Some experts claim that the next world war is going to happen for the possession of water and water bodies, what the public who extensively share this through social media fail to understand is that war never means a border line conflict involving weaponry and genocide.
War can essentially be any hostile situation that results in the damage of everything around it. It can be in a stock market or with a dealer or just the driver who brings the water in a tanker. The truth is that we are too afraid to accept the fact that we have dug our own grave and that too a large one in the same place where once there were lakes, and so we wait for a war to start in order to understand the value of water.
Bengaluru, the garden city, has been under rapid growth since the 90’s and has tripled in size, area and much more in the number of people living there. It is also called as the Silicon Valley of India and it is said that silicon does not react to water but this city and its people do. People who can’t pay their way out have to stand in long queues and wait for the tanker. But recently, even the people who could pay for it are facing problems as borewells have reached around depths of 1500 feet and have started to dry up, creating a rift between demand and supply, which makes the students living in Tavrekere, HSR Layout and Whitefield worried.
The fact that Bengaluru expects an increase of about 8 million in the next 10 years raises
serious infrastructural problems. Firstly, it starts with finding a suitable place to live in the city with basic amenities. Providing these facilities is another problem but finding the resources to carry out these building projects is tough as the steel and cement industries are the most water intensive ones. Secondly, the city not been planned in the greatest manner and the Cauvery river which provides water for two-thirds of Bengaluru also has limits on its
usage as per the Supreme Court. Moreover, this river also provides to other states like Tamil Nadu and Telangana which makes it even more difficult to accept it as our primary source for water.
On one hand our neighbouring state Kerala is in floods and Bengaluru is facing a water crisis despite of 970mm of rainfall a year which is a significant amount. The obvious solution to this fact is ‘rainwater harvesting’ and the Bengaluru Water Supply and Sewage Board (BWSSB) has been collecting around 12 crores in taxes from 1.2 lakh households as a penalty for not installing a rainwater harvesting system, but still 80% buildings in Bengaluru don’t have such a system. This is not about giving time to the public to implement such a system otherwise it would have been more than 6 lakh households harvesting water which
can get them through at least four to five months a year, but it is about prioritising their focus on a sustainable system rather than fighting to draw water from a dam 425km away which costs exactly 1000 times the fine that the households are paying right now. This is the same authority we are talking about which was successful in putting a helmet over every two-wheeler driver and a seatbelt on every four-wheeler one.
Speaking of four-wheeler, most of the new societies or buildings that are coming up are
solely responsible on water tankers for their supply. This raise a thousand questions of the reliability of the system but the biggest problem is still the human element. This circumstance gives the dealer of the tanker service complete autonomy to set higher prices where an average household spends about Rs.3000 monthly on water. These dealers can cut off their supply anytime, discriminate amongst the buildings and give excuses which the people have to accept because they have no other choice. This also implies that even though fossil fuels, which are much higher on the scarcity scale compared to water, we are ready to use up huge amounts of petrol to run the trucks here and there to ensure water supply which again speaks to the opportunity cost of the solution.
The truth is, we might find the most ideal solutions of all but it would still do no good if we are not trying to implement it. Rainwater harvesting is an excellent solution and the step by Govt. to fine for not using this system is also relevant but they should do this on a larger scale city-wide.
The pipelines installed by Govt. for crores of rupees should be maintained as there are leakages during transportation which not only is a wastage of water but also the pressure inside the pipes to pump water to the required places reduces, rendering it completely useless.
We might think of temporary solutions like cloud seeding which is essentially how Saudi
maintains at least 100 cm of rainfall, but the state is not a victim of lack of rain but one of
These were the larger and more expensive solutions which can prove to be long term but what about the neglected ones which we see but don’t get alarmed by like the water that is leaked out of the trucks during transportation. If the Govt. is fining customers then it only makes sense that they cap both ends of the business transaction, that is, the dealers of thesetankers. They should include hefty fines for not maintaining the hygiene or the condition of
the tankers. It is evident that they will get some way around these penalties but it will be a start and would help to understand and develop the regulations.
The effects of global warming and climate change are alarming and we blame machines and deforestation for it but water also has a significant role in temperature regulation. More the number of water bodies that evaporate and more the number of buildings that come up subsequently are directly proportional to the amount of heat as metal heats up quickly and without enough moisture to cool it down, the temperatures around start rising.
Desperation and necessity is what gets people running and a threat to the economic status gets the world leaders running. Water is a requirement in each and every factor of business may it be man, machine, raw materials, land or even printing the green paper. Rules and regulations may make people retaliate but the threat of an economic loss is what they can neither resist nor do they want to face one. If they can understand the value of water themselves, then we can correct the human element of this disaster.
India is moving towards a paperless society, I think as the IT hub of this country, we should be the first and the most successful ones to embrace this idea. “Water is the elixir of life”, it is true but is incomplete. “Water is the elixir of all life”, is more appropriate as in theory sea creatures were one of the earliest known beings and although we haven’t even explored even 50% of our oceans but ISRO, sitting right here in Bengaluru launched the Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) which had one of its objective to trace out water in Mars. If that doesn’t tell us the value of water, then in my opinion nothing can. No piece of fact, evidence or literature can convey the urgency of our situation, but if we can find a reason to make it urgent for us, then maybe this situation will improve over time.
