The report on the sixth census on small irrigation projects was made public by the Ministry of Jal Shakti. According to the research, there are 23.14 million minor irrigation (MI) schemes in the nation, of which 21.93 million use groundwater and 1.21 million use surface water. For the first time, information regarding the gender of the MI scheme owner was also gathered in cases where there was individual ownership. 18.1 percent of all privately held schemes are owned by women.
The majority of MI programmes are located in Uttar Pradesh, which is followed by Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, and Tamil Nadu. The GW schemes are ranked in the same order as the states. Karnataka, Telangana, Odisha, and Jharkhand are the next states to implement SW programmes after Maharashtra. The report also showed that there have been 1.42 million more MI schemes than there were in the previous census.