Oil and water, we have often been told, don't go together. But Uma Bharti doesn't believe in such old axioms. She is happy to mix the two.

The minister for water resources is not well, so I am ushered into her bedroom in her government bungalow in central Delhi for our meeting. I find her sitting cross-legged on her bed, vigorously oiling her hair.

She looks alarmed when she sees me. "I hope you are not going to take my photograph," she asks. I assure her that I have no such plans, and she asks me to take a plastic chair placed near her bed. She is going to carry on oiling her hair as she speaks, she warns me.

So, of course, I ask her about the water scarcity that many parts of the country are reeling under. Immediately, her attention veers from the oil in her hand (in a pink bottle) to the subject at hand.

"Water always fascinates me," she says, her face suddenly aglow. She narrates the steps that her ministry has taken to tackle the worst drought in decades, which has affected over 330 million people in 10 states. "Actually the drought situation is not that bad. This is because of the initiatives taken by each and every government of the drought-affected states," she adds.

But didn't the Supreme Court recently slam the governments of Haryana, Bihar and Gujarat for their "ostrich-like attitude" to the calamity and call on the Centre to set up a drought fund?

"Whatever the state governments could do, they did," she says. "The central government also did not leave any stone unturned and provided relief to the people with water trains, etc.," she adds.

Yet, farmers in Maharashtra, Punjab and Telangana are committing suicide, I point out. Around 400 farmers have taken their lives in the Marathwada region alone.

The minister stresses that she has held a meeting with the Maharashtra government and asked it to prepare two special packages - one for suicide-prone districts and the other for drought-hit districts.

"Farmers are committing suicide because they are not able to pay debts and meet the increase in the cost of cultivation," she replies. "I have requested the state governments to reach out to indebted farmers who have no other source of income. The state governments should take an initiative to provide water to their fields. I am holding such meetings with governments in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh," she says.

Bharti then holds forth on the steps undertaken under the Centre's Accelerated Irrigation Benefits Programme to provide central loan assistance to irrigation projects. "We have shortlisted 99 such projects across the country. Once all the projects are completed, they will have the capacity to irrigate 8 million hectares of land. This is the best way to tackle drought," she holds.

Bharti, 57, has held many portfolios over the years. In Atal Bihari Vajpayee's government, she dealt with human resource development, youth affairs and sports, tourism, and coals and mines. She was also the chief minister of Madhya Pradesh for a spell.

But water, she insists, is her special area of interest.

"Since my childhood, I have always loved water and I am very happy here. I think I have some inherent expertise in this field," she says. "This ministry has brought me a lot of challenges and joy, too."

What worries her is the wastage of water because of "crude" irrigation technology. "We have told the state governments that till 2017 they can use the old technology in which water goes through canals. But come 2020, they have to go for pressure technology, with which we will be able to save 60 per cent of water. Water is now wasted because of seepage through the canals," she says.

States with low water tables have been asked to change their crop patterns. She also has plans to recharge groundwater. "For that we need aquifer mapping of the whole country. Then we can recharge the groundwater by tapping rainwater," she explains.

Bharti doesn't want any credit for these "revolutionary ideas" - for behind every smart move is Prime Minister Narendra Modi. "All this is because of the Prime Minister. His thinking is so radical that we have all got inspired by his ideas. He is a great person. He will bring in great changes."

Modi and Bharti weren't the best of friends some years ago, when she had called him Vinash Purush, or a destroyer. But much water, clearly, has flown down the Ganga since then.

The minister, who also holds the portfolio of river development and Ganga rejuvenation, is currently involved with the government's ambitious river-linking project.

"We have identified 31 links across the country. If we can create all the links, we can irrigate 35 million hectares of land and also generate 34,000 megawatt of power," she says. The rivers in the links cut across Maharashtra, Gujarat, Odisha, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Uttar Pradesh and Haryana. The project, she adds, will be completed in seven years.

But it hasn't been smooth sailing, the minister concedes. "Don't think just because the Prime Minister says so they (the states) agree. It does not happen that way. I had to make them sit together and then reach an understanding."

Did she speak with the Bangladesh government which has expressed concern over the river-linking plan, fearing it may be denied its share of water flowing from the Himalayas if the ambitious proposal goes through?

"The Prime Minister has asked me categorically not to touch international boundaries. The five links are the ones that we are going ahead with," she says. "Once the river-linking project is complete we will be able to turn 100 per cent agricultural land into irrigated land and the country's GDP will be the No.1 in the world."

That sounds good. As does Uma Bharti's pledge to make the Ganga one of the 10 cleanest rivers in the world within the next two years. Right now, it is one of the most polluted rivers.

"The challenges I face are because of the country's urban planning, which is against the rivers. People believe rivers are for their dirty water; they think the rivers are a drain. All the chemical effluents, the sewage, everything goes into the river. Now I have to reverse the whole process. Our main agenda is not to allow sewage water or chemical or industrial effluent to go into the Ganga."

Other rivers will follow suit. "I wanted to create a model. Once the Ganga planning is over I will start on the Yamuna," she says.

The minister says that she is so focused on the river cleaning project that she can hardly devote any time or thought to issues such as the elections in Uttar Pradesh, slated to be held next year.

"If my party asks me to campaign for 10 or 15 days, I'll do so. But I am so engrossed in thoughts about cleaning the Ganga and facing the drought that I cannot think of anything else," she says.

How does she expect her party - the Bharatiya Janata Party - to fare in UP? "The BJP will definitely do well considering the responses we got at the Prime Minister's Saharanpur rally (held to mark the government's second year in power last month). More than three lakh people gathered to listen to the PM in that heat."

The voters, she holds, have had enough of the Samajwadi Party's regime of corruption and crime. They cannot forgive the Bahujan Samaj Party, she adds, for indulging in corruption during its reign. And the Congress, she holds, is nowhere.

"The Congress has to realise that they are a party of the past in this country. The BJP is the party of the present and the future," the minister asserts.

Bharti's strength, clearly, is her eloquence. Indeed, for someone who has studied up to Class VI, her linguistic prowess is commendable. But then it was this felicity with words - the ability to recite the Hindu scriptures - that won her prominence when she was a child growing up in Madhya Pradesh in a peasant family. Soon the young girl had come to the notice of Gwalior's Vijayaraje Scindia, who was a member of its erstwhile royal family and later a prominent BJP leader.

"Rajmata used to treat me like her daughter. She gave me a car and allowed me to stay in her house in Gwalior," she recalls.

Uma Bharti, who has penned three books - Swami Vivekananda (1972), Peace of Mind in Africa (1978) and Manav Ek Bhakti ka Naata (1983) - has another project in mind.

"I now want to write a book on Narendra Modi. But I need to go on vacation to write that. I don't have even a single moment to spare now," she says.

She looks at the grandfather clock and exclaims, "I have already given you 50 minutes. Angrezi bolne se mera sir dukhta hai (I get a headache when I speak in English)."

As I leave, I see her reaching for her bottle of oil again.