Dr. Samanpreet Kaur Baweja, Principal Scientist in the Department of Soil and Water Engineering, specializes in groundwater resource assessment, irrigation management, climate change impact studies, and groundwater modeling. She played a key role in drafting Punjab’s State Irrigation Plan and Water Policy and is recognized for site-specific groundwater recharge solutions, IoT-based water management, and canal water filtration systems. She received the prestigious Jawaharlal Nehru Award (ICAR) for her work on climate change, agriculture, and the water-energy nexus in Punjab.

Dr. Baweja has led ten projects (including two international) as PI/Co-PI, currently serving as PI for a National Hydrology Project (NHP) and Co-PI for a DST-funded geospatial lab. She is also associated with All India Coordinated Project on Irrigation Water Management and Precision Farming Development Centre. She has published 80+ peer-reviewed papers, 17 conference papers, 6 book chapters, 30 popular articles, and co-authored an award-winning book on climate change. She got trained at Ohio State University, was visiting faculty at the University of Guelph, and actively mentors B.Tech, M.Tech, and Ph.D. students. She also serves as Secretary, ISAE Punjab Chapter.

Professional Accomplishments

Research Projects:

• Establishment of field stations for measuring ET and Soil Moisture funded by NRSC, Hyderabad (PI)
• Establishment of a State of Art Geospatial Lab funded by DST (Co-PI)
• Canal Water Quality Assessment for Artificial Groundwater Recharge in Punjab (Co-PI)
• All India Coordinated Research Project on Irrigation Water Management ( Associated Scientist)
• Establishment of Precision Farming Development Centre ( Associated Scientist)

Research Publications:

1. Das S, Kaur S and Sharma V (2024). Determination of threshold crop water stress index for sub-surface drip irrigated maize-wheat cropping sequence in semi-arid region of Punjab. Agricultural Water Management, 301, 108957.
2. Cutting N G, Kaur S, Singh M C, Sharma N and Mishra A (2024). Estimating crop evapotranspiration in data-scarce regions: A comparative analysis of eddy covariance, empirical and remote-sensing approaches. Water Conservation Science and Engineering, 9(2), 65.
3. Shah A I, Siag M, Kaur S, Thaman S and Sharda R (2024). Designing and evaluating the performance of full-scale bioretention cells in Indian conditions. Water Conservation Science and Engineering, 9(1), 2.
4. Singh A, Cutting N G, Kaur S and Biwalkar N (2025). Assessing groundwater quality and suitability for agricultural use in Punjab, India: A spatial and temporal analysis. Environmental Monitoring and Assessment, 197(2), 1–31.
5. Shukla P, Siag M, Kaur S and Thaman S (2025). Development and evaluation of paddy straw and wheat chaff filter socks for sediment control in surface runoff. Urban Water Journal, 22(2), 223–235.
6. Thakur B, Kaur S, Verma V K and Biswas A (2025). Geostatistical evaluation and network optimization for precision groundwater resource mapping and management in Punjab State, India. Hydrogeology Journal, 1–19.

Awards and Recognition:

• Jawaharlal Nehru Award for Outstanding Doctoral Research in Natural Resource Management
• MS Randhawa Best Book Award (2018)
• NAIP Fellowship for training at Ohio State University under Dr. Rattan Lal (2014)
• Visiting Faculty, University of Guelph (2021–2022)
• Reviewer for international journals: Arabian Journal of Geosciences, GeoHealth, Journal of Water Management