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GS Paper: Governance, Transparency & Accountability, Citizens Charters

  • Fake news in social media

    Context

    Social media platforms have adopted design choices that have led to a proliferation and mainstreaming of misinformation while allowing themselves to be weaponised by powerful vested interests for political and commercial benefit.

    Problems created by social media and issues with response to it

    • The consequent free flow of disinformation, hate and targeted intimidation has led to real-world harm and degradation of democracy in India: Mainstreamed anti-minority hate, polarised communities and sowed confusion have made it difficult to establish a shared foundation of truth.
    • Political agenda: Organised misinformation (disinformation) has a political and/or commercial agenda.
    • Apolitical and episodic discourse in India: The discourse in India has remained apolitical and episodic — focused on individual pieces of content and events, and generalised outrage against big tech instead of locating it in the larger political context or structural design issues.
    • Problematic global discourse: The evolution of the global discourse on misinformation too has allowed itself to get mired in the details of content standards, enforcement, fact-checking, takedowns, de-platforming, etc.
    • Moderating misinformation vs. safeguarding freedom of expression: Such framework lends itself to bitter partisan contest over individual pieces of content while allowing platforms to disingenuously conflate the discourse on moderating misinformation with safeguards for freedom of expression.
    • The current system of content moderation is more a public relations exercise for platforms than being geared to stop the spread of disinformation.

    Framework to combat disinformation

    • Consider it as a political problem: The issue is as much about bad actors as individual pieces of content.
    • Content distribution and moderation are interventions in the political process.
    • Comprehensive transparency law: There is thus a need for a comprehensive transparency law to enforce relevant disclosures by social media platforms.
    • Bipartisan political process for content moderation: Content moderation and allied functions such as standard setting, fact-checking and de-platforming must be embedded in the sovereign bipartisan political process if they are to have democratic legitimacy.
    • Regulatory body should be grounded in democratic principles: Any regulatory body must be grounded in democratic principles — its own and of platforms.
    • Three approaches to distribution that can be adopted by platforms: 1) Constrain distribution to organic reach (chronological feed);
    • 2) take editorial responsibility for amplified content;
    • 3) amplify only credible sources (irrespective of ideological affiliation).
    • Review of content creator: The current approach to misinformation that relies on fact-checking a small subset of content in a vast ocean of unreviewed content is inadequate for the task and needs to be supplemented by a review of content creators itself.

    Conclusion

    Social media cannot be wished away. But its structure and manner of use are choices we must make as a polity after deliberation instead of accepting as them fait accompli or simply being overtaken by developments along the way.

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  • Criminal Procedures (Identification) Bill violates right against self-incrimination

    Context

    The Bill proposes to collect “measurements” of convicted persons, those who are arrested (or detained under preventive detention laws) or those who have executed bonds promising good behaviour.

    Dilution of right against self-incrimination

    • The Constitution, under Article 20(3), protects an accused from being compelled to give witness against himself.
    • This fundamental right has been diluted over the years.
    • In 2005, the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) was amended to allow a magistrate to order any person to give their handwriting samples for the purpose of an investigation or proceeding.
    • In 2019, the Supreme Court, in Ritesh Sinha v. State of UP, held that such handwriting samples could include voice samples.
    • It relied upon its judgment in the Kathi Kalu Oghad case (1962) that held that giving palm impressions or footprints could not be called self-incriminatory because impressions were unchangeable, except in rare cases”.
    • Instead, it held that the Constitution bars the compulsory extraction of a statement — oral or written — from the accused, “which makes the case against the accused person at least probable, considered by itself”.

    Provisions in the Bill

    • While the databasing of convicted persons is not new, the new piece of legislation allows for taking information, including finger-impressions, palm-print impressions, footprint impressions, photographs, iris and retina scan, physical, biological samples and their analysis, behavioural attributes including signatures, handwriting or any other examination referred to in Sections 53, 53A of the CrPC.
    • It also mandates the National Crime Records Bureau to store, preserve and destroy the record of measurements at the national level as well as process and share them with any law enforcement agency.

