Passage - 2

How best can the problems of floods and droughts be addressed so that the losses are minimal and the system becomes resilient? In this context, one important point that needs to be noted is that India gets ‘too much’ water (about 75% of annual precipitation) during 120 days (June to September) and ‘too title’ for the remaining 245 days. This skewed water availability has to be managed and regulated for its consumption throughout the year.

Question: Which one of the following best reflects the practical, rational and lasting solution?

The correct option is: Buffer stocking of water through dams and recharging aquifers.

Explanation:

The passage highlights a major water management challenge in India: skewed water availability. Specifically, India receives about 75% of its annual precipitation within a short window of 120 days (June to September), leaving the remaining 245 days of the year with "too little" water. The core problem is managing and regulating this highly concentrated seasonal water supply so that it can be consumed sustainably throughout the year, thereby minimizing the losses from both floods (too much water at once) and droughts (too little water later).

To address this problem in a practical, rational, and lasting manner, we must look at solutions that directly store excess water during the high-precipitation months and release or utilize it during the dry months:
1. Buffer stocking of water through dams: This captures the surface runoff during the 120 days of heavy rainfall, acting as a buffer that can be released systematically during the remaining 245 dry days.
2. Recharging aquifers: This stores water underground. Underground aquifers prevent evaporation losses, which are extremely high in tropical regions like India, and ensure long-term, decentralized water availability while replenishing groundwater tables. This combination makes the entire water system resilient against both floods (by absorbing excess water) and droughts (by retrieving stored water).

Why other options are less suitable:
- Constructing huge concrete storage tanks and canals across the country: This is financially and environmentally impractical at a national scale, and concrete tanks do not assist in natural ecological restoration or aquifer recharge.
- Changing the cropping patterns and farming practices: While helpful for demand-side management, this does not directly solve the supply-side issue of physical water storage and regulation of floodwaters.
- Interlinking of rivers across the country: This is a highly complex, capital-intensive, and long-term engineering proposal with significant ecological and political challenges, making it less immediate and practical compared to localized dam buffering and groundwater recharge.