Water in the Peri-urban – Changing dynamics & Critical

Sustainability

Alankar (Sarai, CSDS)

Area of Study – Trans-Hindon area in Ghaziabad (THA)

• Borders Delhi – the capital city of India• Largely rural and agrarian till the early 1990s.

Included villages like Karhera & Arthala and vast agricultural tracts.

• Karhera – agricultural, Arthala – complex ghetto• THA officially declared urban • Apart from few middle income housing localities

(Lajpat Ngr, Rajendra Ngr) the 1990s also saw coming up of upper middle and elite conclaves (Vasundhara, Vaishali etc)

Changing water dynamics

• Karhera village till 1990s remained dependent on traditional, locally-managed water systems – wells, johads, river Hindon’s surface and undercurrent supplies

• Remarkable has remained the domestic wastewater management for entire village and its reuse for irrigation purposes

• Arthala village too depended on wells till 1990s• With the formal municipalisation began changes

in water management

Institutionalised Differential Access to Water

• 1990s - Municipality (read State) moved in to provide formal access to water (tapped/piped). Substantive provisioning made available to middle class colonies and further privileged access provided to upcoming rich and upper middle class localities.

• Underground water based supplies + Ganga water • Villages (whose land acquired for developing better off

colonies) remained under-provided• Faustian bargain - Ironically, state’s exclusionary water

provisioning within villages (to few and powerful) led to gradual erosion of traditional water management systems.

Beyond Rur-urbanisation – Coerced Industrialisation

• Late 1990s and early 2000s saw relocation of polluting industries from Delhi. THA became one of the destinations. Villages became sites of labour inflow shaping new ghettos and slums. Pollution from factories is immensely contaminating the groundwater and has already killed the river Hindon

• Gentrification processes in Delhi since 1990s saw sections of middle & upper classes buying land and housing at urbanising locales of THA. Efficient, clean and adequate supplies of municipal water through Ganga water project

Costs of Accessing Water• Both villages today rely on fast depleting groundwater. Use of

submersible electric pumps further creating exclusions. Poor & marginalised facing acute problems. Massive time & opportunity costs. Better off villagers too spending more on electricity, installation & maintenance.

• Slums and ghettos having maximum crisis. No efficient municipal supplies. Polluted groundwater. In places like Ambedkar Bustee, regular fatal accidents while trying to access water from posh locality lying across the adjacent railway tracks.

• Middle class populace evolving multiple coping strategies – motors, pumps, bottled water, better storage, purification devices

• Rich, elite & upper middle class – most privileged. Ganga water institutionally accessed. In-house, tapped, piped supplies in adequate quantities and timings. Best equipped storage. No need for purification

Wastewater dynamics

• A significant contribution of this research – from source to sink.

• Karhera village yet managing domestic wastewater reused in irrigation. Acute problem with solid/semi-solid waste management

• Arthala villagers – No underground sewage. Large cesspool of sewage behind the village.

• Slums & ghettos – critical & dangerous living conditions. Pools of filth, dirt and sewage. Poverty and powerlessness – mutually constitutive

• Middle, upper middle and elite localities – well managed, underground (invisible) sewage disposal infrastructural system in place. Use & Pollute most but remain invisible polluters. Made to pay least (proportionately) for usage & pollution

Municipal Solutions

• Tapped, piped supplies to be provided ‘gradually’ to all

• Beautification of river Hindon and surroundings

• (Only) Religious pollution being addressed• Rainwater harvesting – lip service• Grandiose schemes being ‘reformulated’ –

re-talk of inclusion (similar to earlier schemes on late 1980s and early 1990s)

Alternatives• Institutionalise inclusion - of poor people located in slums &

ghettos and the time-tested ecological wisdom of villagers.• De-pollute factory & domestic wastewater prior to disposal –

resuscitate river Hindon substantively and disallow groundwater’s contamination and overuse by powerful

• Mandate middle & upper class to preserve groundwater. Limit & bring ecological footprint further down (save river Ganga’s growing distant use to stop socio-ecological contests)

• Curb unregulated privatization of water (bottled and tanker-based supplies)

• Increase and expand publicness of state managed and community managed water systems to provide adequate quantity and quality to under-served poor majority.

• Democratize decision making around water management to redistribute water and related technologies, laws, norms & policies etc.