    Issues with the Bill

    • Right against self-incrimination is unlikely to apply to technologies in use today.
    • Wide scope of under new technologies: The logic that was used in 1962 to interpret what would violate the right against self-incrimination is unlikely to apply to technologies in use today.
    • The Bill is vaguely worded and the nature of the processing, sharing, and dissemination of data it entails will most certainly involve the use of new and emerging technologies. 
    •  Their application to policing and the criminal justice system has new implications for the right against self-incrimination.
    • The compulsory submission of such information could have chilling effects after being subjected to new technologies – in other words, the past of an accused person might be enough to incriminate him.
    • Possibility of coercive data collection: The Bill proposes to collect “measurements” of convicted persons, those who are arrested (or detained under preventive detention laws) or those who have executed bonds promising good behaviour.
    • Only those arrested for petty offences that are punishable with less than seven years may not be obliged to allow the recording of measurements.
    • This rings a warning bell about coercive data collection, especially when seen in the light of the practices used to police oppressed communities.
    • For instance, under the Criminal Tribes Act, 1871, many nomadic and semi-nomadic communities were labelled hereditary criminals.
    •  Despite the Act being repealed in 1952, these denotified tribal (“Vimukta”) communities continue to be treated as criminals by birth through the “Habitual Offenders” provisions in state-level police regulations that allow local police stations to keep records of such persons residing in their area.
    • It condemns a section of the country’s population to several cycles of arrest, bail, and acquittal.
    • The new piece of legislation could make the practice of history-sheeting, undertaken when a person is merely alleged of a crime, and not convicted, even more coercive.
    • Long storage period and no clear process for destroying information: the “measurements” are to be stored at the national level for 75 years, with no clear procedure outlined for destroying the information.

    Conclusion

    The right against self-incrimination is at the heart of protection against police excess and torture. Record-keeping as mandated by the Bill violates this right. Parliament must make laws that protect against such blatant attacks on fundamental rights and freedoms, rather than enable them.

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  • CBI should have a strong leader with a distinct belief in the law and ethics

    Context

    The Chief Justice of India (CJI), Justice N.V. Ramana, while delivering the annual (and the 19th edition) D.P. Kohli Memorial Talk minced no words in condemning the utter subordination of agencies to the executive and its disastrous consequences for the cause of justice.

    Key takeaways

    • Resisting the pressure: The CJI called upon investigators to stand up to unethical pressures in order not to betray the trust reposed in them by the public.
    • Strong court: We need a strong Supreme Court and equally strong High Courts to keep our investigators on the straight and narrow path.
    •  Fixed tenure: Earlier, CBI Directors were changed at will.
    •  Mandatory tenure was meant to insulate the CBI Director from the caprice of the executive.
    • This process has since been expanded to include the CJI in the selection panel.
    • Strong leadership: The CBI now has some of the brightest Indian Police Service officers in its higher echelons.
    • However, it is not enough if the middle-rung supervisors alone are straightforward.

    Should there be an umbrella organisation?

    • The CJI had proposed an umbrella organisation that will oversee all investigating agencies.
    • This idea was meant to avoid having multiple agencies looking into the same set of allegations.
    • Apart from its impracticality, such a novel body could generate its own problems — of turf wars and ego clashes.

    Way forward

    • There is a need to focus on weeding out the dishonest among officers and rewarding those who have shown and proven themselves to be honest and professionally innovative.

    Conclusion

    There needs to be a strong and virtuous leader who will not only be honest but also stick his neck out to protect his deputies if and when confronted by an unscrupulous political heavyweight.

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  • Human Migration: Reasons & Impact

    Context

    Repeated surveys have found that the incomes of migrant households continue to be lower than pre-pandemic levels, even after returning to cities.

    Lack of policy for migrants

    • In the wake of a nationwide lockdown, India was left shocked by the plight of migrant workers walking hundreds of kilometres.
    • They became the focus of large-scale relief efforts by governments and civil society alike.
    • The Government ramped up the One Nation One Ration Card (ONORC) project, announced the Affordable Rental Housing Complexes (ARHC) scheme, set up the e-Shram portal and began to draft a migration policy.
    •  Despite this, a cohesive migration policy guidance remains elusive.
    • Contribution of migrant workers: Today, a third of the nation’s workforce is mobile.
    • Migrants fuel critical sectors such as manufacturing, construction, hospitality, logistics and commercial agriculture.
    • Despite clear economic and humanitarian reasoning to bring migrants back into the policy discourse, the current policy scenario is at best fragmented and at worst waning.

