ABSTRACT
The Indian part of the Indo-Gangetic Plains extending from the north-western side to the north-eastern side of the sub-continent is the “cereal-bowl” of the country and has a history of settled agriculture, with irrigation from wells, river diversion systems and storage reservoirs and canal networks. In the past five decades, the region has experienced a virtual explosion in well irrigation. The various parts of the plains display distinctly different physical, ecological and socio-economic characteristics. Hence, the groundwater problems and management challenges are also different. While farmers in the Indus plains experience secular declines in groundwater levels, soil salinization and rising cost of well drilling, their counterparts in the eastern Gangetic plains are faced with problems of rising cost of energy and high inequity in access to groundwater. This chapter provides an overview of the groundwater issues in the Indus and Ganges basins within India and the governance and management challenges they pose. It analyses the performance of the existing formal and informal institutions concerned with groundwater development for irrigation and resource management. It also reviews various policies related to groundwater, energy and food security in the basins. Various recommendations are put forward to move from a primary development mentality to a management and governance system that takes equity and resource sustainability as overriding goals.
