World Bank to assist govt scheme on groundwater management

The World Bank on Wednesday offered assistance to the Atal Bhujal Yojana (ABHY), a Rs.6000 crore Central Sector Scheme of the Ministry of Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation.

The scheme will be implemented over a period of five years from 2018-19 to 2022-23, with World Bank's assistance, and aims to improve groundwater management in priority areas in the country through community participation.

The proposal for the scheme has already been recommended by the Expenditure Finance Committee and will be presented for Cabinet approval shortly.

Atal Bhujal Yojana was formulated by the aforementioned ministry to address the criticality of groundwater resources in a major part of the country.

The priority areas identified under the scheme fall in the states of Gujarat, Haryana, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh, representing about 25 percent of the total number of over-exploited, critical and semi-critical blocks in terms of groundwater in India.

They also cover two major types of groundwater systems found in India - alluvial and hard rock aquifers- and have varying degrees of institutional readiness and experience in groundwater management.

Funds under the scheme will be provided to the states for strengthening the institutions responsible for groundwater governance, as well as for encouraging community involvement for improving groundwater management to foster behavioural changes that promote conservation and efficient use of water.

Implementation of the scheme is expected to benefit nearly 8350 Gram Panchayats in 78 districts in the states. Funds under the scheme will be made available to the participating states as Grants.

Ensuring active community participation in groundwater management is among the major objectives of the scheme. The scheme envisages active participation of the communities in various activities such as the formation of Water User Associations, monitoring and disseminating groundwater data, water budgeting, preparation and implementation of Gram-Panchayat wise water security plans and IEC activities related to sustainable groundwater management.

Community participation is also expected to facilitate bottom-up groundwater planning process to improve the effectiveness of public financing and align implementation of various government programs on groundwater in the participating states.

The implementation of the scheme is expected to have several positive outcomes like a better understanding of the groundwater regime, sustainable groundwater management through a convergence of on-going and new schemes and augmentation of groundwater resources in targeted areas.