• The Central government has decided to increase coverage of piped water to households from the current 18 percent to 100 percent by 2024. There is formulation of a plan under ‘Nal Se Jal’ (water from tap) mission to provide tap water to 14 crore households was underway. However, water is a state subject as per the Constitution and union government sought collective efforts and a public movement to achieve the target.

Analysis:

• Access to safe drinking water has been a grave problem for India, especially in rural areas where lack of usable water has resulted in decades old sanitation and health problems.
• A WaterAid report in 2016 ranked India among the worst countries in the world for the number of people without safe water. An estimated 76 million people in India have no access to a safe water supply, and the situation is only getting more serious.
• The Asian Development Bank has forecast that by 2030, India will have a water deficit of 50 per cent. The Union Ministry of Water Resources has estimated the country’s current water requirements to be around 1100 billion cubic metres per year, which is estimated to be around 1200 billion cubic metres for the year 2025 and 1447 billion cubic metres for the year 2050.
• India is not a water scarce country. Along with having major rivers, we receive an average annual rainfall of 1170 millimeters. But lack of sensitisation with regard to both conservation of water and pollution of water sources has resulted in a large part of the population for whom water has become more of a curse than a boon. Infrastructure for storage of water must be developed properly to ensure that people have access to safe water across the country, said Dr. Narayan G. Hegde, Trustee of the BAIF Development Research Foundation and author of the report ‘Water Scarcity in India.’
• Water supply in India has two principal sources, namely water from rivers and groundwater. However, the rivers are shrinking because of pollution and industrialization, while the population keeps growing, pushing us towards an enormous water deficit.
• Rampant pollution, dumping of sewage waste and abuse of the rivers has led to large sections of important rivers like Ganga and Yamuna becoming unfit for use. Take for instance, the Ganga, which flows through 11 states of India and provides water to more than 500 million people.
• Many parts of the Ganga in Bihar and Uttar Pradesh have become completely unfit for use because of incessant waste disposal, ranging from dead bodies and to industrial waste. Earlier the water in many parts of these two states could be consumed and used for other purposes, but pollution has rendered the river water completely useless, said Vikas Chandra, an activist who has been campaigning for a pollution free Ganga for the last 19 years.
• Safe drinking water, a basic amenity has become a luxury in many Indian households, especially in semi-urban and rural areas. Official figures show that each day, approximately 500 million litres of wastewater from industrial sources is dumped into the Ganga. The Yamuna, similarly receives 850 million gallons of sewage every day from Delhi alone. For those who are dependent on groundwater sources, the presence of arsenic in the eastern belt in the Ganga-Brahmaputra region poses equally dangerous threats.
• Arsenic is a major problem, especially for people residing in the Ganga-Brahmaputra belt in eastern India. Arsenic laden water has many adverse health effects and affects over 900 million people in India. With India’s rivers becoming more polluted with every passing day, the dependency on groundwater resources is increasing. But steps must be taken to ensure that people do not end up using arsenic laden water, as that would be more harmful than beneficial,  said K.B. Biswas, Chairman, Central Ground Water Board.
• Several initiatives have been undertaken to deal with the water crisis looming ahead of India, both by government and non-government bodies. In 2014, the 20,000 crore Namami Gange program was announced by the Union Government. It is a holistic program that not focuses on cleaning the Ganga, along with setting up biodiversity centers, crematoriums and toilets along the river banks to reduce pollution in the river.