1 Introduction
India’s federal water governance is defined by its distinct arrangements as laid out
by the Constitution. Water governance is practised as an exclusive domain of states,
though the states’ powers are subject to the Centre’s powers over interstate river
regulation and development. The Centre’s role remains critical for three broad
reasons.
First, due to the states’ presumed exclusive powers and dominant executive
powers, India’s long-term water security is determined by the cumulative outcome
of the states’ actions—their own strategies and approaches to water governance.
The Centre must play an anchoring role to ensure long-term national water security.
Second, India’s ambitious development goals are increasingly located into the
realm of interstate river development and regulation: meeting irrigation development needs, river rejuvenation, inland navigation, interlinking of rivers, etc. These
plans locate the Centre’s role in an imagery of intricately woven interdependent
hydro-geographies.
Third, the emerging conditions of ‘water crisis’ and new challenges in water
governance, including climate change, raise questions about India’s long-term
water security. The ‘crisis’ is manifested and unravelled as inequities in access,
competitive interests between sectors and states, depleting groundwater levels,
deteriorating water quality, etc. Besides climate change, new and emerging challenges include disasters and degrading river ecosystems and ecologies. These
conditions and challenges reiterate the Centre’s key role in anchoring states’
development interests towards the long-term water security interests of the country.
In contrast to assuming this central and vital role, the Centre has relegated itself
to interstate river water dispute resolution—the record of which is not too inspiring.
Yet, the national water policy discourse continues to assume Centre’s leverage over
states’ approaches to water governance (NWP 1987, 2002, 2012). This is reflected
in repeated instances of national policy-making without adequate attention to the
means of implementing or ‘giving effect’ to these policies. The most visible means
of making it possible, as the discourse goes, is through reworking fiscal transfers
and using them as a leverage, especially through the specific-purpose intergovernmental financial transfers (IGFTs). The 15th Finance Commission (FC15)’s
terms of reference (ToR) include the possibility of performance-linked IGFTs.
Perhaps, the NITI Aayog’s ranking of states’ water governance performance
through the Composite Water Management Index (CWMI) too reflects this thinking
(NITI Aayog 2018, 2019).
This chapter attempts to carry out a reality check and to critically analyze the
tenability of such assumptions. It seeks to examine the Centre’s ability to influence
states’ water governance regime by looking at its historical role in water resources
development and management in India vis-à-vis the states. Specifically, the chapter
explores the budgetary allocations and fiscal transfers between the Centre and states
to discuss the former’s leverage in pursuing developmental and long-term water
security goals.
166
S. Chokkakula and P. Prajapati
India’s federal water governance is defined by its distinct arrangements as laid out
by the Constitution. Water governance is practised as an exclusive domain of states,
though the states’ powers are subject to the Centre’s powers over interstate river
regulation and development. The Centre’s role remains critical for three broad
reasons.
First, due to the states’ presumed exclusive powers and dominant executive
powers, India’s long-term water security is determined by the cumulative outcome
of the states’ actions—their own strategies and approaches to water governance.
The Centre must play an anchoring role to ensure long-term national water security.
Second, India’s ambitious development goals are increasingly located into the
realm of interstate river development and regulation: meeting irrigation development needs, river rejuvenation, inland navigation, interlinking of rivers, etc. These
plans locate the Centre’s role in an imagery of intricately woven interdependent
hydro-geographies.
Third, the emerging conditions of ‘water crisis’ and new challenges in water
governance, including climate change, raise questions about India’s long-term
water security. The ‘crisis’ is manifested and unravelled as inequities in access,
competitive interests between sectors and states, depleting groundwater levels,
deteriorating water quality, etc. Besides climate change, new and emerging challenges include disasters and degrading river ecosystems and ecologies. These
conditions and challenges reiterate the Centre’s key role in anchoring states’
development interests towards the long-term water security interests of the country.
In contrast to assuming this central and vital role, the Centre has relegated itself
to interstate river water dispute resolution—the record of which is not too inspiring.
Yet, the national water policy discourse continues to assume Centre’s leverage over
states’ approaches to water governance (NWP 1987, 2002, 2012). This is reflected
in repeated instances of national policy-making without adequate attention to the
means of implementing or ‘giving effect’ to these policies. The most visible means
of making it possible, as the discourse goes, is through reworking fiscal transfers
and using them as a leverage, especially through the specific-purpose intergovernmental financial transfers (IGFTs). The 15th Finance Commission (FC15)’s
terms of reference (ToR) include the possibility of performance-linked IGFTs.
Perhaps, the NITI Aayog’s ranking of states’ water governance performance
through the Composite Water Management Index (CWMI) too reflects this thinking
(NITI Aayog 2018, 2019).
This chapter attempts to carry out a reality check and to critically analyze the
tenability of such assumptions. It seeks to examine the Centre’s ability to influence
states’ water governance regime by looking at its historical role in water resources
development and management in India vis-à-vis the states. Specifically, the chapter
explores the budgetary allocations and fiscal transfers between the Centre and states
to discuss the former’s leverage in pursuing developmental and long-term water
security goals.
166
S. Chokkakula and P. Prajapati