Deep Aquifers

Featured Articles
July 11, 2022 The Chauka system of Rajasthan can not only provide a sustainable way to manage water resources in water stressed regions, but also support livelihoods through development of pastures.
Can greening of barren lands happen? (Image Source: India Water Portal Flickr photos)
July 29, 2021 Experiences from participatory groundwater management efforts in Maharashtra
Unless work on managing the demand is undertaken, the notion of ‘infinite’ groundwater will be hard to address. (Image: Rucha Deshmukh, ACWADAM)
December 4, 2019 The 2015­-2018 drought, the longest, but less severe of droughts experienced by India raises alarm on the negative effects of future droughts on water security in the country.
India will see more droughts in the future. (Image Source: Wikimedia Commons)
October 25, 2019 Groundwater use has doubled in Pune. Comprehensive mapping of groundwater resources and better management and governance is the need of the hour.
Groundwater, an exploited resource (Image Source: India Water Portal)
October 1, 2019 Deconstructing the traditional narrow engineering based policy discourses around floods and droughts and connecting them to social and cultural realities is the need of the hour in India.
Water talk Series at Mumbai (Image Source:Tata Insitute of Social Sciences)
September 30, 2019 The recently concluded 4 day conference in Bangalore looked at the current state of global water resource challenges & future pathways to achieve the SDGs, while ensuring equity in access to all.
Charles Vorosmarty, Chair, COMPASS Initiative, Water Future at the opening plenary on advanced water system assessments to address water security challenges of the 21st century.
Preparation of strategic plan for rural drinking water sector in India – A draft discussion paper by the Department of Drinking Water Supply
Preparing a strategic plan for rural drinking water sector in India with technical and financial details to accelerate coverage across the rural land. Posted on 26 Dec, 2010 07:27 AM

This draft discussion paper by the Department of Drinking Water Supply (Ministry of Rural Development) deals with the preparation of strategic plan for rural drinking water sector in India. The Government of India introduced the Accelerated Rural Water Supply Programme (ARWSP) in 1972–73 to support States and UTs with financial and technical assistance to implement drinking water supply schemes in order to accelerate the pace of coverage across rural India.

Rainfed areas and rice farming Crucial agricultural water issues
Making up-gradation of rainfed areas a priority for food production and poverty alleviation Posted on 25 Dec, 2010 08:30 PM

John Thompson works on power, policy and sustainability issues in food and agriculture, water resource management and rural development. He is a STEPS Centre member, IDS Fellow and joint Co-ordinator of the Future Agricultures Consortium. He presents two crucial agricultural water issues to take priority on World Water Day.

Understanding groundwater - A course by ACWADAM
How does the groundwater form? How does it move, flow and store? A six module course designed to detail these and more questions on groundwater Posted on 20 Dec, 2010 01:01 AM

The  Advanced Centre for Water Resources Development and Management (ACWADAM) has created a power-point course to explain the formation of groundwater and its management.

The course consists of 6 modules; it includes the basics of understanding groundwater, study of geology, groundwater level and movement, planning and management of groundwater, storage and flow of groundwater and water quality. The modules have been made into succinct power-point presentations that include charts, diagrams and photographs besides the written word.

Mining - An increasing threat to our rivers - Article by Nitya Jacob
Mining constitutes a major, and largely unrecognized, threat to our rivers. It takes away what we have and also destroys whatever is left of it. Posted on 20 Dec, 2010 12:29 AM

Content Courtesy: Solution Exchange and Nitya Jacob
Author: Nitya Jacob

India’s arteries are choking. Her rivers, the lifeline of hundreds of millions, are over-taxed, polluted and encroached. They are being mined, dammed and emptied of water. Save for the four monsoon months, most rivers are streams of drains, depending on how many cities they pass through. This year people gaped in awe at the River Yamuna (I am sure they were over-awed by other rivers elsewhere too) as for the first time since 1978 looked like a river and not a drain.

