Water is essential thing for living being but if we are talk about pure water then there is huge scarcity of pure water in our country; just because water is getting polluted day by day.

So I am going to share my problem regarding scarcity of water in my locality. We face lot of problem regarding water scarcity. We are not getting sufficient water for our basic needs like drinking and cooking. Supply water always comes on specific time and is not so clean and pure that we can drink; for this we need water purifier.

But what about poor? How they are going to survive because they do not have enough money to purchase water purifier.

Patna like in the past, residents of various cities in the state has started experiencing acute shortage of portable water this summer too. With increasing demand for water, the ground water resources are depleting fast and a large number of households in various cities get only limited access to safe drinking.

Ground water experts said at least eight cities including Patna, would face severe water crisis in the near future.”Gaya and Bhagalpur are already experiencing declining groundwater levels and consequent water scarcity. Muzaffarpur, Darbhanga, Aara, Munger and Biharsharif will also face the crisis in near future, they said.

According to a study conducted by the central ground water board (CGWB), groundwater reservoirs in as many as 11 blocks of the state are in semi critical condition. These blocks are Gaya, Sadar, Rajgir and Nagarnausa in Nalanda district, Muskaur in Nawada, Kurtha in Arwal, Birpur and Naokothi in Begusarai, Masaurhi and Sampatchak in Patna, Mushhar in Muzaffarpur and Tajpur in Samastipur district. “These blocks would be in critical condition as soon as the development stage exceeds 90%,” the study suggests.

The water scarcity is more pronounced in the cities located in the marginal alluvial plain area where the aquifers are not recharged fully owing to less than normal rainfall in the region. people residing in Gaya, Nawada, Aurangabad , Munger and the area bordering Jharkhand have to suffer much owing developing to water crisis”  said the former CGWB regional director Shambhu Nath.

As far as Patna is concerned, the ground water table has reportedly gone down by 10 to 15 feet in recent years.

“Over exploitation of ground water through deep tube wells is getting the groundwater reservoir depleted faster than it is being replenished.

For a city of nearly 25 Lakh people, already facing a major water crisis, the rapid depletion of groundwater would spell doom” the CGWB scientists said.

In the last few years, many shallow tube wells have got dried up during the summer months with sand filling the pipes, leading to complete breakdown of tube wells. Through the average annual rainfall in Patna is fairly high about 1,000 mm per annum) the bulk of rainwater is lost through surface run off. Things have worsened due to the gradual disappearance of ponds and other open surface water bodies that helped recharge the groundwater reservoir through slow seepage, said environmentalist Mehta Nagendra Singh.

Gaya urban area with a population of more than 4 Lakh people depends largely on groundwater. Due to limited recharge from scanty rainfall and the alarming water table decline in the underlying aquifer system, the situation has become worse. There is a decline in water level in the Falgu river bed too.

In Bhagalpur urban area, the groundwater level has reportedly declined by 4 to 5 meters in the last four to five decades as the maximum stress of water supply lies on singe deep aquifer in the city.  

In Bihar many face water crisis from January and February. Drought has been declared in 275 blocks across 24 districts (Bihar has total 38 districts).  The groundwater level is going down, so there could be scarcity of drinking water. Because of water scarcity people with no resources leave their cattle behind.

This is a major issue not only occurred in my locality but in entire country. So, we must take initiative to solve our problem. I would like to request the people to use minimum amount of water; don’t waste it and don’t pollute the river. I would also like to request government to work on the water scarcity problem.

Written by Sakshi Kumari

  India, Patna, sustainable development, water, water pollution