In these, private tanker truck operators transport water extracted from peri-urban wells to urban consumers. This study adopted a systems modeling approach to analyzing the informal tanker market in India. The results indicate that the demand for tanker supply was caused by lack of groundwater availability in private wells as well as unreliable piped supply. The study shows that two groundwater factors are relevant: depth to water and aquifer productivity. Together, these could explain the difference in spatial, temporal and consumer-specific variations in tanker dependence.