It was the scorching heat of March 2015, with the sun overhead. Laxmibai from Sawali village near Latur had a big water-carrying pot over her head, with two additional pots in her hand to help her. Laxmibai’s 8-year-old daughter carried water, a weight disproportionate to her age. With the water source being as far as 12-15 km away from home, the destination appeared to be distant. With this needing to be done almost twice a day, Laxmibai was in dire need of more hours a day, as fulfilling other family responsibilities was almost impossible in a 24-hour day. This story of Laxmibai and many others highlights the urgency of water resource management.

The scenario of Latur is no different from other parts of India, and in fact all over the world – with a zero water day in a South African city already declared, climate refugee influx multiplied, and population explosion demanding more water, especially in developing countries like India. All these highlight that water resource management is no longer a choice, but rather it is sine-qua-non for human survival.

In this essay, we will elaborate upon factors – push and pull – calling for urgent water resource management, components of it, actors involved in this process, some global best practices that can be replicated, challenges that will come in during so, and how to overcome those challenges with water governance in India and the world.

To begin with, water resource management involves dual components – managing the surplus as well as scarcity. It means, in a narrow sense, management for drought as well as floods. Also, it needs to be kept in mind that the same location faces both these problems at different times like the city of Chennai which faced severe urban floods in the past and now recently faced acute drought. This means the spatial aspects of water management need to have a dual approach.

To manage any resource, we need to understand the source and utilization of it. The statistics of the water budget of Earth will itself reveal the urgency of its management. Out of the total Earth, two-thirds are oceans. But out of the total water, only 3% is fresh water. Out of this 3%, 79% is in ice caps and glaciers, 20% is groundwater. It means that only 1% is easily accessible fresh water. Out of this 1%, 52% is in lakes, 38% is in soil moisture, 8% in the atmosphere, 1% in rivers, and the remaining 1% in living organisms. This necessitates not only management of water resources but also it has to be efficient, effective, and economical.

To look into the future, at times we need to look back into the past. And water conservation is not an exception. The temporal perspective of water resources highlights that earlier civilizations – Indus Valley, Mesopotamian (Euphrates River), Egypt – Nile river, Chinese all depend on water resources. Even it is believed that life is made up of five elements panchamahabhoota – fire, wind, water, earth, and Ether. This highlights that the history of the evolution of mankind is also the history of the evolution of water resource management.

Analyzing the urgency of water resource management, first comes the basic needs of humans – food, clothes, shelter – all three intrinsically linked to water. But we earlier presumed that water will always be there and did not include water in these basic needs. At present, the situation is that across the globe more than 50% of the population doesn’t have access to safe drinking water for sanitation. Water acts as an important social determinant of health. With India and the world not having achieved MDG and SDG goals just 11 years ahead, water resource management is the need of the hour.

Continuing from above, as almost 50% of the population of the world lives in Monsoonal Asia – with all its uncertainty and non-predictability – management of scarce water resources is needed. Monsoon gives very uneven rainfall across the country. Where Meghalaya faces problems of abundance, the desert of Rajasthan waits for a drop of rain. While Bihar was busy dealing with deaths due to floods, Maharashtra had to deal with deaths from farmer suicides due to drought. All these demands annual water budgeting for monsoon.

Agriculture remains still dominant in contributing to employment in India (47%). Also, we have guaranteed the right to food for our 67% of the population. When the agriculture sector is facing distress due to water crisis – in both ways – we can’t assure the target of doubling farmers’ incomes by 2022. With irrigation coverage still around 48% at an all-India level, we need better water resource management at the farm level. The farmers’ budget de facto depends on water availability, accessibility, and affordability. This is especially true when many regions of India are in rain shadow areas that demand the highest attention in water resource management.

The mismanagement of the past has led to the vagueness and urgency of managing for the future. The human consumption of water in an unsustainable manner has exploited water beyond the replenishment rate of nature. This climate change-induced impact has led to the Anthropocene epoch now. But this epoch cannot survive without water. The principle of sustainable development says that future generations have the right to resources equally as much as we have. This demands effective water resource management.

In the industrial sector, water is a necessary input for production. In the past, we found industries were forced to shut down during droughts, for example, Latur drought and sugarcane industries. Can we achieve targets of “Make in India” by importing water? With the Industrial Revolution witnessing its 4th generation, water resource management also needs a revolution. Water-intensive and water-polluting industries need to be punished and disincentivized.

In the social sector, gender and water have a strong linkage in the Indian scenario. Data suggests that on average, an Indian woman walks 1400 km per year in search of water. Laxmibai’s story in the beginning indicates how water scarcity impacts girl child education. Also, male members of society are pushed away from homes to search for jobs. Studies suggest an emerging phenomenon of water wives in India, men marrying multiple women to carry the water burden of the family. Gender Budgeting should necessarily include water budgeting in the future. The dream of women’s development cannot be achieved without effective water resource management.

In the urban sector, the problem of water abundance leading to urban floods is evident from reports of Mumbai, Delhi, and Chennai witnessing floods; it means we have not learned lessons from the past. How many times will a water train save us? And what if the water train itself gets stuck in between floodwaters, similar to what happened for a train plying between Kolhapur and Mumbai? As the UN population fund says, 40% of India’s population will be in urban areas by 2023, so it needs effective urban water resource management.

In the rural sector, traditional floods are devastating agriculture fields, destroying crops. Due to climate change-induced uncertainty, planning for water has become more challenging and has negatively impacted rural economy. Rural societies need their decentralized water planning to ensure resilience against the dual faces of water problems – floods and Water