The plains of western Uttar Pradesh sit above one of the most intensively used aquifer systems in the world, and that aquifer is being drawn down. In situ observations indicate that the western part of the state and adjoining districts have lost tens of cubic kilometres of groundwater in under two decades, a decline corroborated by satellite gravity data and driven by a surge in deep tube wells, intensive irrigated cropping, reduced canal recharge, and drought-diminished rainfall. This paper synthesises the evidence for this silent drawdown in the Ramganga basin and the upper Ganga doab and proposes a framework for its sustainable management. It argues that the depletion is the outcome of a specific transition, from a canal-fed system that recharged the aquifer to a tube-well-fed system that mines it, and that management must therefore act on both sides of the water balance: reducing the demand that empties the aquifer and restoring the recharge that once refilled it. The framework combines demand-side measures, principally a shift away from the most water-intensive crops and a reform of the energy incentives that drive over-abstraction, with supply-side measures centred on reviving canal and surface-water recharge and developing managed aquifer recharge, and it binds these together through participatory groundwater governance. The framework is illustrated for the Ramganga basin and doab and is set within the water-energy-food nexus that the region so clearly embodies.
groundwater depletion; Upper Ganga Basin; tubewells; canal recharge; water-food nexus; western Uttar Pradesh
Saurabh Singhal. The Silent Drawdown: Groundwater Depletion in the Ramganga Basin and Upper Ganga Doab, and a Framework for Sustainable Management. Indian Journal of Modern Research and Reviews. 2026; 4(7):290-293
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