    Structural constraints

    1] Politicisation of issue and fragmented policy response

    •  Migration is a highly politicised phenomenon in India.
    • ‘Destination States’ experience a tension between economic needs, which require migrant labour, and political needs, which promote nativist policies that impose domicile restrictions on employment and social security.
    • On the flip side, the ‘sending States’ are highly motivated to serve their “own people” because they vote in their source villages.
    • This fragmented policy response to internal migration follows from State-specific calculations.
    • Development policy in India has bet big on rural development as an antidote to migration.
    • This widespread ‘sedentary bias’ continues to influence policy even though migration is an important pathway for impoverished marginalised rural households to find economic security (and social emancipation).

    2] Categorisation challenge

    • Migrants are a perennially fuzzy category in policy discourse, located inside two larger categories: the unorganised worker and the urban poor.
    • Even the e-Shram portal, which has made impressive progress in registering unorganised workers, has been unable to accurately distinguish and target migrants.
    • Policy interventions in major urban destinations continue to conflate the urban poor with low-income migrants.
    • Hence, slum development continues as the primary medium for alleviating migrant concerns, while in reality, most migrants live on worksites that are entirely out of the policy gaze.

    3] Gaps in the data

    • Migration policy discourse is seemingly paralysed by the now well-acknowledged failure of official datasets to capture the actual scale and the frequency of internal migration in India.
    •  Data systems designed to periodically record only one spatial location have posed great challenges to welfare delivery for up to 500 million people who are part of multi-locational migrant households.
    • The novel coronavirus pandemic has placed a sharp focus on problems such as educating and vaccinating those children who accompany their migrant parents, or ensuring that migrant women avail maternity benefits at multiple locations.

    Way forward: Strategic policy guidance by Centre and a platform for inter-State coordination

    • Policy in India often emerges from the ground up, taking decades to cement into national law and standard practice.
    • We have seen this in education and food security.
    • State’s initiatives: In migration too, many States have initiated data projects that can track migrants and generate dynamic real-time data that aid welfare delivery.
    • Maharashtra’s Migration Tracking System (MTS), Chhattisgarh’s State Migrant Workers Policy is premised on registering migrant workers at source and tracking them through phone-based outreach systems.
    • Multisectoral approach: There is further need for multisectoral approaches underpinned by a strategic convergence across government departments and initiatives.
    • Odisha’s Planning and Convergence Department, which offers an institutional mechanism for inter-departmental coordination, is one possible model.
    • Important role of the Centre:  State-level political economy constraints make the Centre’s role particularly crucial in addressing issues of inter-State migrant workers at ‘destination States’.
    • The NITI Aayog’s Draft Policy on Migrant Workers is a positive step forward.

    Conclusion

    Strategic initiatives to provide migrants safety nets regardless of location as well as bolster their ability to migrate safely and affordably must keep up the momentum toward migrant-supportive policy.

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  • 13 new districts created in Andhra Pradesh

    Andhra Pradesh has got a new map with the creation of 13 new districts, taking the number of total districts in the state to 26.

    What are Districts?

    • India’s districts are local administrative units inherited from the British Raj.
    • They generally form the tier of local government immediately below that of India’s subnational states and territories.
    • A district is headed by a Deputy Commissioner/ Collector, who is responsible for the overall administration and the maintenance of law and order.
    • The district collector may belong to IAS (Indian Administrative Service).
    • Districts are most frequently further sub-divided into smaller administrative units, called either tehsils or talukas or mandals, depending on the region.

    How are new districts carved?

    • The power to create new districts or alter or abolish existing districts rests with the State governments.
    • This can either be done through an executive order or by passing a law in the State Assembly.
    • Many States prefer the executive route by simply issuing a notification in the official gazette.

    How does it help?

