Nearly 75% of the world’s population lives in countries classified as water-insecure or critically water-insecure. The prediction of below-normal rainfall this year in India due to El Nino effect may further cause a crisis in the country. The world is already in the state of ‘water bankruptcy’. In many basins and aquifers, long-term overuse and degradation mean that past hydrological and ecological baselines cannot realistically be restored.
While not every basin or country is water-bankrupt, enough critical systems around the world have crossed these thresholds and are interconnected through trade, migration, climate feedbacks and geopolitical dependencies that the global risk landscape is now fundamentally altered.
‘Water stress’ and ‘water crisis’ are no longer sufficient descriptions of the world’s new water realities. Many rivers, lakes, aquifers, wetlands and glaciers have been pushed beyond tipping points and cannot “bounce back” to past baselines, meaning that the language of temporary crisis is no longer accurate in many regions.
The picture of most countries, including India, is quite distressing, with surface waters and wetlands shrinking on a massive scale. Meanwhile, groundwater depletion and land subsidence show that hidden reserves are being exhausted. Around 70% of the world’s major aquifers show long-term declines, while land subsidence linked to groundwater over-pumping now affects over 6 million square km (almost 5% of global land area) and nearly 2 billion people, permanently reducing storage and increasing flood risk in many cities, deltas and coastal zones.
The explosive population growth in cities throughout the world has created an inordinate demand for safe groundwater supplies, raising concerns for their long-term sustainability at a time when aquifers are being increasingly degraded by human activity.
In India, more groundwater is used than any other country, including the US and China put together. It provides drinking water for about 85% of people in rural areas and irrigation for over 60%. People used to see this dependence as a success story, a quiet revolution that freed farmers from uncertainty of monsoon rains. But questions arise whether this can be sustainable in the long run.
India is on the brink of a water crisis. Several river basins, including Kaveri, Penna, and Sabarmati, are already categorised as water-scarce, and others like Krishna are approaching similar status. The Himalayan glaciers, crucial for replenishing India’s rivers, have retreated by 67% over the last decade. This loss endangers not just water availability, but also the ecosystems and agricultural systems that depend on these rivers.
Thus, people in rural areas collect groundwater to stay alive while in urban India they do it for convenience and often use more than the basic requirement. Groundwater plays a crucial role in supplying cities such as Delhi, Bengaluru, and Chennai. Even in areas with municipal water, private borewells and tanker services flourish. This has resulted in an unregulated, parallel water economy.
Importantly, India’s groundwater crisis isn’t just caused by climate change, but its effects include erratic rainfall patterns, late monsoons, and extreme weather events, making surface water less reliable. In response, both farmers and cities are using groundwater more aggressively, which makes the cycle of depletion worse.
Recognising this situation, programmes such as Jal Shakti Abhiyan: Catch the Rain (2021) and the Atal Bhujal Yojana tried in scaling community-based water governance, but with little success. Long-term progress thus will depend on expanding groundwater conservation efforts and improving water-use efficiency.
The path to water-secure rural India is challenging, but possible. If, however, India continues this trajectory, rural regions can become more productive, more resilient and better prepared for the uncertainties of a changing climate. Water, when managed well, is not just a resource; it is a catalyst for hope and a cornerstone of sustainable rural development.
The problem needs to be tackled with all seriousness, though policy responses have often depended on technological solutions like laws about collecting rainwater, programmes for developing watersheds and micro-irrigation systems.
