The Peshwa Nahar System: Sustainable Water Management in the Past and for the Future

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DOI:

https://doi.org/10.58981/bluepapers.2025.1.08

Keywords:

Pune, heritage, aqueduct, smart systems, water management system

Abstract

Urban water infrastructure in India is currently focused on technocratic solutions, often disregarding sociocultural and environmental values. This article examines the eighteenth-century Peshwa-period nahar (aqueduct) system in Pune, within the broader context of three centuries of urbanization. Developed as part of the 2023 professional education course Water Systems Design: Learning from the Past to Design Resilient Water Futures, it employs the value case methodology and the framework of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to highlight ecosystem-based thinking reflecting traditional knowledge systems. Although today the nahar system is no longer functional, the authors argue that it can inform future design thinking and offers an important example for initiatives like India’s Smart Cities program, offering a sustainable water management approach by integrating ecological and sociocultural values in infrastructure planning.

How to Cite

Mulay, R., & Gokhale, P. (2025). The Peshwa Nahar System: Sustainable Water Management in the Past and for the Future. Blue Papers, 4(1), 118–29. https://doi.org/10.58981/bluepapers.2025.1.08

Published

2025-07-09

Issue

Vol. 4 No. 1 (2025): Water & Heritage for Sustainable Development

Section

methodologies and case studies

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Copyright (c) 2025 Radhika Mulay, Pallavee Gokhale

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Author Biographies

Radhika Mulay, Indian Institute of Science Education and Research

Radhika Mulay has an MSc in Water Science, Policy and Management from the University of Oxford (UK). She began working as an environmental researcher at Kalpavriksh, Pune, on an activist-academic research project called ACKNOWL-EJ. From 2020 to 2022, she worked as a researcher at the Gomukh Trust in Pune and was one of the authors of the book The Heads and Tails of Ganga River – the Cryosphere and the Delta, published by INTACH-Delhi. Currently, she is based at the Centre for Water Research, IISER-Pune, where she is exploring interests in the field of water research.

Pallavee Gokhale, Pratt Institute

Pallavee Gokhale holds a PhD in humanities and social sciences from IISER Pune. Her research involved interdisciplinary approaches for the interpretation of archaeological data. She holds postgraduate degrees in archaeology from Deccan College, Pune; in GIS-remote sensing from the University of Greenwich, UK; and in indology from TMV, Pune. She has 12 years of professional experience in geospatial technologies and software quality engineering.

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