    • States argue that smaller districts lead to better administration and governance.
    • For example, in 2016, the Assam government issued a notification to upgrade the Majuli sub-division to Majuli district for “administrative expediency”.

    Does the Central government have a role to play here?

    • The Centre has no role to play in the alteration of districts or creation of new ones. States are free to decide.
    • The Home Ministry comes into the picture when a State wants to change the name of a district or a railway station.
    • The State government’s request is sent to other departments and agencies such as the Ministry of Earth Sciences, Intelligence Bureau, Department of Posts, Geographical Survey of India Sciences and the Railway Ministry seeking clearance.
    • A no-objection certificate may be issued after examining their replies.

     

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  • It’s time to repeal AFSPA

    Context

    The Centre on Thursday significantly reduced the footprint of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), 1958 in the Northeast, withdrawing it entirely from 23 districts in Assam; and partially from seven districts in Nagaland, six districts in Manipur, and one district in Assam.

    Background of AFSPA

    • AFSPA was adopted in 1958 during the early days of the Naga uprising to apply to what was then the state of Assam and the union territory of Manipur.
    • The counterinsurgency campaigns against the Nagas were counterproductive.
    • In the following decades, as new states were formed in Northeast India, AFSPA was amended to accommodate the names of those states.

    Provision under AFSPA, 1958

    • AFSPA allows civilian authorities to call on the armed forces to come to the assistance of civil powers.
    • Sweeping powers to armed forces: Once a state — or a part of a state — is declared “disturbed” under this law, the armed forces can make preventive arrests, search premises without warrants, and even shoot and kill civilians.
    • Approval of central government for legal action: Legal action against those abusing these powers requires the prior approval of the central government — a feature that functions as de facto immunity from prosecution.

    Issues with AFSPA

    • Critics charge that it effectively suspends fundamental freedoms and creates a de facto emergency regime.
    • In 2012, a petition was filed in the Supreme Court to investigate as many as 1,528 cases of fake encounters that allegedly occurred in the state between 1979 and 2012.
    • Supreme Court appointed a three-member commission to inquire into the first six of the 1,528 cases in the petition.
    • Its interim judgment of July 2016 said that “there is some truth in the allegations, calling for a deeper probe”.
    • In the court’s view, AFSPA clearly provided the context for these killings.

    Demand for changes and repeal

    • When the Supreme Court pronounced AFSPA constitutional in 1997, it also recommended some changes.
    • Among them was the stipulation that a “disturbed area” designation be subjected to review every six months.
    • In some parts of Northeast India, AFSPA is now routinely extended every six months. But there is little evidence that any meaningful review occurs at those times.
    • In 2004, the then central government set up a five-member committee under former Supreme Court Justice Jeevan Reddy, which submitted its report in 2005 recommending the repeal of AFSPA, calling it “highly undesirable”, and saying it had become a symbol of oppression.
    • Subsequently, the Second Administrative Reforms Commission, headed by Veeerapa Moily, endorsed these recommendations.

    Conclusion

    One must welcome the government’s announcement to reduce the number of such areas. But not to consider the repeal of this law, which is now almost as old as the Republic, is a missed opportunity to reflect on why this law has or has not been successful, and to learn from this history and strengthen the foundation of our democracy.

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  • Building faith in India’s investigative agencies

    Context

    The image of the institution of police is regrettably tarnished by allegations of corruption, police excesses, lack of impartiality and close nexus with the political class.

    Police and investigation agencies need social legitimacy

    • The police and investigative agencies may have de-facto legitimacy, but as institutions, they are yet to gain social legitimacy.
    • Police should work impartially and focus on crime prevention. They should also work in cooperation with the public to ensure law and order.
    • The CBI possessed immense trust of the public in its initial phase.
    • But with the passage of time, like every other institution of repute, the CBI has also come under deep public scrutiny.
    • The need of the hour is to reclaim social legitimacy and public trust.

