water supply and sanitation in india water supply and sanitation in india india faces challenges ranging from sourcing water for its megacities to its distribution network which is largely intermittent with continuous distribution networks just beginning to emerge. non-revenue water is a challenge. india: water and sanitation data access to basic drinking water source 90% (2019) access to basic sanitation 90% (2020) safely managed sanitation: 50% basic sanitation: 40% limited sanitation: 14% no access to sanitation (open defecation): 8% average urban water use (liter/capita/day) 126 (2006) average urban water and sewer bill for 20m3 us$2 (2007) share of household metering 55 percent in urban areas (1999) share of collected wastewater treated 27% (2003) annual investment in water supply and sanitation us$5 / capita institutions decentralization to municipalities partial national water and sanitation company no water and sanitation regulator no responsibility for policy setting state governments; ministry of housing and urban poverty alleviation, ministry of urban development and ministry of drinking water and sanitation at the federal level sector law no number of urban service providers 3,255 (1991) number of rural service providers about 100,000 the share of indians with access to improved sources of water increased significantly from 72% in 1990 to 88% in 2008. in 1980, rural sanitation coverage was estimated at 1%. by 2018, it reached 95%. however, many people still lack access to water and sewage infrastructure. water supply cities in 2005 none of the 35 indian cities with a population of more than one million distributed water for more than a few hours per day, despite generally sufficient infrastructure. owing to inadequate water pressure people struggle to collect water even when it is available. service benchmarking carried out in 2006 in 28 cities found the average duration of supply was 3.3 hours per day, with a range from one hour every three days to 18 hours per day. a 2007 study showed that in 20 cities the average duration of supply was only 4.3 hours per day. the longest duration of supply was 12 hours per day in chandigarh, and the lowest was 0.3 hours per day in rajkot. in 2015, 88% of the total population had access to at least basic water, or 96% in urban areas and 85% in rural areas. that is, there were still 150 million people without access to at least basic water. in delhi land usage for residential area varies widely from planned colonies to unplanned slums. despite the large piped network, with some areas receiving intermittent water supply, there are large areas that lack coverage. reliance on dubious private water vendors is costly. for example, in delhi water trucks get water from illegal wells on the banks of the yamuna river for 0.75 rupees per gallon (about us$2.70/m3). in india, delhi has the highest usage of household water purifiers/filters. basic gravity water filter, electric reverse osmosis and ultraviolet filters visible. standard 20l bottled water visible. the supply of cities that depend on surface water is threatened by pollution, increasing water scarcity and conflicts among users. for example, bangalore depends to a large extent on water pumped since 1974 from the kaveri river, whose waters are disputed between the states of karnataka and tamil nadu. as in other indian cities, the response to water scarcity is to transfer more water over large distances at high costs. in the case of bangalore 500,000 cubic meter of water is pumped per day over a distance of 100 km, thus increasing the city's supply by two-thirds. jamshedpur provided 25% of its residents with continuous water supply in 2009. in 2021, some parts of mumbai got 24 hour supply, others got 19 hours supply or less. puri became the first city in india to get a piped 24 hour continuous drinking water quality water supply. trivandrum is the largest indian city and the only million agglomeration that enjoys uninterrupted hygienic water supply. chennai has two desalination plants ate the nemmeli and minjur. towns malkapur is the first indian town to provide 24*7 water supply with 100 percent coverage. the program started in 2008 as a pilot project and soon covered the entire city. the connection is 100 percent metered with telescopic tariff. rural kaapil has been successful in providing continuous piped water supply to all households. rainwater harvesting in the early 21st century, india began heavily investing in rainwater harvesting infrastructure and policy as an urgent response to water scarcity. in 2001, tamil nadu became the first indian state to make rainwater harvesting compulsory in every building to avoid groundwater depletion. in rajasthan, rainwater harvesting has traditionally been practiced by the people of the thar desert. increase in rainwater harvesting efforts across the nation have revived ancient water harvesting systems in rajasthan, such as the chauka system from the jaipur district. other large cities like pune, mumbai and bangalore all have varying rules for mandatory rainwater harvesting, especially in new buildings. in 2002, the municipal corporation of greater mumbai required all new buildings over 1000 square meters to have rainwater harvesting infrastructure. the law was expanded in 2007 to 300 square meters. the goal was to ensure buildings had enough water to last them through non-monsoon seasons. the process included a catchment system, an initial flush, and extensive filtering. as of 2021, the brihanmumbai municipal corporation (bmc) reported 3000 newly constructed or redeveloped buildings with rainwater harvesting infrastructure. however, many residents have complained that the stored water is contaminated, turning saline and brackish. experts and residents argue that bmc authorities have done little to take implementation seriously, and the actual effectiveness of the rainwater harvesting mandate is unknown. while rainwater harvesting in an urban context has gained traction in recent years, evidence points toward rainwater harvesting in rural india since ancient times. the type of system varied depending on the geography and culture of the region. himachal pradesh, for example, relied on kuhls, a community-owned rainwater irrigation system. maharashtra predominately used bhandara phads, a check dam which lowers the velocity of flow from rivers and reduces erosion. on the onset of british rule in the early 19th century, many of these systems were abandoned. environmentalists and scholars now believe that agricultural communities should revive ancient techniques to allow for rainwater harvesting to source the water needs of the community. sanitation in 2015, 44% had access to basic sanitation, or 65% in urban areas and 34% in rural areas. in 2017, at least basic sanitation increased to 59.5%. between 2014 and 2019, the government in india claims to have built around 110 million toilets, all across india, due to which the basic sanitation coverage went up from 38.7% in october 2014 to 93.3% in 2019. for years, most indians depended on on-site sanitation facilities which means mainly pit latrines in rural areas. the government has been investing heavily in building sanitation units, in a nation-wide campaign called the swachh bharat mission. between 2014 and 2020, the indian government managed to make household toilets accessible to over 99% of the population. this translates to a total of 110 million toilets build since 2014, according to statista. preceding this success is the success of the slum sanitation program in mumbai that has provided access to sanitation for a quarter million slum dwellers. sewage, where available, is often in a bad state. in delhi the sewage network has lacked maintenance over the years and overflow of raw sewage in open drains is common, due to blockage, settlements and inadequate pumping capacities. the capacity of the 17 existing wastewater treatment plants in delhi is adequate to cater a daily production of waste water of less than 50% of the drinking water produced. of the 892 million people in the world that defecate openly, some 15 million live in india, making it the country with the highest number of people who defecate in the open. this has serious public health implications. a specific indian problem is also the (officially prohibited) "manual scavenging" which is connected to the officially banned caste system, and relates to unsafe and undignified emptying of toilets and pits, as well as handling of raw, untreated human excreta.millions depend on the ganga river.as of 2003, it was estimated, that only 27% of india's wastewater was being treated, with the remainder flowing into rivers, canals, groundwater or the sea. for example, the sacred ganges river is infested with diseases and in some places "the ganges becomes black and septic. corpses, of semi-cremated adults or enshrouded babies, drift slowly by." in 2008, newsweek described delhi's sacred yamuna river as "a putrid ribbon of black sludge" where the concentration of fecal bacteria is 10,000 times the recommended safe maximum despite a 15-year program to address the problem. cholera epidemics are not unknown. based on a survey of human rights experts administered by the human rights measurement initiative in 2019, india is doing only 67.0% of what should be possible at its level of income on the right to water, and is performing at only 63.6% of what should be possible at its level of income on the right to basic sanitation. health impact