Jaipur’s Public Health Engineering Department has begun preparing a Jaipur water crisis plan nearly five months before the next peak demand season, bringing forward its usual planning cycle amid concerns over water scarcity across Rajasthan. The department has sought division-wise proposals on local requirements, vulnerabilities and possible solutions before the summer supply pressure intensifies.
PHED officials said summer contingency planning normally begins around February for the March-June peak season. This year, the department has started the process before Diwali, describing the move as an early response to the state’s water scarcity. The department has also changed how the plan will be prepared, seeking inputs from engineers who manage household supply at the local level.
Instead of relying primarily on broad district-wise plans, PHED has asked engineers in each division to identify specific requirements and risks. Each PHED district is divided into circles, which are further divided into divisions. Engineers in these divisions oversee day-to-day household water supply and will now submit proposals based on conditions in their respective areas.
Once the proposals are received, PHED will analyse them, prepare contingency plans and issue work orders, according to officials quoted by The Times of India. The department has not announced the final list of works or a completed funding plan in the information available so far.
In Jaipur, one proposal under consideration is greater use of groundwater to supplement water supplied from Bisalpur Dam. Possible measures include increasing tubewell capacity and connecting additional groundwater sources to existing pipelines. Officials said groundwater quality would be monitored by chemists around the clock before the water enters the supply network.
The proposed groundwater measures come as PHED has noted a substantial rise in Jaipur’s groundwater level over the past two years, citing reports from the groundwater department. The department is considering whether that improvement can provide additional support to the city’s drinking water system during the summer, although the reported rise does not by itself establish how much water can be sustainably extracted or for how long.
PHED officials said the current storage level in Bisalpur Dam is not alarming. However, the department has recently brought several new localities, particularly in the Prithviraj Nagar division, under Bisalpur supply. The expansion has increased the number of areas dependent on the network and is expected to add to pressure during the high-demand months.
The early planning exercise therefore combines two operational concerns: the need to manage demand across an expanding supply network and the possibility of using local groundwater to supplement the main source. Its division-level format is intended to identify differences between local systems before summer begins, rather than preparing a single broad response for each district.
PHED’s immediate next steps are to collect proposals from divisional engineers, assess the submitted requirements and vulnerabilities, finalise contingency plans and issue work orders ahead of the March-June peak season. The department’s final measures for Jaipur will become clearer after that process is completed.
