Field Notes from Jharkhand: Testing Jaltol on the Ground with WASSAN
By collating secondary data and allowing for grassroots communities to input specific primary data, Jaltol can address the data and technical gap that impairs rural water planning.
Lakshmi Pranuti, Ashish Sinha, Craig Dsouza
On a bright November morning in Dhodrobaru village in southern Jharkhand, around 45 villagers gathered for a tricky exercise — estimating crop water use in the region. They were split into two groups — one was asked to estimate the demand for water and the other had to try and assess what the availability of water was.
The first group looked at the total area of the village, the extent of cultivable land, the number of households and livestock, what crops are grown in the Kharif season, all in a bid to arrive at a reasonable estimate for the quantum of water their village needs. The second group talked about the total rainfall in the region, how many rainwater harvesting structures exist. They carried out simple calculations based on rules of thumb on what percentage of rainfall is lost as run-off and how much is stored.
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We attended this exercise done to estimate how much water is available for the ongoing Rabi season, when crops are sown from October to November, once the southwest monsoon departs. Led by staff with the Watershed Support Services and Activities Network (WASSAN), one of the largest networks of CSOs in the country involved in rural water security, this was an attempt at participatory planning.
By clarifying the mechanics involved in water demand and supply, WASSAN hoped to highlight to the gram sabha and the villagers the need for better structures to store water and advocate for slight changes in their cropping pattern. For example, if the amount of water available is less, it is wiser to reduce the acreage for water-intensive crops such as paddy.
This is the kind of work that we imagine Jaltol, a digital tool we developed for water accounting, can help with. By collating reams of secondary data and allowing for grassroots communities to input specific bits of primary data, Jaltol can address the data and technical gap that impairs rural water planning.
Water woes in a state like Jharkhand
The average annual rainfall in Jharkhand is a high 1200 mm, rendering the state less vulnerable to the kind of severe water scarcity that plague parts of Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan. There are also a number of rivers that quench the state.
However, as development projects are implemented in Jharkhand and water is drawn faster than it can replenish, such regions are headed towards a major crisis in terms of availability of water. This isn’t a future scenario; there are reports of lakes and other surface water bodies running dry.
We wrote about this context before and why there is an urgent need for measures such as water budgeting, that take into account trends in the region’s water availability, and domestic and crop water requirements. But we can’t parachute into a new area with Jaltol and expect the tool to work wonders for local communities and grassroots organisations. Our tool is heavily dependent on the feedback we get from users on the ground, based on which we identify the need for new features, tweak the tool and take it back to our collaborators. Rinse and repeat.
We recently completed an important step in this process with WASSAN, with whom we signed a Memorandum of Understanding earlier this year to support them in conducting participatory crop water budgeting exercises. In November, we visited Dhodrobaru village in Anandpur subdivision of Pashchimi Singhbhum district in Jharkhand to see how the community could use their tool in CWB activities.
Visiting the area, in person, enabled us to troubleshoot and carry out a more effective training session. The experience was also invaluable for us in terms of helping us understand how they carry out primary data collection and how it could be integrated with secondary data such as cropping patterns, evapotranspiration rates etc.
How WASSAN wants to use Jaltol in Jharkhand
WASSAN’s main mandate in Jharkhand is to prepare Detailed Project Reports that focus on how soil and water conservation measures can be integrated with the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (MGNREGA). Calculating the water budget is an important component of the DPR, for which WASSAN depends on primary data collected by community resource persons for parameters such as well depths, crop types and acreage, presence of farm ponds. This DPR is submitted to the rural development department, with whom the CSO partners to implement a wide range of activities.
So far, they have collected data for 962 micro-watersheds, or villages. Of these, they have prepared and submitted 788 DPRs to the government. WASSAN wants to test Jaltol in 44 villages in Anandpur block, after which it will be extended to all villages.
Surface water calculations are of high priority here
In places like Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, water budgeting is commonplace out of sheer necessity since the aquifers in this part of the country hold less water, and hence crops are more susceptible to dry spells. Farmers spend more to chase the water table, installing borewells that are up to a whopping 700–1,000 feet in depth. In Jharkhand, on the other hand, a 35-foot borewell can comfortably access water. Groundwater scarcity, WASSAN staff say, is a worry that they can shelve for now. They are more concerned about the region’s surface because it fails to store enough water above ground. Water percolates below or is lost as run-off because of the region’s hilly terrain.
Their top priority is identifying techniques for retaining the available surface water, storing it efficiently so that it can be used for irrigation. Communities here want to ensure optimal usage of surface water sources. This was important feedback that we are acting on by exploring ways to improve surface water estimation on Jaltol. Since WASSAN has been working on the ground, they have also collected data on the extent of surface water sources. The CSO’s field staff need to be able to input such primary data, for which we will be creating a placeholder in the surface water availability section on the app.
Given the limitations with remote sensing data that may not afford the kind of granularity required to assess the distribution and spread of surface water bodies, such primary data is critical to improve the tool’s effectiveness.
From a community engagement perspective, this visit highlighted how important it is to undertake field visits at the early stages of working with a new partner or community. It clarifies exactly what the need is on the ground and also helps us map government schemes that are active in the area and can thus be leveraged for water budgeting activities.
Edited by Kaavya Kumar
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