Haryana, Karnataka top states in wastewater management: Report

Haryana and Karnataka are the leading states in treated wastewater management across the country, according to a new study released on Tuesday.

In 2021, Indian cities produced over 72,000 million litres of used water (domestic sewage) daily, with only 28 per cent undergoing treatment. The remainder was discharged into natural water bodies, contributing to pollution in rivers and lakes during non-monsoon months.

The pollution burden is particularly concentrated in river stretches passing through urban areas, especially metropolitan cities. The study, conducted by the independent think tank, the Council on Energy, Environment and Water, aimed to develop the Municipal Used Water Management (MUWM) Index for urban local bodies in India to assess their performance in treated wastewater management.

To achieve this, 503 Urban Local Bodies (ULBs) from class I (population above 1,00,000) and class II (population of 50,000–99,999) cities in 10 Indian states — Andhra Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Gujarat, Haryana, Jharkhand, Karnataka, Madhya Pradesh, Punjab, Rajasthan and West Bengal — were selected. These states had already adopted a treated wastewater reuse policy before the launch of the National Framework on Safe Reuse of Treated Water (SRTW) in January 2023 by the National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG).

The selected ULBs were grouped into five categories — aspiring, promising, performing, leading, and outstanding — based on their index composite scores, with ‘aspiring’ representing the lowest and ‘outstanding’ the highest scores.

Surat and Bangalore topped the MUWM Index, with the formulation of a dedicated action plan for treated wastewater management being a key enabler of their noteworthy performance. Haryana and Karnataka secured the top two state ranks with scores of 1.94 and 1.74 out of 5, respectively. The CEEW report highlighted their comprehensive graded action plans for wastewater treatment and reuse.

Punjab and Rajasthan followed in third and fourth positions, scoring 1.71 and 1.57 out of 5, respectively.

In 8 out of 10 states, 85 per cent of the ULBs collectively fall under the promising and performing categories.

Jharkhand and West Bengal have nearly 90 per cent of ULBs belonging to these categories, the report said, suggesting significant progress in certain themes but acknowledging a long journey ahead for comprehensive used water management.

Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, and Andhra Pradesh occupied the bottom three positions, scoring 0.84, 1.01, and 1.07 out of 5, respectively. These states were noted for not providing compiled service-level benchmarking (SLB) performance reports in the public domain, as per Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs (MoHUA) directives, leading to a lack of available data affecting performance assessments and resulting in low state-wide performance on the MUWM Index.