- Borewells around the Narmada River in Madhya Pradesh are drying up which indicate groundwater depletion in the river basin.
- The natural flow of the river has also been affected due to rampant sand mining and the construction of big dams. Overexploitation of river water, chemical farming are also some causes of depletion of groundwater in the Narmada River basin.
- India has the highest dependence on groundwater in the world and uses a quarter of the world’s groundwater.
Satyanarayan Patel, a 60-year-old farmer, hails from Bijanwada village of Narmadapuram (Hoshangabad) district in Madhya Pradesh. His house is located on the banks of the Pasa river, a tributary of Narmada River. Ironically, a water crisis looms in his village. Wells in Bijanwada are drying up one by one. Patel’s well also dried up two-three years ago.
“I was quite surprised the first time my well dried up. This had never happened before. The water of the Pasa river used to come from the well in the form of groundwater,” Patel said.
Reminiscing, he continues, “We have spent our childhood on the banks of this river. We do not remember if the river was ever dry, but for the past few years, this river only has water for a month or two. As a consequence, our wells started drying up too. The bores that are 200-250 feet deep have also started drying up,” Patel told Mongabay-India.
Patel’s family relies on farming in Sohagpur’s Mahuakheda Khurd village, 20 km from his village in Bijanwada. Two years ago, the borewell installed in the field also stopped giving water. “The place comes within a five-kilometre radius of the Narmada River. Despite being so close to the river, the underground water is going down,” Patel told Mongabay-India.
Satyanarayan Patel’s house is on the banks of the Pasa river. In recent years, the flow of the river has reduced. Photo by Manish Chandra Mishra/Mongabay.
Apart from Patel, thousands of farmer families in Madhya Pradesh are facing the problem of depleting groundwater level. In the year 2019, more than 600 tube wells in the district stopped working. Almost every year, more borewells dry up.
In Pipariya’s Bankhedi village alone 400 borewells have dried up. Bankhedi is placed as semi-critical category in the Ground Water Resource Assessment 2020. That is, 70 to 90 percent of groundwater is exploited here.
Baba Mayaram, a writer who undertakes researches on agriculture and rivers in the area, explains the reason for the exploitation of groundwater, saying, “Every year the water level goes further down and people increase the depth of the bore in search of water. Most of the water is extracted from the earth for irrigation, drinking water and factories,” he said.
According to the 2020 report of Dynamic Ground Water Resources of India released by the Ministry of Jal Shakti, the exploitation of groundwater increased in 2020 as compared to 2017. In Madhya Pradesh, 26 out of 317 blocks have been categorised as overexploited, which means that groundwater is being extracted faster than it is being recharged. Eight blocks have been kept in the critical category, which means that extraction of groundwater is 90 to 100 percent as compared to recharge. At the same time, 50 blocks have been considered as semi-critical, in which 70 to 90 percent of groundwater is exploited.
The fields of Pipariya are irrigated with groundwater even in monsoon. Experts say that due to chemical farming, water consumption is high. Photo by Manish Chandra Mishra/Mongabay.
River expert and geologist K.G. Vyas associates the problem of borewells drying with the drying up of the river.
In a conversation with Mongabay-India, he said, “A borewell draws water from all sides. If a borewell is running on the banks of the river, even though it is taking water from inside the ground, that water is from the river itself. The problem of Narmada and Gangetic basin is the same, exploitation of groundwater. The water table in Hoshangabad has been affected due to the drying up of the river.
Worrying state of groundwater in Madhya Pradesh
The places in Madhya Pradesh where borewells are drying up are on the banks of the Narmada river. These areas fall under the larger area called the Narmada basin. In such a situation, the question arises whether the groundwater level of Narmada basin is decreasing?
Narmada is the seventh largest river in the country and the largest among the west flowing rivers, notes a Ministry of Water Resources (Ministry of Jal Shakti) report. Nineteen important tributaries along with the main river Narmada, drain an area of 92,672.42 sq.km which is 3% of total geographical area of the country. Agriculture is the dominant land-use category (56.90 %) in the basin. Also, a large part is covered by forest accounting to 32.88 % of the total area of the basin,” the report said.
Narmada travels a distance of 1,312 km before it falls into Gulf of Cambay in the Arabian Sea near Bharuch in Gujarat. According to National Institute of Hydrology’s website, the basin covers an area of about 98,796 square kilometres, of which the largest part (88.58%) is in Madhya Pradesh. “The first 1,079 km of its run are in Madhya Pradesh. In the next length of 35 km, the river forms the boundary between the states of Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra. Again, in the next length of 39 km, it forms the boundary between Maharashtra and Gujarat. The last length of 159 km lies in Gujarat,” the website said.
The river crosses 38 districts in these four states. Within these districts, four blocks are under critical category, 17 in semi-critical category and 10 blocks in over-exploited category, as per the Ground Water Resource Assessment 2020.
A block is categorised as ‘Critical’ when the stage of groundwater extraction is between 90-100 % of annual extractable resources available and ‘Semi-Critical’ when the stage of groundwater extraction is between 70 % and 90 %. If the stage of groundwater extraction is less than 70 %, it is considered as ‘safe’. Semi-critical areas are where cautious groundwater development is recommended, by the Central Ground Water Board while critical and over-exploited areas are where there should be intensive monitoring and evaluation and future ground development be linked with water conservation measures.
by Manish Chandra Mishra on 30 March 2022
As publish on:
https://india.mongabay.com/2022/03/borewells-on-the-banks-of-narmada-are-drying-up-indicating-concerning-groundwater-situation
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