In 2016, a Standing Committee of Parliament pointed to the need to carry out a separate census of water bodies. The government then commissioned the first census of water bodies in 2018-19 along with the sixth Minor Irrigation (MI) census.
As per the first water body census report, released recently, India has 24.24 lakh water bodies like ponds, tanks, and lakes. The Ministry of Jal Shakti released the census report which provides a comprehensive database of ponds, tanks, lakes, and reservoirs in the country. The census was conducted in 2018-19, and enumerated more than 2.4 million water bodies across all states and Union Territories.
All natural or man-made units bounded on all sides with some or no masonry work used for storing water for irrigation or other purposes (e.g. industrial, pisciculture, domestic/drinking, recreation, religious, ground water recharge etc.) were treated as water bodies in this Census.
The census found that 1.6% of enumerated water bodies — 38,496 out of 24,24,540 — had been encroached upon.
More than 95% of these were in rural areas — which is logical because more than 97% of the water bodies covered by the census were in the rural areas. In almost 63% of encroached water bodies, less than a quarter of the area was under encroachment; in about 12% water bodies, more than three-quarters of the area was under encroachment.
Based on the criteria of filling up of storage capacity during last 5 years, out of 5,403 water bodies, 63.2% (3,414) water bodies are found to be filled up every year, 35.8% (1,935) are usually filled up, 0.7% (38) are rarely filled up and 0.3% (16) are never filled up.
The objective, according to the census report, was to collect information “on all important aspects of the subject including their size, condition, status of encroachments, use, storage capacity, status of filling up of storage etc.”
As regards Jammu and Kashmir, the census noted that 76.7% of water bodies are ‘in use’, primarily for domestic, drinking, and irrigation purposes. Conversely, the census found that 23.3% of water bodies ‘not in use’ due to drying up or being destroyed beyond repair. Additionally, the census highlighted encroachment in 103 water bodies, chiefly in ponds.
As has been depicted in the report a number of water bodies are on the brink of extinction. More so, water bodies like world famous Dal Lake, Wullar, Nigeen, Suriansar, and Mansar are facing major encroachments. While 23.3% of water bodies in J&K have already been lost, many more will disappear provided measures needed to address issues are addressed at the earliest and sans further delay.
