The Monsoon-Fed Rivers of Maharashtra: Their Hydrogeomorphic Characteristics and Management

Intensity, Frequency and Coverage of Hydro-Meteorological Droughts and Agriculture in the Semi-Arid Region of Maharashtra (India)

“…Although the groundwater resource facilitates to ful ll the domestic and livestock water requirements during the drought condition, it cannot buffer the water scarcity for more than two years (Pavelic et al 2012; Udmale et al 2014a). With a declining trend in monsoon rainfall (Kale et al 2014), the runoff volume over the Upper Bhima Basin (including the present study area) is observed to be reduced during the recent decades (Biggs et al 2007). Such changes in water resources to some extent may be attributed by human interventions in river basins (Todmal 2019).…”

“…On account of high annual mean temperature (~ 22°C) and notably high rate of evapotranspiration, the study region experiences annual water de ciency between 800 and 1100 mm (Todmal 2019a). As all the rivers in Maharashtra are rainfed, the selected rivers display ephemeral or intermittent character (Kale et al 2014). During the non-monsoon season as well as during the below-normal monsoon years, the availability of water in streams, aquifers and reservoirs declines remarkably and poses a serious threat to agricultural productivity, livelihoods and the rural economy.…”

“…3c). On account of increased surface storage structures in the semi-arid region of Maharashtra during the last three decades (Todmal 2016; Biggs et al 2007), the marginal amount of runoff generated during the below-average monsoon rainfall year could not reach the downstream discharge gauging sites (Kale et al 2014). Therefore, the ENSO induced minor decrease in rainfall (SPI > -1.0) resulted in severe to extreme runoff droughts (SRI < -1.0).…”

“…Particularly, the semi-arid region of Maharashtra (about 83% of the area) frequently experiences water scarcity problem (Deosthali 2002; Sikka et al 2016). As the monsoon rainfall mainly determines the water resources in the semi-arid region of Maharashtra, the meteorological de cits are responsible for remarkably low or nil discharges in the rivers (Kale et al 2014) and below-average groundwater levels (GSDA 2014; Gokhale and Sohoni 2015; Pavelic et al 2012) which lead overexploitation of sub-surface water resource (Limaye 2010). Although the groundwater resource facilitates to ful ll the domestic and livestock water requirements during the drought condition, it cannot buffer the water scarcity for more than two years (Pavelic et al 2012; Udmale et al 2014a).…”

“…Such changes in water resources to some extent may be attributed by human interventions in river basins (Todmal 2019). Although the relationship between El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) and monsoon rainfall at the all-India level become weak (Kumar et al 1999;Shewale and Kumar 2005), the ENSO phenomenon considerably affects the monsoon rainfall (Takle and Pai 2020; Rishma and Katpatal 2016; Todmal and Kale 2016), runoff (Kale et al 2014) and groundwater (Wable and Jha 2017; Janga Reddy and Ganguli 2012; Rishma and Katpatal 2019) in different parts of Maharashtra. However, the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) is another ocean-atmospheric phenomenon that explains rainfall variability in western India (Ashok and Saji 2007;Todmal 2019).…”