Vidhi Codex

section 2

Definitions.

The Maharashtra Groundwater (Development and Management) Act, 2009
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Chapter I PRELIMINARY

Statutory text
  1. (1) In this Act, unless the context otherwise requires,-
    • (i) "aquifer" means geological formation saturated with water below ground;
    • (ii) "Area of Influence" means the entire area beneath which groundwater or pressure surface contours are modified by pumping, which includes the area of pumping depression and area of diversion;
    • (iii) "artificial recharge to groundwater" means the process by which groundwater reservoir is augmented in excess of recharge under natural conditions of replenishment;
    • (iv) "Deep-Well" means a machine-made pit or hole, usually vertical, that derives groundwater from the pores, weathered strata, interstices, fractures or joints of the rocks or soils that it penetrates, and includes a bore-well, tube-well of normally sixty metre or of more depth, which taps one or more aquifers;
    • (v) "District Authority" means the Authority appointed under section 17;
    • (vi) "District Watershed Management Committee" means the District Watershed Management Committee constituted under section 18;
    • (vii) "drinking water purposes", in relation to the use of water, means consumption or use of water by human population for drinking and for other domestic purposes such as cooking, bathing, washing, cleaning and other day - to - day activities, and includes consumption of water for similar such relevant purposes for live-stock;
    • (viii) "Empowered Committee" means the Empowered Committee specified under section 15;
    • (ix) "Expert Bodies" means the Central or the State Government organizations, institutions or agencies and private sector and non-government organizations, accredited by the Central Government or the State Government or the State Authority, working in the groundwater sector;
    • (x) "Government" or "State Government" means the Government of Maharashtra;
    • (xi) "groundwater" means water existing in an aquifer below the surface of the ground in the zone of saturation which can be extracted through wells, borewells, tubewells or any other means or emerges as springs and base flow in streams and rivers;
    • (xii) "Groundwater Surveys and Development Agency" means the Groundwater Surveys and Development Agency, under the Water Supply and Sanitation Department of the Government;
    • (xiii) "hydrological year" means the year which starts from the 1st day of the month of June and ends on the 31st day of the month of May, every succeeding year;
    • (xiv) "Integrated Watershed Development and Management Plan" means an Integrated Watershed Development and Management Plan prepared under sub-section (2) of section 9;
    • (xv) "non-notified areas" means areas other than the notified areas;
    • (xvi) "notified areas" means areas included in over-exploited or critical or water quality affected watershed or aquifer or any such categorization as per the groundwater estimations carried out, based on the guidelines issued, from time to time, by the Central Government and State Government, which have been notified by the State Authority for regulation of extraction of groundwater after following the procedure indicated in section 4;
    • (xvii) "Panchayat" means a Panchayat established or deemed to have been established under the 1Bombay Village Panchayats Act, 1958 (Bom. III of 1959); (xviii) "Panchayat Samiti" means a Panchayat Samiti constituted under the Maharashtra Zilla Parishads and Panchayat Samitis Act, 1961 (Mah. V of 1962);
    • (xix) "prescribed" means prescribed by the rules;
    • (xx) "Public Drinking Water Source" means a source from which the State Government or a local authority or such other authority as the State Government may, by notification in the Official Gazette specify, provides water to the public and includes such well, borewell, tubewell or any other drinking water source as may be notified by the District Authority;
    • (xxi) "Public Water Supply System" means the structure relating to a public drinking water source, including conveying pipelines, storage reservoir, stand posts, cisterns, hand pump, power pump and all other materials connected thereto, through which water is supplied for drinking water purposes;
    • (xxii) "rain water harvesting" means the technique of collection and storage of rain water on surface or in sub-surface aquifer or other structures; (xxiii) "recharge worthy area" means area favourable for groundwater recharge and storage, as delineated by the Groundwater Surveys and Development Agency;
    • (xxiv) "rules" means the rules made under this Act;
    • (xxv) "sand mining" means the process of the actual removal or extraction of sand from the foreshore including rivers, streams, lakes, etc., and also the coastal areas;
    • (xxvi) "sink" means, with all its grammatical variations and cognate expressions, in relation to a well, includes digging, drilling or boring of a new well or an existing well, deepening and modification of radials and galleries of the existing wells; (xxvii) "stakeholders of the area" means the authorities, corporate bodies and persons concerned with the planning, development, regulation and management of groundwater and uses thereof; (xxviii) "State Authority" means the State Ground Water Authority established under section 3;
    • (xxix) "State Watershed Management Council" means the State Water Council constituted under section 16 of the Maharashtra Water Resources Regulatory Authority Act, 2005 (Mah. XVIII of 2005);
    • (xxx) "Talathi" means revenue functionary at the level of village or group of villages;
    • (xxxi) "urban local bodies" means a Council constituted under the Maharashtra Municipal Councils, Nagar Panchayats and Industrial Townships Act, 1965 (Mah. XL of 1965), and a Municipal Corporation constituted under the Mumbai Municipal Corporation Act (Bom. III of 1888) or 1the City of Nagpur Corporation Act, 1948 (C.P. and Berar II of 1950) or 2the Bombay Provincial Municipal Corporations Act, 1949 (Bom. LIX of 1949); (xxxii) "user of groundwater" means the person or persons or an institution including a company or an establishment, whether Government or non-Government, Water Users' Association, Groundwater Users' Association, Industrial Users' Association, co-operative society registered under the Maharashtra Co-operative Societies Act, 1960 (Mah. XXIV of 1961), Panchayat, Private Bulk Users, Public Registered Bodies, etc., or any other group of community, who or which extracts and uses or sells groundwater for any purpose including domestic, industrial or agricultural purposes; (xxxiii) "water scarcity area" means an area declared as such by the District Authority under section 25; (xxxiv) "watershed" means an area confined within the topographic water divide line, as identified and notified by the Groundwater Surveys and Development Agency, from time to time, having regard to the purposes of this Act;
    • (xxxv) "watershed or aquifer based groundwater use plan" means the groundwater plan prepared by the Watershed Water Resources Committee or Panchayat, with the technical assistance of the Groundwater Surveys and Development Agency, which indicates the groundwater status or levels in the watershed or aquifer and includes the water account and water budget of both recharge and withdrawal of groundwater of the area during the hydrological year; (xxxvi) "Water Resources Act" means the Maharashtra Water Resources Regulatory Authority Act, 2005 (Mah. XVIII of 2005); (xxxvii) "Water User's Association" means a Water User's Association formed at minor level or above, which represents the users of irrigation water from that segment of any project, canal or natural flow or storage system; (xxxviii) "Watershed Water Resources Committee" means the Watershed Water Resources Committee constituted under section 29; (xxxix) "well" means a well sunk for the search or extraction of groundwater by a person or persons and includes open-well, dug-well, bore-well, dug-cum-bore-well, tube-well, filter point, collector well, infiltration gallery, recharge well, disposal well or any of their combinations or variations, excluding the structures sunk by the authorised officials of the Central or the State Government for carrying out scientific investigations, exploration, augmentation, conservation, protection or management of groundwater.
  2. (2) Words and expressions used and not defined in this Act but defined in various irrigation or water resources or other related Acts in the State, in force shall have the same meanings as respectively assigned to them in those Acts.

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