Water Woes...

Its a shame that a country that aspires to be the next super power still has a tough time in providing water to its citizens. Indeed its a sad commentary on the state of civic amenities in the country. Any nation that wants to be among the elite nations has to put good civic amenities in place because for a lay man what matters more is getting his share of drinking water more than a double digit growth rate of the economy.

The recent cauvery verdict sparked of incessant mud-slinging from both sides of the river but such reactions are like 'missing the tree for the woods'. We have missed the whole point in doing this,which is that we are still in the middle-ages viz. our water facilities and need to jump into the 21st century. Ok we have a billion people whose thirst has to be quenched and its a mammoth task but the same constraint apply to China as well and she is coping up well with the problem so there is no reason why we shouldn't.

It really confounds me how the rivers of north and east India keep flooding year after year and at the same time we in the south struggle for every drop of water. A practical solution would be to link these rivers thereby solving two problems with a single solution. But as always the political will is lacking and this sane idea has got lost in the rhetoric of RealPolitik.

As all aspects in India even this problem has got politicized and conveniently hijacked by the powers-that-be. What we need at the moment is a comprehensive water policy which lays stress on inter-river linkages,rain water harvesting and other such progressive methods of eradicating an age-old problem. In the absence of such a policy we are going to have to put up with inter-state river disputes for years to come.