First Waterbodies Census

The Ministry of Jal Shakti has recently released the report of the country’s first-ever census of water bodies, which highlights important findings about the country’s water resources.

• The census gives a comprehensive list of water sources in India which shows the difference in rural and urban water bodies and the level of encroachment.

What is the Census of Waterbodies?

About:

• The census of waterbodies was done with the 6th Minor Irrigation Census of 2017-18.
• The census defines a waterbody as “all-natural or man-made units bounded on all sides with some or no masonry accessed with but with some or no masonry used for the purpose of holding water for irrigation or any use”.
• The essence of the census was set out to have an inventory of India’s water resources with a view to include all natural and man-made water bodies e.g., ponds, tanks, lakes and collect data on the encroachment of water bodies.

Key Findings of the Census:

• The census returned an enumeration of the number of water bodies as 24,24,540 with West Bengal reporting the highest (7.47 lakh) and Sikkim reporting the lowest (134).

The report clarifies, among others: these as:

• West Bengal has the highest number of ponds and reservoirs

• South 24 Parganas district of West Bengal has the highest number of waterbodies

• Andhra Pradesh has the highest number of tanks

• Tamil Nadu has the highest number of lakes

• Maharashtra leads the way for water conservation models

• The report demonstrated that 97.1% of waterbodies are in rural areas compared to urban at 2.9%.
• Most of the waterbodies are ponds, followed by tanks, reservoirs, water conservation schemes, percolation tanks, check dams, lakes, and others.

Encroachment of Waterbodies:

• The census collected information on encroachment of waterbodies for the first time, which highlights the fact that 1.6% of all of the waterbodies enumerated have an encroachment, and of this, the encroachment occurred in 95.4% in rural locations, and 4.6% in urban settings
• A substantial portion of encroachments have encroachments taking up more than 75% of the waterbody  area.

Importance:

• The census is an important source of information for decision-makers, to be able to provide directions towards water resource management and conservation.
• It also demonstrates a contrast within rural and urban settings, that highlights the need for effective measures to deter encroachments.
• The information in the census could be used to provide a baseline for management of water resources in the future, allowing for assessment of changes and progress made towards sustainable uses of water resources in India.