    Issues affecting the system and causing delay in trial

    • Lack of infrastructure, lack of sufficient manpower, inhuman conditions, especially at the lowest rung, lack of modern equipment, questionable methods of procuring evidence, officers failing to abide by the rule book and the lack of accountability of erring officers.
    • Then there are certain issues that lead to delays in trials.
    • They are: Lack of public prosecutors and standing counsels, seeking adjournments, arraying hundreds of witnesses and filing voluminous documents in pending trials, undue imprisonment of undertrials, change in priorities with the change in the political executive, cherry-picking of the evidence, and repeated transfers of officers leading to a change in the direction of the investigation.

    Way forward

    • Break the nexus with political executive: The first step to reclaim social legitimacy and public trust.is to break the nexus with the political executive.
    • Reform of the police system is long overdue in our country.
    • The Ministry of Home Affairs has itself recognised the glaring need for the same in the “Status Note on Police Reforms in India”. 
    • Comprehensive law: Our investigative agencies still do not have the benefit of being guided by a comprehensive law.
    • Independent and autonomous investigative agency: The need of the hour is the creation of an independent and autonomous investigative agency.
    • Umbrella organisation: There is an immediate requirement for the creation of an independent umbrella institution, so as to bring various agencies like the CBI, SFIO, and ED under one roof.
    • This body is required to be created under a statute, clearly defining its powers, functions and jurisdictions.
    • Such a law will also lead to much-needed legislative oversight.
    • Separation of prosecution and investigation: One additional safeguard that needs to be built into the scheme, is to have separate and autonomous wings for prosecution and investigation, in order to ensure total independence.
    • Annual audit of performance: A provision in the proposed law for an annual audit of the performance of the institution by the appointing committee will be a reasonable check and balance.
    • Strengthening state investigative agencies: There is no reason why state investigative agencies, which handle most of the investigations, cannot enjoy the same level of credibility as that of the national agency.
    • The proposed Central law for the umbrella investigative body can be suitably replicated by the states.
    • Ensure women’s representation: An issue that needs addressing at this stage is the representation of women in the criminal justice system.
    • Often, women feel deterred in reporting certain offences due to a lack of representation.
    • Relations with community: Relations between the community and police also need to be fixed.
    • This is only possible if police training includes sensitisation workshops and interactions to inspire public confidence.

    Consider the question “The police and investigative agencies may have de-facto legitimacy, but as institutions, they are yet to gain social legitimacy. In the context of this, examine the challenges faced by the police and the investigative agencies in India and suggest ways to help them gain social legitimacy.”

    Conclusion

    It is imperative for the police and the public to work together to create a safe society. Ultimately the police must remember that their allegiance must be to the Constitution and the rule of law and not to any person.

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  • What is a Look Out Notice?

    Delhi High Court has sought the Enforcement Directorate’s (ED’s) response on a journalist’s challenge to its action of restraining her from leaving the country. She was stopped in Mumbai on Tuesday evening based on a look out circular (LOC) issued by the ED.

    Look out notice: What is it, when is it issued?

    • An LOC is issued to make sure that an individual who is absconding or wanted by law enforcement agencies is not able to leave the country.
    • It is mostly used at immigration checkpoints at international airports and seaports by the immigration branch.
    • In certain cases, the police can approach a court asking for the restriction of a person’s movement outside the country, when that person is a suspect and there is an apprehension that they may not join the investigation at a later stage.
    • The subject of an LOC can challenge the circular and get relief from a court.

    Who can issue an LOC?

    • An LOC can be initiated by a large number of authorised officers, including an officer not below the rank of deputy secretary, an officer not below the rank of joint secretary in the state government, a district magistrate or superintendent of police.
    • Also, designated officers of various law enforcing and security agencies, a designated officer of Interpol, an officer not below the rank of additional director in the Serious Fraud Investigation Office, and the Ministry of Corporate Affairs can also issue LOC.
    • In 2018, the government also empowered the heads of public sector banks to directly request the authorities to issue an LOC against wilful defaulters to prevent them from leaving the country.
    • So now, an officer not below the rank of chairman/managing director/chief executive of any public sector bank can make a request.
    • An LOC can be modified/deleted/withdrawn by the Bureau of Immigration only on the specific request of the authorised originator on whose request the LOC was issued.

    Does an LOC lead to arrest?

