Experts today exploded the myth that water harvesting is only a rustic tradition in villages that needs to be conserved. It is equally relevant in cities to cope with the urban water crisis. Cities and towns of India will have to develop and preserve local water harvesting systems to trap and store water as much as possible to escape the crippling effect of water scarcity.

Most dramatic evidence comes from Chennai which is in the grip of acute water crisis. Chennai has emerged as the first ever Indian city to recognise the importance of rainwater harvesting system as the city government makes it mandatory for all new houses to have roof water harvesting systems. Chennai learnt the hard way during the devastating drought of 1993. Santha Sheela Nair, former chairperson and managing director, Chennai Metropolitan Water Supply and Sewage Board informed that following the drought the city government mandated that all new construction in the city should have rain water harvesting structures to recharge ground water and check flooding. "A massive public education programme has been mounted through the media for carrying the message on the need for rain water harvesting in all buildings, old and new", said Nair.

Chennai today boasts of the first ever modern rainwater harvesting (RWH) company promoting RWH designs and technology in the country. A forum of builders in Chennai is already working on the harvesting methods to be adopted in the building plans. R Jeykumar, managing director, Rajparis Civil Construction Limited, is a builder from Chennai who presented innovative building designs to capture roof water to quench the city’s thirst.

Clearly, the city governments are learning from what communities have developed over the millenia. Traditional roof water harvesting systems are still alive to meet the local water needs in the towns of northeast. Dunglena, former secretary, public works department, from Aizawl, the hill capital of Mizoram, informed that Aizawl meets most of its water needs from roof top rainwater harvesting today. Dunglena lamented that subsidised pipe water which came to this town only in 1988, has endangered the finest rain water harvesting system capable of meeting the entire local need. Yet interestingly, erratic and unreliable pipe water supply has increased dependence on the traditional roof water harvesting system. About 10,000 rain water tanks still operate in individual houses with capacities ranging from 500 litres to 5 lakh litres. Local people construct these systems without any aid from the government. Says Dunglena, the government must have clear policies to preserve and develop these techniques.

Realisation has dawned even on the mega cities like Delhi which has wasted enough subsidised water and scurrying to bottled and tanker water to survive. NGOs in Delhi have begun to look into the possibility of reviving the traditional old bowries to store rain water and also use the storm water channels to conserve flood water. INTACH is studying the possibilities of using the Najafgarh drain for on channel storage and recharge of ground water. Depressions and even used quarries are being identified to create off channel storage space in the capital.

The discussions today revealed change in official attitude at least in some states towards the local water harvesting system to cope with land degradation and water scarcity. The finest example was presented by R Gopalakrishnan, secretary to the chief minister, Madhya Pradesh and co-ordinator of the Rajiv Gandhi Watershed Management Mission who showed how over 300 villages in drought prone Jhabua district of Madhya Pradesh are participating in an outstanding and unprecedented watershed management programme of the Madhya Pradesh government. This is a first time that a government has started a peoples movement for combined land and water management.

The participants were unanimous that only effective peoples involvement in water harvesting and management could help to meet the serious challenge. Effective policies are needed to enable replication of the success stories. They called for legal changes to allow people to be managers of their resources. Anil Agarwal, director CSE, stressed on the need for "participatory regulation". In support of this view Gopalakrishnan cited that in Jhabua the emphasis is on participatory evaluation of the government’s watershed programme by the local panchayats. A M Bhattarai from Centre for Environmental Education demanded revision of the panchayat act to allow greater participation of people in management of water resources. Most poignant statement was made by Ganeshlal Gurjar, a semi literate farmer from Mewar Krishak Vikas Samiti of Rajasthan, "Plan for 10 ha and not 10,000 ha. Involve us. We understand the local ecology better."

The experts endorsed the demand for a clear water policy to shape up water conservation programmes as opposed to the current strategy of pushing programmes without a clear policy objective.

Venue: Gulmohar Hall, India Habitat Centre

For more information please contact Anumita Roychowdhury, Shefali and Priti Kumar at 464-5335, 464-334