Fetching drinking water is a backbreaking daily routine for women in India. Even without enduring the scorching summer months or the freezing winters, they walk for miles every day, balancing pots and buckets for some water for daily chores is hectic and tiresome daily routine for millions of women in most of the parts of Maharashtra. According to a recent report by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and Unicef, 1.8 billion people worldwide collect drinking water from supplies located off premises, and in seven out of 10 households, women and girls are primarily responsible for water collection. This is particularly true in India where, experts say, the need to secure drinking water is holding women back and hindering economic growth. While nearly 50.2 percent of the households have access to tap water in the state, less than 32 percent of this water is treated, while only 42 percent of the rural population has access to drinking water within the household premises.
However, the situation in Maharashtra’s rural part is gloomy virtually every year. The state faces acute drinking water shortage due to poor monsoon and abandoned water conservation schemes. Water stock in dams starts reducing in the month of January and in some districts and the administration starts supplying water through tankers. This is not for a particular period but by and large the same picture is seen every year. The government announced various schemes. Some of them started and the inauguration took place with much pomp. After some time everything came to a grinding halt.
In 2018, the state launched a Project on Climate Resilient Agriculture (PoCRA) also known as Nanaji Deshmukh Krushi Sanjeevani Prakalp. It aimed to increase the adaptive capacity of marginalised farmers from 5,142 villages in 15 districts of the Marathwada region. The total cost of the project was estimated to be Rs 4,000 crore, 30 percent of which was to be borne by the state while the remaining by the World Bank. What happened to this scheme even officials in the department are unaware of. There have been other schemes and interventions from the state government such as the Integrated Watershed Development Program, Marathwada Water Grid Project, Gaalmukt Dharan and Gaalyukt Shivar among others. Schemes took off well, initial provisions for the fund were also made but after that nothing.
The schemes remained on paper and the government failed to provide any relief to farmers and rural inhabitants barring tanker supply during the summer.
According to the Groundwater Survey and Development Agency (GSDA), water levels have gone down to 3 metres from 1 metre in villages across 245 of 353 Maharashtra talukas between 2014 and 2019. Climate change is making the state more vulnerable. Maharashtra has experienced a seven-fold and six-fold increase in drought and flood events over the past 50 years, according to a Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW) report.
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