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| Jammu stares at water catastrophe | | Traditional water bodies drying up, Water table receding, PHE clueless! | | Abodh Sharma
Early Times Report
jammu, May 5: At a time when entire country has been shocked by unprecedented water crisis in Latur region of Maharashtra and several other regions in the western and central India, Jammu is staring at severe water crisis in times to come if SOS measures are not taken by the Government and PHE department without any further delay.
Tawi, which has quenched city's thirst from times immemorial, has reduced to its half, while the population that depends on it for its water needs has more than doubled. Eventhough new sources of water have been augmented in the form of tube wells in large numbers, the city continues to be short by close to five lakh gallons of water per day. The floating population that the city receives everyday has also increased several folds in the past few years as city emerged as a major employment provider to the people living in peripheries.
"All plans are made according to census reports, which do not include the floating population and the migrants from other states. But Jammu has a large chunk of such population, which is swelling further" said a retired executive engineer of PHE department. "A study conducted by ISRO divulges that water table in most part of the city have receded to levels which can render the soil unfit for any agricultural activity, lack of remote sensing and foresight on part of the department is pushing Jammu towards imminent crisis" he added.
As Tawi is becoming increasingly incapable of meeting the water requirements of the city, Chenab is the only feasible source of water that can be tapped to quench the thirst of this fast growing city. "Some projects were proposed to lift water from chenab, but they had to be shelved for want of funding and project has been issue of political empty recurring" averred the former engineer.
Water harvesting has been becoming a popular water conservation measure in the country, but it has failed to catch the fancy of Jammuite as yet. Lackadaisical attitude of the government in making the people aware about the water harvesting techniques has been a major reason for its unpopularity in this region. It is imperative that the urban agencies made it mandatory through a legislation for the new buildings to have water harvesting mechanism in place for getting their building plans approved.
Water harvesting: what does it mean
l Capturing runoff from rooftops
l Capturing runoff from local catchments
l Capturing seasonal floodwaters from local streams
l Conserving water through watershed management
What can be achieved
l Provide drinking water
l Provide irrigation water
l Increase groundwater recharge
l Reduce storm water discharges, urban floods and overloading of sewage treatment plants
l Reduce seawater ingress in coastal areas.
How much water can be saved
l Area of plot = 100 sq. m. (120 square yards)
l Height of the rainfall = 0.6 m (600 mm or 24 inches)
l Volume of rainfall over the plot = Area of plot x height of rainfall
l Assuming that only 60 per cent of the total rainfall is effectively harvested
l Volume of water harvested = 36,000 litres (60,000 litres x 0.6) |
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