22 pc underground water resources dried up or in critical category; govt mapping aquifers: Shekhawat

Almost 22 per cent of underground water resources in the country have either dried up or fall in the critical category, Jal Shakti Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat said on Friday, adding that his government has initiated work on mapping all the aquifers in the country for their better management.

Speaking at an event here, Shekhawat said that his government is committed to complete the mapping of all the aquifers (groundwater resources) in the country by the next two years, while work on mapping the aquifers in the critically exploited districts is aimed to be completed by March 2020.

"Of the total number of underground water resources in India, almost 22 percent of them are either dried up or on the verge of drying up, they are critically exploited. My government under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi has taken up an initiative to map the aquifers," Shekhawat said.

"We have covered almost a million square kilometres of aquifer mapping and we are committed to complete it by the next two years, and we have further amended our commitment to complete the mapping of aquifers by next March for the exploited districts and areas," he added.

Shekhawat made the remark following the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) between Central Ground Water Board (CGWB) and Australia's MARVI (Managing Aquifer Recharge and Sustaining Groundwater Use through Village-level Intervention).