These Nashik Villagers won the National Award for Water Conservation!

Water Conservation is the need of the hour and it has become quintessential to raise awareness about it. Considering the current scenario, if we do not step now, our future generations will have to face acute water shortages. Bringing up a great example on a global level, some villagers in Nashik have found their own unique ways to conserve water and have been doing eco-friendly irrigation planning for 27 years now. These Nashik Villagers recently got honoured with the National Award for Water Conservation 2019 for their efficient irrigating plans to facilitate water conservation.

Around 17,000 farmers have been planning post-monsoon irrigation so that there is no shortage of water. All these hardworking farmers come from 41 smaller units and are dependent on the Waghad irrigation project in the taluka of Dindori. These farmers from Nashik won the second prize in the ‘Best water users’ association’ category in the Union government-instituted National Water Award in 2019. Coming together as a group, the Waghad Project Level Water Users’ Association aims to provide equitable water distribution for the purpose of irrigation. This system ensures that each and every farmer gets the required amount of water by the use of a canal network.

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The office-bearers of the association are elected by the members from all the 41 units. There is no involvement of any political party or individual politician in this association. The association generates a yearly turnover of INR 30-35 lakh by way of water cess and management charges.

One of the office bearers, Shahaji Somwansh, told Times of India that the association has been able to provide water supply to each and every farmer and make them aware of the fact that they will be secure if they pay for the water. This is the very base of their water management system. The system ensures irrigation of agricultural land for 8 months, during monsoon when the water supply is more, the excess water is stored in dams and then released gradually after the end of the monsoon season. Lauding this efficient water management system, the villagers’ team received the National Award for Water Conservation 2019.

The Waghad project which has been constructed on Kolwam river which is a tributary of Kadwa is efficient to irrigate more than 140% of its target of 6,750 hectares. Farmers of this area could only cultivate Kharif crops earlier, but thanks to the association, they are now able to cultivate cash crops like grapes as well.

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Thus, these Nashik Villagers have independently created their own efficient water management system for irrigation which brought them the appreciation through the National Award for Water Conservation. Keep watching this space at Leverage Edu as we bring you more such interesting and informative reads from across the globe.