Dear Senaka Samarasinghe

Thank you for your message. I read very carefully the resources
available in the internet on the efforts being made by your
Government since 1997 with the assistance of the Asian Development
Bank (ADB) and the Food & Agriculture Organization (FAO) to establish
an Interim National Water Resources Authority (NWRA) under the
Ministry of Irrigation and Water Management with key specialised
staff appointed on a temporary basis to facilitate the emergence of
the NWRA.

The draft bill was no doubt prepared very carefully by assigning
specific roles to the NWRA in national/ regional/ long-term river
basin planning using river basin as the unit, coordination and
collection of all data related to water from all concerned agencies,
issuing water rights to all big/ small stakeholders in different
seasons, improvement of data management/ monitoring/ evaluation/
commissioning of research, drought/ flood management and mitigation,
stakeholder mobilisation for conservation and protection using
watershed as the unit and for controlling all riverine activities,
providing education and dissemination of information to the public,
and finally collaborating with the various sector agencies to develop
a national water resources plan.

Passing of this draft bill into a law is absolutely needed to
introduce water sector reforms to regulate water use by competing
water users, conserving water to optimum extent, making water of
adequate quality and quantity available to all sections of
populations in a cost-effective manner, and preventing any
degradation of surface and ground water quality. Unfortunately, the
draft bill not only aims at modernising the water resources
management but also incorporates Water Resources Policy, Act and
Regulations. Your government is naturally afraid to pass the bill and
give such powers to the NWDA, a budding national agency in its
incipient stage of development, which has yet to have a capacity
building programme to demonstrate its capabilities to take up such
gigantic tasks and responsibilities. By giving such sweeping powers
to the NWDA, there appears to be a genuine fear on the part of your
government that the water scenario of the country may change from bad
to worse.

There should be no difficulty for your government to pass the bill
almost immediately, if it is revised to make your agency responsible
initially to take up the scientific component, but not the regulatory
component of the draft bill. Once such a bill is passed, your
organisation will get adequate resources to make an impact on the
water resources planning and development of your country in a big
way. After that, it is question of time for the NWRA to get the
additional responsibility to become a regulatory agency to promote
planned development of your country's water resources.

Preparation of such a revised draft bill has to be taken up carefully
by taking into account the intimate relationship existing between the
surface and ground waters and other factors peculiar to your country.
Your country being an island, there is enormous wastage of water as
runoff to the sea. Wastage of surface runoff requires creation of
adequate live storage by constructing reservoirs of a very large
capacity to utilise the 75% dependability yield of the river waters.
Such constructions can lead to environmental degradation and conflict
with environmental activists and the land losers. The ideal approach
would be to take up construction of subsurface dams at suitable
locations across all the rivers of the country in an environmentally
friendly way without involving any land submergence. Such
constructions allow for reducing the present wide disparity in the
availability of water in wet and dry seasons, and make adequate water
available for all the stakeholders on sustainable basis. You can know
something about subsurface dams from my message on "Unseen waters" at
http://www.indiatogether.org/2004/may/env-subsurf.htm.

I inform you that I am a Ph.D. and a retired Professor of Geology
from Sri Venkateswara University, India. I live at Tirupati, located
close to Chennai (Madras). I have been actively engaged in the study
of water resources at grassroots to advanced levels since 1965 as a
teacher, researcher, extension worker and consultant to offer
pragmatic solutions to government, industry, NGOs, farmers and
individuals to obtain water (particularly ground water) of adequate
quality and quantity in a cost-effective and sustainable manner. Most
of my works remained unpublished until I started publicising them
since 1999 mainly through Internet. This has led to the receipt of a
Water Voice Messenger Award in the 3rd World Water Forum, Kyoto in
March 2003 besides invitations to participate in a few national and
international conferences.

I have enough expertise not only to assist in the preparation of the
revised draft bill but also impart training for the NWRA staff in
equipping the necessary infrastructure for taking up various works.
If you are interested to take my services and can invite me to your
country to know how useful I would be, I can send my detailed
curriculum vitae.

Kind regards,

Dr. R. Jagadiswara Rao
63 A, 2nd Cross West, Vidyanagar
Tirupati, AP 517502, India
jagadiswara@...

