Groundwater Recharge

Green pastures and meadows, tall trees, lakes, wells and the river…those are my memories of Delhi. It wasn’t too long ago that one woke up early to the sounds of lawns being watered, children running off to school and people walking in the parks. A flurry of activity but quite different from what it is today.

The Catch Every Drop campaign, which created awareness about water conservation, spun off a few other events in Bangalore. Save Our Lakes, which focused on protecting B

Ufrenkhal – the village
Driving towards Ufrenkhal, a village in Pauri Garhwal (Uttarakhand), I see a lush, green mountain covered with deodar, banj and utees trees. Little did I realize that this diverse and dense forest, which is alive with wildlife, is very new. 40 years ago, this vast area was a firing range!

India is heavily dependent on groundwater use. Domestic use, agriculture and industry all rely on groundwater extracted by means of pumps, wells and tanks. This  dependence is illustrated by falling groundwater levels. Frequently, this overuse and consequent decline trigger conflicts.

Pure and beautiful, mountain springs confer lives. With change in climate conditions and rainfall patterns, rural habitations in Sikkim face drinking water shortages. Many of these springs are drying up or their discharge declining. But there is hope at the end of an endeavour, where science, government and community come together to revive springs of their local region.

the drought situation in Maharashtra, the traditional rainwater harvesting system in Rajasthan. Besides this, the news also includes reports on the campaign to save the Loktak lake in Assam and mangroves in Sundarbans, the water supply schemes in Kerala and the dropping of groundwater levels in India

New bill to control groundwater exploitation

Kerala is a rain blessed state in the country. It has highest  number of wells, when compared with other states. However due to its slanting topography there is significant decline in the ground water levels leading to severe water scarcity during summer months in most districts of the state. Further over extraction and dependence of groundwater for domestic use from the dug wells especially in rural pockets has resulted in several groundwater problems. In this backdrop the paper in  The Ecosan- An International Quarterly Journal of Environmental Science, sheds light on groundwater quality issues in two panchayats of Kerala.

Groundwater is essential for India's agricutural economy. However, there is a large variation in the groundwater resources of each region. Some regions are already over-exploited, while others can still tolerate more withdrawal. In her blog 'Waterscapes', Aditi Mukherji discusses the need for regional strategies to manage groundwater economy.