts of the state people are not denied of drinking water. In the hinterland and particularly districts inhabited by tribals, the traditional wells have dried up. In some places deep tube wells have been installed. A visit to the Santhal Paragans areas would reveal that a number of big size trucks having Tamil Nadu registration number, fitted with machines to bore deep tube wells are moving around. They charge exorbitant for fixing a deep tube well.

In this connection the remarks of the Jharkhand Economic Survey 2010-11 is worth mentioning which underlined that the acute shortage of irrigation water and shrinking watershed areas in forest regions pose additional problems. The survey said surface water for agriculture was not sufficient due to inadequate storage facilities and ground water availability was poor due to little recharging by natural process and absence of artificial recharging facilities. 'As a result the water level in the plateau is going down. Water is the most critical resource and is expected to become scarce in future with further demand from household, industries and agricultural sectors,' the report said.

In fact, ground water directorate had conducted a block-wise survey of the state in March 2011 in which it was found that six blocks, namely, Jharia, Dhanbad, Jamshedpur, Godda, Ramgarh and Kanke have been over exploited. The ground water of six blocks in Jharkhand has already been overexploited, including the one at Kanke block that caters to the state capital. The ground-water level of Hinu was 1.20 mts in June 2008. It went down to 9.47mts in June 2012. Thus the depletion level was highest with a decrease of 8.27mts. In Hatia, the ground-water depletion level was 6.59 mts and at Hotwar it was 5.18 mts.

They have been used more than their capacity, i.e. more than 100 per cent. Kanke block that has Kanke dam, the main source of water supply to Ranchi, has been exploited by 122.44 per cent. In another survey conducted in June 2012, the ground-water level was found to have fallen by 13.4 metres since June 2008 to June 2012. Water crisis is felt much more in urban Jharkhand compared to rural parts of the state. As many as 11 major blocks covering urban Jharkhand are either overexploited or semi-critical when it comes to ground-water exploitation.

The directorate held that if the situation persists then that day is not far when urban Jharkhand will face severe water crisis in the years to come. No doubt bob-sheets and files mention several schemes the state government is implementing to reduce the adverse effect of water scarcity, ground water management and watershed management. But the government is willing to put a ban on extract water by the realtors. Jharkhand is following in the footsteps of Vidarbha.

The state’s ground water directorate confirms what the study has observed: Jharkhand’s water table dropped by an average of three metres between 2009 and 2010, from 17 metres to 20 metres. The rain deficit in Jharkhand last year was 41 per cent as against 2 per cent in the rest of the country. Normal rainfall in the state is around 1,100 mm; some districts received as little as 500 mm. Till eight years ago, the decline in water table levels before and after the monsoon was in centimetres. Now it is in metrers.

According to yet another study, drinking water in villages in Jamtara, Deoghar, Giridih and Hazaribagh districts will be exhausted soon. In Bokaro’s non-industrial areas almost all wells were dry in December. Some time back waterman Rajendra Singh had suggested some remedial measures to the state government. But the government did not move.

Since the formation of Jharkhand the state has been witnessing construction of multi-storeyed buildings. Many of the small ponds which were main source of water are now filled for construction purposes. Deep borings in Ranchi have forced the water table to move down. Many houses have been built over the recharge area which are the major source of water to unconfined aquifer below. During last years the ground water level has alarmingly decreased. Ranchi, which was known as a city of rivers, lakes and ponds and treated as its summer capital, is dying for drinking water.

According to statistics groundwater extraction is as high as 70 per cent. This trend is dangerous as Jharkhand does not have deep aquifers to retain the water. Only 24 per cent of about 7 million hectares of agricultural land in Jharkhand is irrigated; the rest is rain-fed. Jharkhand’s average agricultural produce in the non-drought years has been 3 million tonnes. But the yield in the past two years has been 2.2 million tones, which is less than half the state’s requirement of 5.5 million tonnes. Urban areas in Dhanbad and Ranchi are parched. Poor people have to walk 100-500m daily to fetch water. (IPA Service)