Water management across space and time in India – A working paper by the University of Bonn
This paper links development of water management and its practices with social, religious, economic development with the rise and fall of the ruling regime. Posted on 17 Dec, 2010 10:09 PM

This working paper by the University of Bonn attempts to give a spatial and temporal overview of water management in India. It traces how people and the successive regimes made choices across space and time from a wide range of water control and distribution technologies. The paper divides the water management in India into four periods –

  • the traditional system of water management before colonial times;
  • response from the colonial rulers to manage the complex socio-ecological system;
  • large scale surface water development after independence; and
  • finally, the small-scale community and market-led revolution.

An illustrated collection of groundwater problems: A guide to a beginner in groundwater hydrology by CAREWATER
Understanding groundwater hydrology. Posted on 18 Oct, 2010 07:53 PM

This report by CAREWATER has been prepared as part of a component on Groundwater Governance in Asia: Theory and Practice under the CGIAR Challenge Programme on Water and Food. The purpose of this collection is to guide a beginner to groundwater hydrology through the basic concepts in this subject. The problems begin with fundamentals of the subject and are followed by those which test the comprehensiveness of understanding. Most problems are illustrated and a real-world situation is related with the problem.

Training modules on planning, development and management of groundwater with special reference to watershed management programmes by ACWADAM
A comprehensive training module on basic hydro-geology and groundwater science Posted on 06 Oct, 2010 08:12 PM

Acwadam

Advanced Center for Water Resources Development and Management (ACWADAM) is a premier education and research institution and facilitates work on groundwater management through action research programmes and trainings. ACWADAM’s main thrust has been on the process of capacity building and facilitation, both founded strongly on its research base.

ACWADAM, with support from the Ford Foundation, has embarked on strengthening civil society capabilities in groundwater management, using the watershed management platform. A comprehensive training module on basic hydrogeology and groundwater science, has been developed, and can be sourced by writing to ACWADAM at acwadam@vsnl.net.

These trainings enable the trainees particularly from Civil Society Organisations to improve the planning, implementation and monitoring of their watershed development and allied projects.

Water Resources Engineering and Management - A Civil Engineering Course under the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning
A web-based course to enhance the quality of engineering education in the country Posted on 29 Sep, 2010 07:42 AM

This Civil Engineering Course under the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) on the broad subject of Water Resources Engineering and Management is being carried out by Indian Institute of Technology’s and the Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore as a collaborative project supported by the Ministry of Human Resource Development (Government of India) to enhance the quality of engineering education in the country, by developing curriculum based video and web courses. In these web based lectures, the authors have developed the subject in detail and in stages in a student-friendly manner. The broad group of Water Resources Engineering is structured into modules on the topic by IIT Kharagpur as follows:

Case studies on water quality - A presentation by ACWADAM
Here, a case study of Karnataka helps understand the hydrogeology of peninsular metamorphics. Posted on 25 Sep, 2010 10:19 AM

This presentation by ACWADAM deals with monitoring of water quality in a watershed. It describes the process of going about conducting a hydrogeological study of the watershed, right from the study of the basic geology to the importance of the quality of groundwater in the watershed. The main hydrogeological provinces of India are described - (a) Hard rock regimes: Crystalline rocks, Volcanic (Deccan basalt), (b) Alluvial regimes, and (c) Consolidated sedimentary regimes: Soft sedimentary, Hard sedimentary.

Aquifers: The hosts of groundwater – A presentation by ACWADAM
Mapping acquifers is essential to understand how water exists in each type of rock or sediment Posted on 25 Sep, 2010 08:44 AM

This presentation by ACWADAM on aquifers states that a systematic approach to groundwater studies is required to understand how water exists in each type of rock or sediment for which hydrogeological mapping of aquifers becomes significant in every watershed programme. The necessity of studying the scientific aspects of groundwater such as its properties and distribution below the earth’s surface is highlighted.