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Stretching over 2,500 kilometres and spanning 13 Indian states, the Indian Himalayan Region is home to nearly 50 million people. Agriculture, animal husbandry, and horticulture form the backbone of livelihoods here, all of which depend heavily on the region’s fragile water systems.
The Himalayas are the origin of three of Asia’s great rivers the Indus, Ganga, and Brahmaputra which are fed by glaciers, snowmelt, and monsoon rains. These rivers provide water for irrigation, drinking, and hydropower across vast plains downstream.
Glaciers and snowpacks act as natural reservoirs, particularly vital in the western Himalayas.
Mountain springs remain the sole water source for many mid-hill communities, though they are rapidly drying.
Hidden aquifers and glacial lakes offer underground and surface storage, critical for drinking water.
At the IWMI–Tata partners meet held in December 2025 in Anand, Gujarat, experts, policymakers, and researchers from came together to discuss the critical role of the Himalayas in sustaining life and livelihoods across South Asia in a session titled ‘Himalayan ecosystems, aquifers and livelihoods’. The session highlighted the immense ecological, hydrological, and social importance of the Indian Himalayan Region (IHR), while also sounding the alarm on the mounting pressures facing its water resources.
The first part of the session set the context for the emerging water challenges in the Himalayan region followed by discussions on the need for collaborative action and future directions to be undertaken to deal with the water challenges through the formation of the Himalayan Research Consortium. Speakers underscored how climate change, urbanisation, and land-use changes are straining Himalayan water systems.
Priyanka G, a researcher from International Water Management Institute IWMI provided a background to the emerging issues in the Himalayas by sharing her findings from an analysis of irrigation utilisation potential from the 5th to the 6th irrigation census. “Springs are drying, aquifers are depleting, and rural water is increasingly diverted to urban centers. While tubewells and borewells have expanded in foothill regions, the hilly terrain limits groundwater exploitation. Irrigation census data shows surface water remains dominant but has stagnated nationally, while groundwater remains underutilised in the mountains. How to develop irrigation potential in the mountains remains a challenge,” she said.
The participants for the session included experts from Centre for Ecology and Development and Research (CEDAR), ITC, Water For People, Tata Trusts and IWMI. The first part of the session included a presentation by Dr Rajesh Thadani from CEDAR followed by an open discussion.
Dr Rajesh Thadani argued that there was a need to look at the Himalayas from a different perspective than before in the context of the changing climatic, socioeconomic and demographic situation in the region. There was a need for:
Breaking the silos
A key theme was the need to move beyond siloed thinking. Dr Thadani said, “Mountains are fundamentally different than the plains. Even if we look at groundwater and surface water, its not a dichotomy as we see in the plains, in mountain ecosystems, groundwater and surface water are deeply interconnected, and interchangeable, snow and glaciers melt and change to surface water, it goes into aquifers and become groundwater, then gets out in the form of springs, and turns to surface water yet again, so there is no separation between the two” .
“We have been thinking of the Himalayas in a very siloed way. We started with the Swajal project that focused on drinking water supply and then moved to watersheds which were more about erosion control and infiltration of water into aquifers from where we moved to springshed management pioneered by ACWADAM that joined all organisations and players together. But can we tie all these efforts together?. There is a need to move away from a structured and siloed approach and look across geographies while understanding the Himalayas,” he added.
The session called for a continuum approach that recognised these linkages and integrated management strategies accordingly.
Beyond glaciers: Rivers, rainfall and the changing narrative
The Himalayas have often been viewed through a glaciocentric lens. However, the Himalayas have only 0.02 percent of the global ice, and snow and ice are important in some parts of the Himalayas, with the western rivers depending on them for their flows. However, rivers like the Ganga and Brahmaputra are largely rain-fed, with snow and ice contributing to their flows only in their upper reaches. This shift in understanding challenges long-held assumptions and demands new approaches to water management.
The rainfall paradox
Despite being a high-rainfall region, the Himalayas face acute water scarcity outside the monsoon. With 80% of rainfall concentrated in a few months, storage becomes a challenge. Constructing tanks is difficult in mountainous terrain, making springs indispensable as natural storage systems. Mountainous terrain and climate change induced intense rainfall is creating problems for infiltration in mountainous regions of the Himalayas and springs in the region are drying rapidly creating further challenges for water security in the region.
The Himalayas are changing, so should our approach
“ Dr Thadani added “It is important to understand that knowledge and issues in the Himalayan region are changing, locally and globally. The concept of mountain aquifers and springs has changed drastically in the last 20 years, and the one spring, one aquifer approach has expanded to take into consideration basin-level connections.”
Reviving springs and recharging aquifers
Treatment of recharge zones is often expensive and can offer temporary relief while long-term sustainability requires ecological restoration and community-led management. Solutions can include restoring native vegetation or forests to enhance infiltration and recharge aquifers.
Building partnerships to find solutions
While source sustainability is the key, water is much more than that. Different organisations have been exploring. But water is much more than that. How does the water get used? Partnerships are essential to find solutions by merging different perspectives together.
Floating the idea of the Himalayan Water Consortium, Dr Thadani emphasised the importance of people and organisations working at the grassroot level, working across different geographies on different issues like urban water supply, sewage management etc across the Himalayas to come together as a part of the Himalayan Water Consortium.
