Question

What is the importance of rain water harvesting?

Answer 1

(i) The demand for water is increasing. The urban population of India has increased five times in the last five decades from 62.4 million in 1951 to 286 million in 2001. The demand for water has concomitantly grown to almost double the amount of water a citizen ordinarily requires.
(ii) Till not very many years back our cities were self-sufficient for water. Today, water bodies are disappearing and ground water is being extracted. The rivers are getting polluted.
(iii) The management of water is in the hands of the states. This has led to communities and
households ho longer being the agents of water management.
(iv) The earlier use of rain water and flood water has declined. In its place, an ever growing reliance on river water and ground water has arisen. This has led to such large scale extraction of ground water both by the government and private bodies that our river basins are getting polluted.
(v) Large dams are constructed to store water and canals constructed to distribute the water. The former have caused large scale displacement of communities and ecological havoc, while the latter has brought large scale degradation of land due to soil salination. Water availability both in terms of quality and quantity has declined to such an extent that many parts of India face a drought like situation.