New Delhi:-Union Minister Chaudhary Birender Singh said that the States need to take advance steps to prepare for the monsoon of 2015 so that maximum water can be stored in those few months for the benefit of all. He was addressing the delegates from all states after inaugurating the two-day workshop on ‘Construction and Desilting of Checkdams/ Water Harvesting Structures’ in New Delhi today. He said that the idea of Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modi that a timely and advance preparation can enable a significant increase in capacity to store water in the multitude of checkdams, ponds, tanks etc in the country is a very practical and doable. This will result in two important things -improving the storage and thus rejuvenating these structures as well as reducing floods at the local level. This workshop is being organized with the view to kick start the process of planning to increase water storage for monsoon 2015.
Chaudhary Birender Singh said that water conservation and harvesting needs to be a mass peoples’ movement. All sections of the society are required to work in a co-ordinate manner to efficiently harvest water. Efficient and scientific water harvesting is the first step towards revolutionizing water use in the country. It is important to keep in mind that the planning needs to be done at a landscape level, where the requirements of the upper and lower reaches and all the sections including agriculturists and others are taken care of to maintain equity and sustainability. Welcoming the participants, among them Shri Chandi Prasad Bhatt, Shri Suresh Khanapurkar, Shri Rajendra Singh, Shri Popatrao Pawar and Shri Premjibhai from Gujarat, the Minister said, these are the men from among us from whom we can learn a lot in making environment and water conservation a people’s movement.
As per the analysis of Ministry of Water Resources, the country has a potential of 3840 BCM (Billion cubic meter; 1BCM = 1 lakh crore liter) of rain water out of which 48% is lost in surface runoff while only about 11% goes into ground water recharge . Besides, we are able to use only about 55% of our utilizable water. About 63% of our agriculture land is still dependent only on rainwater. Land in many of these seasonal storage structures can be put to multiple use.
Chaudhary Birender Singh said, government is implementing various programs in the rural development, drinking water and sanitation for better sourcing and use of water for domestic use, drinking and for agriculture. The Department of Land Resources is implementing Integrated Watershed Management Program. However, there are many check dams built in earlier programs which are silted or are damaged. Most of the time these departments work in isolation losing the opportunity of creating synergies and increasing effectiveness. It is important that water harvesting and storage is done in a collaborative manner by drawing up plans at the landscape level to improve the outcomes of the finances employed in the process. It is crucial to ensure that these structures particularly the Check dams & Nala-bands are built in right place that are technically feasible and are socially viable. It is important to ensure that not only they are properly constructed but are also properly maintained over time. Post- project maintenance of these assets is also very important.
Social contribution is incomplete without Public Private Partnership (PPP) and involvement of corporate sector. I suggest that as we have an integrated approach to implement the strategy of improving the capacity of water harvesting structures by involving Corporates, Civic Societies, NGO’s along with Government in general facilitative role. Such an approach will be necessary for overall success of this program
