Rajat Banerji | April, 2002

Thousands of citizens formed a human chain along the ghats of Varanasi to demarcate World Water Day on March 22, and India's spiralling water crisis. By 2025 we could run out of fresh water altogether, writes Rajat Banerji.

If you want a glass of uncontaminated water in India, it'll cost you.

	Dr. Veer Bhadra Mishra (center, wearing garland) is leader of the Campaign for a Clean Ganga (picture is from last year's chain)

Because not less than 90 per cent of India's water resources are polluted by untreated industrial effluents, untreated sewage, and agricultural runoff. And in a country heavily dependent on rivers like the Ganga (Ganges), not one of them has been cleaned up in the 54 years since Independence.

No wonder around 200 million Indians lack access to safe and clean water. When this figure is broken down, the scenario becomes even more bleak - 45 million Indians are affected by water problems caused by pollution, excess fluoride, arsenic, iron or salt.

Human and material costs are astronomical. The country loses more than 200 million workdays annually costing USD 8.3 billion because of waterborne diseases. Ultimately, India's fresh water resources are likely to be exhausted by 2025, at the present population growth rate.

The human chain is an annual event in Varanasi in the early morning hours on World Water Day (picture is from last year's chain)

Anybody doing anything about it?
The simple answer is: not much.

The National Water Policy was formulated in 1987 and has been adopted only in April 2002!. Even in the organised sector - where municipalities ensure safe treated water - cost recovery is abysmal. In the agriculture sector, easily the largest user, the cost factor is so deeply enmeshed in the political miasma that a solution seems beyond reach.

India has 16 per cent of the world's population, 2.45 per cent of the world's land area and only 4 per cent of global water resources. Central Pollution Control Board estimates that of 22.9 billion litres a day of sewage, only 5.9 million litres or 3 per cent is treated before discharge. The scenario isn't much better in industry. Of the 8,432 large and medium-sized industries in the country, 4,989 have installed effluent treatment facilities. Most of the 2 million small industries haven't even tried.

Some 21 per cent of all communicable diseases in India are waterborne. The World Health Organisation (WHO) estimates that almost one million Indian children die because of drinking unsafe water, which is often the result of poor sanitary conditions. Other recent estimates put this mortality figure at 1.5 million.

The problem isn't just lack of access to water, but also the degradation and depletion of water ecosystems, lakes, rivers and wetlands. In 15 states with major metros, underground water levels have been falling by 5 per cent. By 2015, some may dry up entirely because of over-exploitation and misuse. Haryana, Punjab, Bihar, Orissa, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Gujarat are listed by the Central Groundwater Board as areas at risk.

	More than 10,000 citizens formed a human chain along the historic ghats of Varanasi on World Water Day last year. The event is organized by the Campaign for a Clean Ganga (picture is from last year's chain)

The bigger picture
In South Asia, more than 2 billion people lack proper sanitation, and some 830 million people lack access to safe drinking water. Some 80 per cent of rivers in India and China are too toxic to support fish. Most governments in this region do not have an environmental, administrative, institutional or legal mechanism for better water management.

Globally, the scenario isn't much brighter. More than 300 million people in the African subcontinent lack reasonable access to safe water. An estimated US $ 100 billion must be invested annually to address the global water crises.

School going children in Australia, link arms on World Water Day, March 22nd 2002.

This is because 1.3 billion people lack safe drinking water, and 2.4 billion must subsist without basic sanitation. A joint report by WHO, UNICEF and Water Supply and Sanitation Collaborative Council (WSSCC) states that 6,000 people die daily of waterborne diseases such as diarrhoea.

"Surely this is an alarming figure," says Dr Gourishankar Ghosh, Executive Director of WSSCC. "Improved sanitation, in conjunction with safe water supply can immediately improve the situation."


Sensible solution
While efforts are underway to tackle this problem from the lower end, another approach is to reduce consumption - the mother of all ills. The per capita usage in Germany is only 30 per cent of what it was 20 years back. The consumption by the average German is 125 litres per day as compared to the 300-400 litres by the citizen of the United States.

Urban centres in the developing world have no choice but to carefully examine success stories such as Germany's, in order to rationalise the use of water. In the Indian context, developments such as water harvesting need to be encouraged and implemented. Instances of water pollution- whether domestic or agricultural or industrial - have to be reduced. Water usage, especially by the agricultural sector, needs rationalisation.

This is by far the greatest challenge any Indian government will ever face.

Rajat Banerji is an environmental researcher and journalist based in New Delhi