The census provides data on access to drinking water sources in urban and rural areas. The data are used by government departments to assess the status of water supply in India, and by researchers to understand access to water sources across regions and among different sections of society. Census 2011 reports that 30.8% of households in rural India access taps for drinking water, and the Ministry of Drinking Water and Sanitation (MDWS) uses this as an indicator of piped water coverage (Government of India 2013). While “access to taps” is the terminology used by the census, “piped water coverage” is the terminology used by the MDWS. The ministry aims to cover 90% of rural households with piped water supply by 2022, at 70 lpcd (litres per capita per day), which includes both potable and non-potable water. In this article, we point out aspects that should be considered while interpreting decadal census data on rural water, drawing upon different components of the census data itself, and a year-long fi eld study conducted in 2013–14 covering 518 households in 16 villages around Bengaluru in Karnataka. First, we show that there are discrepancies in data on water sources between house listing data and village amenities data, both from the 2011 Census for the 16 villages that we surveyed. Second, we discuss whether census data on access to taps can be used as an indicator of piped water coverage. Third, we look at the reliability of data collected from households related to treated water.