    • Not necessarily. LOCs can be of several types.
    • They can seek to merely stop a person against whom the circular has been issued from travelling outside the country, to prevent a person from entering the country, or inform the concerned investigation agencies.
    • The proforma of the LOC also contains a request to detain the individual at the local police/investigation agency, which generally leads to arrest.

    Back2Basics: Directorate of Enforcement (ED)

    • ED is a law enforcement agency and economic intelligence agency responsible for enforcing economic laws and fighting economic crime (esp Money Laundering) in India.
    • It is part of the Department of Revenue of the Ministry of Finance.
    • It is composed of officers from the Indian Revenue Service, Indian Police Service and the Indian Administrative Service as well as promoted officers from its own cadre.
    • The total strength of the department is less than 2000 officers out of which around 70% of officials came from deputation from other organizations while ED has its own cadre, too.
    • The prime objective of the Enforcement Directorate is the enforcement of two key Acts namely, the Foreign Exchange Management Act 1999 (FEMA) and the Prevention of Money Laundering Act 2002 (PMLA)

     

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  • Smart Policing

    Context

    On March 11, speaking at the NCRB Foundation Day, the Union Home Minister remarked that the second phase of the Inter-operable Criminal Justice System (ICJS) is set to be completed by 2026.

    Increasing use of technology for policing

    • the Inter-operable Criminal Justice System (ICJS), a Rs 3,500 crore project, is set to be completed by 2026 with increased use of artificial intelligence, fingerprint systems and other tools of predictive policing.
    • One crore fingerprints had already been uploaded and if these were available to all police stations as part of the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network System (CCTNS), there would no longer be any need to pursue criminals.
    • The existing systems of ICJS and CCTNS empower the state to cross-reference data between different pillars of the criminal justice system.
    • Recently, the Indore Police Commissioner unveiled a “fingerprint-based criminal record data fetching system” in which a small thumb impression machine can be added to a phone.
    • If the fingerprint recorded matches with the police database, all information about a person’s criminal record will be pulled up.

    Issues with the use of technologies

    • Privacy concerns: The enthusiasm for generating and cross-referencing data to make policing more efficient ignores privacy concerns and structural faults of policing.
    • The Supreme Court in K.S Puttaswamy declared a fundamental right to informational privacy as paramount and noted that any measure that sought to collect information or surveil must be legal, necessary, and proportionate.
    • Fear of mass surveillance: Integrating “fingerprint-based criminal record data fetching system” to the list of predictive policing practices will give birth to mass surveillance, particularly of certain oppressed caste communities, based on little evidence.
    • Nomadic and semi-nomadic tribes were ascribed “criminality by birth” and considered as “hereditary criminals addicted to systematic commission of non-bailable offences” under the colonial Criminal Tribes Act, 1871.
    • It has been replaced with the murky Habitual Offenders (HO) provisions, which have acted as a tool for police to continue to attribute criminality to Vimukta communities, by mandating their surveillance through regular check-ins at police stations.
    • Mere suspicion or FIRs filed against an individual are sufficient to trigger the discretionary powers of the police.

    Consider the question “Use of technology in policing can make it better at the same time run the risk of making it more dangerous.” Critically examine.

    Conclusion

    With the increasing adoption of technology in policing, we must pay attention to the risks involved and the issue of misuse.

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  • Water management needs a hydro-social approach

    Context

    The Global Water System Project, which was launched in 2003 as a joint initiative of the Earth System Science Partnership (ESSP) and Global Environmental Change (GEC) programme, epitomises global concern about the human-induced transformation of fresh water and its impact on the earth system and society.

    Valuation of water

    • It is globally estimated that the gap between demand for and supply of fresh water may reach up to 40% by 2030 if present practices continue.
    • SDG 6: The formation of the 2030 Water Resource Group in 2008, at the instance of the World Economic Forum, and the World Bank’s promotion of the group’s activity since 2018, is in recognition of this problem and to help achieve the Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) on water availability and sanitation for all by 2030 (SDG 6).
    • The latest UN World Water Development Report, 2021, titled ‘Valuing Water’, has laid stress on the proper valuation of water by considering five interrelated perspectives: water sources; water infrastructure; water services; water as an input to production and socio-economic development, and socio-cultural values of water.

