SIMPLIFIED TEMPLATES FOR THE IMPLEMENTATION OF STATE SPECIFIC ACTION PLAN

Abstract

The demand for water is increasing substantially due to increasing population, growing urbanization and rapid industrialization along with the need for raising agricultural productivity. The demand of water is increasing day by day. On the other side, the supply of water is either constant or decreasing due to global warming. Therefore, there is an urgent need to utilize the valuable (fresh) water resources in an efficient way and more and more water saving techniques should be used to save some water for future. For this, State water budgeting is an efficient tool to find out whether the State is surplus or water deficit. In order to carry out the State water budgeting, it requires preparation of plans for each of the components of supply, demand and quality dimensions. Keeping this in view, the National Water Mission provided a model template for State water budgeting across the country. For this purpose, State Specific Action Plan (SSAP) is being implemented. A model template has been prepared and the experience is that it is too comprehensive and cumbersome to apply in field conveniently, and therefore, need to be simplified for collecting data for both supply and demand. This study investigates the templates for their possible simplification for implementation of SSAP in India with the objective of carrying out the State water budgeting for having assessment if the State is water surplus or water deficit. To meet the objective, an example dataset for a typical State as provided by the National Water Mission was considered for analysis with the premise that it can be further refined in future using the real data of a State. The State was divided into to three broad land uses: Urban, Agricultural, and Forest. The input variables/parameters used in the complete water balance equation were analyzed for their sensitivity to the change in storage at the end of the year, i.e. storage at the end of the year - storage at the beginning of the year, which is also known as carryover or residual storage. This concept was utilized to indicate whether the State is water surplus or water deficit at the end of the year. If the State is water surplus, there exist two possibilities, either more developmental activities can be taken up in the State for more beneficial use of the surplus water or, alternatively, the supply to the State could be reduced for utilization of surplus water in other States which are water deficit. On the other hand, if the State is water deficit, it might necessitate to either curtail the demands in or increase the supply to the State. Thus, the variables/parameters more sensitive to meeting the objective of maximizing the iii carryover (for making the State water surplus) and the corresponding templates describing these parameters/inputs be retained, otherwise ignored for simplification purpose. Inorder to carry out the State water balance study, the templates should be required to be filled up by the required data/information. To collect the data and to carry out the water balance, the available draft template report can be divided into three volumes, Volume-I, Volume II and Volume III respectively inorder to meet the expected outcomes of SSAP. Volume-I of this report gives brief description about the particular State and the methods and the procedures which are used to carry out the water budgeting. Volume-II comprises of two phases Phase I and Phase II. Phase I is the main part of the report where the water budgeting is carried out. Phase II gives in the brief description of the condition of the State. And the Volume-III is useful for the policy makers and water managers to make the decision for the water resource management. So with the classification of the report into the three volumes the water budgeting can be carried out with more ease.