This open discussion included experts such as Shilpa Verma from IWMI, Divwang Waghela from Tata Trusts, Biswadeep Ghosh form Water For People and Prabhakar L from ITC who discussed the vision of a Himalayan Water Consortium a decentralised network that would share data, connect experts, scientists, environmentalists, and citizens, as well as global communities, and create workable models that can be scaled up in different parts of the region. Its mission would be to ensure source sustainability, improve water use efficiency, collect and share data to build evidence, and develop scalable models tailored to diverse Himalayan geographies.
Biswadeep Ghosh shared his experiences of working with the Participatory Groundwater Management initiative with Arghyam and its partners and the work on springshed management pioneered by ACWADAM that not only spread across the Himalayan regions and beyond, but also highlighted the importance and need to conserve springs in the mountain regions as they were the only crucial source of water supply for communities in the region. The effort led to major breakthroughs in involving communities in managing their springs, recognition of springs as important sources for water security in hilly terrains and the need to conserve them at the policy level and attaining water security through efforts made by different organisations in the mountain landscapes.
The effort also highlighted the need for more data on springs and the need for more dedicated funds to support institutional models for spring rejuvenation and water security in the mountain landscapes. Priorities which could be pushed forward through the consortium, which could build on these experiences from the earlier efforts were mentioned. He also highlighted the need to recognise the role of forests in water security and the need for incorporating payment for ecosystem services to understand the value of forests at the community level through the consortium.
Divyang Waghela from Tata Trusts pointed out that earlier experiences showed that the experiences and the level of springshed management that was done in different states was different, both in terms of political systems and maturity of civil society. The consortium would be a good starting point to meet this gap through capacity building of stakeholders and local institutions through sharing and collective action to make connections between science, policy and practice and help make changes at the policy level.
Prabhakar L from ITC reminded that the consortium idea was new to the Indian ecosystem and it was important to build awareness of funding partners and direct their attention to important issues needing intervention through the consortium. There was also a need to build a data base and inventory of efforts being made in different parts of the country and their successes and failures and also develop training and information material for capacity building as a part of the consortium.
Water storage and dryland agriculture in Uttarakhand
Arun Pandhi from P - Green Solutions highlighted the difficulties of water storage in rural Uttarakhand, where scattered land holdings and limited infrastructure constrain agricultural productivity. Cropping patterns are often dictated by water availability, and inefficiencies in storage and distribution lead to significant losses.
Lack of data on recharge and discharge potential of storage structures hampers planning.
Storage capacity remains limited, and distribution losses are common.
The study found that 20–40% greater efficiency is possible through improved soil moisture management and better use of available water resources on small plots.
Land use and land cover change in Jammu & Kashmir
Dr F A Shaheen from the Sher-e-Kashmir University of Agricultural Sciences and Technology of Kashmir in his presentation emphasised how urbanisation, tourism, and agricultural intensification are reshaping the delicate balance of wetlands, alpine lakes, pastures, and watersheds in Jammu & Kashmir.
Forest loss since 1960 has been driven by transport expansion, tourism inflows, and climate change.
Agricultural land has expanded, with farmers shifting from cereals to apples and fruits due to shrinking water resources.
Pastures and grazing lands have declined, affecting small ruminants.
Encroachment on lakes and water bodies has reduced freshwater areas, increasing flood risks and diminishing ecosystem services.
While these changes threaten ecosystems and livelihoods, the government is funding more research and investing in initiatives such as pollinator revival and springshed restoration.
Springs: Disappearing lifelines
Evidence on the status of springs in the Himalayas was shared by Vinod Kothari from Himmothan Society. Springs remain vital sources of water in the Himalayas, but they are disappearing at a rapid pace. Heavy rainfall events are increasing runoff, while data on springs is scarce. Community participation in springshed management and data collection is essential, especially as disasters intensify.
The case of Almora, once known as the “town of springs”, illustrates the crisis. With many springs dried, the town now depends on the Kosi River, whose discharge has also reduced. Springs feeding into streams that sustain the Kosi are being overused, leading to further drying and reduced baseflows.
Urban Water Challenges
Emerging evidence shows that urban areas in the Himalayas face complex water problems:
Reliance on lift irrigation schemes is growing, while traditional resilient systems are disappearing. thus traditional springs cannot be sole sources of water, but can support other sources of water in the region and need to be restored.
Multiple agencies manage water, leading to inefficiencies and high distribution losses.
Rising populations and shrinking sources exacerbate contamination and scarcity.
In the panel discussion that followed, community involvement emerged as a recurring theme. The example of the revival of Nainital Lake, supported by citizen-led efforts around Sukhtaal recharge structures, was discussed, demonstrating the power of collective action. Yet, participants acknowledged that participation is uneven.
While rural communities are changing, growing urban populations often depend on the state to meet their water needs. Experts stressed that springs will remain important but cannot be the sole solution. Complementary measures such as rainwater harvesting, wastewater recycling, and water budgeting must be integrated. To succeed, interventions must be designed differently — incentivising communities, democratising knowledge, and engaging youth who bring new perspectives and priorities.
The conference highlighted that Himalayan water challenges are deeply interconnected — spanning agriculture, ecosystems, urbanisation, and community dynamics. Addressing them requires not only technical solutions but also social innovation through empowering communities, restoring ecosystems, and rethinking governance. The future of Himalayan water security will depend on how effectively science, policy, and citizen action converge to sustain this fragile lifeline.