    Need for hydro-social cycle approach

    • Designing a comprehensive mix of divergent views about water along with ecological and environmental issues held by stakeholder groups is necessary.
    • In this context, a hydro-social cycle approach provides an appropriate framework.
    • It repositions the natural hydrological cycle in a human-nature interactive structure and considers water and society as part of a historical and relational-dialectical process.
    • The anthropogenic factors directly influencing a freshwater system are the engineering of river channels, irrigation and other consumptive use of water, widespread land use/land cover change, change in an aquatic habitat, and point and non-point source pollution affecting water quality.

    The intra- and inter-basin transfer (IBT) of water

    • IBT is a major hydrological intervention to rectify the imbalance in water availability due to naturally prevailing unequal distribution of water resources within a given territory.
    • There are several IBT initiatives across the world.
    • The National River Linking Project of India is one of those under construction.
    • Based on a multi-country case study analysis, the World Wildlife Fund/World Wide Fund for Nature (2009) has suggested a cautious approach and the necessity to adhere to sustainability principles set out by the World Commission on Dams while taking up IBT projects.

    Issues with assumptions, use and management of freshwater resources in India

    1] Contestation on concept of the surplus and deficit basin

    • The basic premise of IBT is to export water from the surplus basin to a deficit basin.
    • However, there is contestation on the concept of the surplus and deficit basin itself as the exercise is substantially hydrological.
    • Besides this, rainfall in many surplus basins has been reported as declining.
    • The status of the surplus basin may alter if these issues are considered.

    2] Low capacity utilisation

    • There is concern about the present capacity utilisation of water resources created in the country.
    • By 2016, India created an irrigation potential for 112 million hectares, but the gross irrigated area was 93 million hectares.
    • There is a 19% gap, which is more in the case of canal irrigation.
    • In 1950-51, canal irrigation used to contribute 40% of net irrigated area, but by 2014-15, the net irrigated area under canal irrigation came down to less than 24%.
    • Groundwater irrigation now covers 62.8% of net irrigated area.
    • Low efficiency of irrigation projects: The average water use efficiency of irrigation projects in India is only 38% against 50%-60% in the case of developed countries.
    • More water consumption for crops: Even at the crop level we consume more water than the global average.
    • Rice and wheat, the two principal crops accounting for more than 75% of agricultural production use 2,850 m 3/tonnes and 1,654 m 3/tonnes of water, respectively, against the global average of 2,291m 3/tonnes and 1,334m 3/ tonnes in the same order.
    • The agriculture sector uses a little over 90% of total water use in India.
    • And in industrial plants, consumption is 2 times to 3.5 times higher per unit of production of similar plants in other countries.
    • Similarly, the domestic sector experiences a 30% to 40% loss of water due to leakage.

    3] Low use of greywater

    • Grey water is hardly used in our country.
    • It is estimated that 55% to 75% of domestic water use turns into greywater depending on its nature of use, people’s habits, climatic conditions, etc.
    • At present, the average water consumption in the domestic sector in urban areas is 135 litres to 196 litres a head a day.
    • If grey water production in the rural areas is considered it will be a huge amount.
    • The discharge of untreated grey water and industrial effluents into freshwater bodies is cause for concern.
    • The situation will be further complicated if groundwater is affected.

    4] Other issues

    • Apart from the inefficient use of water in all sectors, there is also a reduction in natural storage capacity and deterioration in catchment efficiency.

    Way forward

    • The issues are source sustainability, renovation and maintenance of traditional water harvesting structures, grey water management infrastructure, groundwater recharge, increasing water use efficiency, and reuse of water.
    • The axiom that today’s water system is co-evolving and the challenges are mainly management and governance has been globally well accepted.
    • It is important to include less predictable variables, revise binary ways of thinking of ‘either or’, and involve non-state actors in decision-making processes.

    Conclusion

    A hybrid water management system is necessary, where along with professionals and policy makers the individual, a community and society have definite roles in the value chain. The challenge is not to be techno-centric but anthropogenic.

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