--- In gwrm@..., "Senaka Samarasinghe" <senaka39@s...>
wrote:
> Dear Prof. R. Jagadiswara Rao,
>
> Your reply is quite interesting. As I was attached to National Water
> Resources Authority you answer is very helpful for me.
>
> For the last ten years, we are trying to approve a Water Policy to
Sri
> Lanka. Every Government comes in to power they are afraid to take
this Bill
> to the Parliament. They say that we are trying to sell water either
within
> Sri Lanka or multi national companies.
>
> Please give me an answer for this. So that I can submit it to
relevant
> Authorities
>
> With kind regards,
>
> Senaka Samarasinghe
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: Prof. R. Jagadiswara Rao <jagadiswara@y...>
> To: <gwrm@...>
> Sent: Sunday, May 08, 2005 5:00 PM
> Subject: [gwrm] Re: Community level social regulations in Ground
> Watermanagement
>
>
> Dear Rama Mohan
>
> I am a retired Professor of Geology settled at Tirupati. I have been
> actively engaged in the study of water resources at grassroots to
> advanced levels since 1965 as a teacher, researcher, extension
worker
> and consultant to offer pragmatic solutions to government, industry,
> NGOs, farmers and individuals to obtain water (particularly ground
> water) of adequate quality and quantity in a cost-effective and
> sustainable manner. Most of my work remained unpublished until I
> started publicising it since 1999 mainly through Internet. This has
> led to the receipt of a Water Voice Messenger Award in the 3rd World
> Water Forum, Kyoto in March 2003 besides invitations to participate
> in a few national and international conferences.
>
> I am happy to know that you have been working in rural water
> management for the past one decade and presently working with Centre
> for World Solidarity to introduce social regulations in ground water
> management in four villages in Andhra Pradesh. I congratulate you
for
> achieving some success in bringing water equity and control to
> provide drinking water, besides introducing the concept of making
> irrigation water available to those who don't own bore wells. Your
> success is evidently because of your appreciation that controlled
> extraction of deep ground water rather than revival of traditional
> minor irrigation works such as tanks can meet the rural water needs
> on a more sustainable basis.
>
> I agree with you that ground water is a public property and anyone
> can exploit it to the extent required/possible. Although your NGO
> cannot prevent people who can afford from developing deep ground
> water, you can develop additional deep ground water for sharing by
> those who cannot develop it on their own. By taking up such a work
on
> a large scale, you may yourself become a culprit for accelerating
> ground water depletion.
>
> To achieve success, it is important for your NGO to take up the
> following works.
>
> . Take drainage basin rather than village as unit
>
> . Quantify the quantum of ground water that could be withdrawn
> on sustainable basis by taking into account rainfall, evaporation,
> transpiration, infiltration, surface/ground water runoff,
> surface/ground water conveyed into/outside the basin
> naturally/artificially
>
> . Establish a strategy for all round development of people in
> the basin through optimum use of the available water by introducing
> various water conservation methods including
>
> o Motivating people to adopt one-child norm
> o Evolving methods for primary workers to become secondary and
> tertiary workers
> o Plugging unproductive losses of water through evaporation and
> transpiration
> o Preventing surface/ground water leaving the basin
> o Obtaining as much surface/ground water as possible from
> outside the basin
> o Introducing improved methods of irrigation such as drip/pulse
> irrigation
> o Using hydrophilic soil amendments to prevent evaporation of
> soil moisture
> o Encouraging farmers from growing dry crops instead of water-
> intensive crops
> o Finding good marketing facilities from farmers to get good
> return from their produce
> o Transforming some weed crops such as Prosopis juliflora that
> need very little irrigation water into a cash crop for use in
biomass
> power plants that presently deplete forests
>
> I hereby offer my services in anyway you want for the success of
your
> work, which can include training for taking up the above works
> effectively.
>
> Best wishes
>
> Dr. R. Jagadiswara Rao
> Former Professor of Geology, S.V. University
> 63A, 2nd Cross West, Vidyanagar
> Tirupati, AP 517502, India
> Email: jagadiswara@y...
> Mobile: 94401-84012
>
> --- In gwrm@..., "Rama Mohan R.V." <rvrm2@y...> wrote:
> > Dear All,
> >
> > I am Rama Mohan working in Rural Water Management
> > since 10 years in India. I presently work in Centre
> > for World Solidarity, a non-profit organization
> > located in Hyderbad, India.
> >
> > I am looking for cases of ground water management and
> > regulations by communities in rural areas either in
> > India or overseas.
> >
> > I am sending a brief of what we are doing in 4
> > villages in Andhra Pradesh, India. The project is
> > titled "Social Regulations in Ground Water
> > management" with specific focus on irrigation. As a
> > part of this, we are working to develop community
> > level social regulations on use and managemnt of
> > Ground water. Ground water levels had fallen to
> > alarming levels in these districts and
> > over-exploitation continues unchecked. In this
> > scenario, only few bore well owners gulp all the water
> > and poor people not having bores are denied their
> > right. So far, we could acheive some success in
> > drinking water equity and control. In irrigation
> > water, we could cultivate the concept of sharing of
> > water by borewell owners with people without any bore
> > well or source of irrigation. This is a pilot project
> > coming to end by Sept 2005.
> >
> > Ultimate goal of this project is to advocate that
> > lands rights are not water rights and groundwater is a
> > public property and ensure the rights of poor and
> > water loosers. After implementing one and half years,
> > we would like to explore and learn from similar
> > experiences elsewhere.
> >
> > Can any one help find out and link us / provide
> > contact within your reach any such projects being
> > implemented. We would like to visit for exposure and
> > sharing of our own experience.
> >
> > Thanking You in advance,
> >
> > R.V.Rama Mohan
> >
> > CWS, Secunderabad
> > India