Water, make it a political issue

This election season, water should rank high up on the electoral issues list. In fact, it should be politicised. Winter rainfall shortage, groundwater depletion, increased warming due to El Nino and its impact on rains will exacerbate water stress. As politicians promise a grand future in their stump speeches, they need to tell voters of their plan to address water woes. More so, as India’s tryst with water stress, if not averted, will short-circuit investment flows, economic growth and jobs, upending the goal of Viksit Bharat. Beacons of developed India like Bengaluru are canaries in the proverbial coal mine.

In 2018, NITI Aayog reported that 600 mn people were living in conditions of high-to-extreme water stress. This is no longer a function of delayed development. Cities, earlier considered immune, are taking the brunt. Increased use of groundwater as urban population grows is no longer a solution. Filling water bodies to construct residential high-rises has slowed groundwater recharge. The situation will worsen. Reservoirs in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh are filled to 25% or less of their capacity. Water storage capacity of 13 east-flowing river basins are deficient-to-highly deficient. It is not just the south, but reservoir capacities are below last year’s levels in other parts of the country too, barring the eastern/northeastern region.

Forecasts of a warmer summer and climate change-induced disruptions in rainfall are already changing life as we know it in our cities. Tankers, transporting water, and interlinking rivers are not the solution. This is a crisis of water planning. Political parties must address this existential problem. Else, what happens in Bengaluru won’t just stay in Bengaluru.