India has something no other water-stressed country has: A billion people whose livelihoods and food security depend on reliable water access, the institutional ambition to act at scale, and a growing culture of corporate responsibility that can channel real capital toward solutions. And solutions are urgently needed. Groundwater — the resource that supplies 90% of India’s irrigation and 85% of its rural drinking water — is projected to reach dangerous depletion levels in 60% of India’s districts within 20 years. India accounts for one-quarter of groundwater demand globally, yet the resource remains poorly understood and unevenly managed. Water (Representational Image) The good news is that India also has every ingredient to set the global standard on water — the scale, the institutional ambition, and increasingly the capital. The foundations are already being laid. Tens of thousands of crores have flowed into water from government programmes, corporate CSR, and philanthropic investment. Check dams, recharge structures, rainwater harvesting — the sector’s energy is real. But the returns have not yet matched the commitment. The gap is not …