A Write Up by,
Jaideep Jayaprakash,
Christ University, Hosur Road
War can essentially be any hostile situation that results in the damage of everything around it. It can be in a stock market or with a dealer or just the driver who brings the water in a tanker. The truth is that we are too afraid to accept the fact that we have dug our own grave and that too a large one in the same place where once there were lakes, and so we wait for a war to start in order to understand the value of water.
Bengaluru, the garden city, has been under rapid growth since the 90’s and has tripled in size, area and much more in the number of people living there. It is also called as the Silicon Valley of India and it is said that silicon does not react to water but this city and its people do. People who can’t pay their way out have to stand in long queues and wait for the tanker. But recently, even the people who could pay for it are facing problems as borewells have reached around depths of 1500 feet and have started to dry up, creating a rift between demand and supply, which makes the students living in Tavrekere, HSR Layout and Whitefield worried.
The fact that Bengaluru expects an increase of about 8 million in the next 10 years raises
serious infrastructural problems. Firstly, it starts with finding a suitable place to live in the city with basic amenities. Providing these facilities is another problem but finding the resources to carry out these building projects is tough as the steel and cement industries are the most water intensive ones. Secondly, the city not been planned in the greatest manner and the Cauvery river which provides water for two-thirds of Bengaluru also has limits on its
usage as per the Supreme Court. Moreover, this river also provides to other states like Tamil Nadu and Telangana which makes it even more difficult to accept it as our primary source for water.
On one hand our neighbouring state Kerala is in floods and Bengaluru is facing a water crisis despite of 970mm of rainfall a year which is a significant amount. The obvious solution to this fact is ‘rainwater harvesting’ and the Bengaluru Water Supply and Sewage Board (BWSSB) has been collecting around 12 crores in taxes from 1.2 lakh households as a penalty for not installing a rainwater harvesting system, but still 80% buildings in Bengaluru don’t have such a system. This is not about giving time to the public to implement such a system otherwise it would have been more than 6 lakh households harvesting water which
can get them through at least four to five months a year, but it is about prioritising their focus on a sustainable system rather than fighting to draw water from a dam 425km away which costs exactly 1000 times the fine that the households are paying right now. This is the same authority we are talking about which was successful in putting a helmet over every two-wheeler driver and a seatbelt on every four-wheeler one.
Speaking of four-wheeler, most of the new societies or buildings that are coming up are
solely responsible on water tankers for their supply. This raise a thousand questions of the reliability of the system but the biggest problem is still the human element. This circumstance gives the dealer of the tanker service complete autonomy to set higher prices where an average household spends about Rs.3000 monthly on water. These dealers can cut off their supply anytime, discriminate amongst the buildings and give excuses which the people have to accept because they have no other choice. This also implies that even though fossil fuels, which are much higher on the scarcity scale compared to water, we are ready to use up huge amounts of petrol to run the trucks here and there to ensure water supply which again speaks to the opportunity cost of the solution.
The truth is, we might find the most ideal solutions of all but it would still do no good if we are not trying to implement it. Rainwater harvesting is an excellent solution and the step by Govt. to fine for not using this system is also relevant but they should do this on a larger scale city-wide.
The pipelines installed by Govt. for crores of rupees should be maintained as there are leakages during transportation which not only is a wastage of water but also the pressure inside the pipes to pump water to the required places reduces, rendering it completely useless.
We might think of temporary solutions like cloud seeding which is essentially how Saudi
maintains at least 100 cm of rainfall, but the state is not a victim of lack of rain but one of
lack of initiative to tap it. We just think about harvesting rainwater as tapping what falls from above but due to heavy infrastructural development water does not seep in the ground but actually goes through the drainage out into the rivers and lakes, dirtying the source as well. So, on the one hand we are using up all the clean water and on the other, dirtying the other potential sources. One of the solutions to this could be installing nets at the mouth of the concrete pipes just before the water is let into open spaces. This will help to collect all the
trash and garbage in the net which could be used for composting after segregation and this also simplifies the process of cleaning the rainwater that runs through these pipes.These were the larger and more expensive solutions which can prove to be long term but what about the neglected ones which we see but don’t get alarmed by like the water that is leaked out of the trucks during transportation. If the Govt. is fining customers then it only makes sense that they cap both ends of the business transaction, that is, the dealers of thesetankers. They should include hefty fines for not maintaining the hygiene or the condition of
the tankers. It is evident that they will get some way around these penalties but it will be a start and would help to understand and develop the regulations.
The effects of global warming and climate change are alarming and we blame machines and deforestation for it but water also has a significant role in temperature regulation. More the number of water bodies that evaporate and more the number of buildings that come up subsequently are directly proportional to the amount of heat as metal heats up quickly and without enough moisture to cool it down, the temperatures around start rising.
Desperation and necessity is what gets people running and a threat to the economic status gets the world leaders running. Water is a requirement in each and every factor of business may it be man, machine, raw materials, land or even printing the green paper. Rules and regulations may make people retaliate but the threat of an economic loss is what they can neither resist nor do they want to face one. If they can understand the value of water themselves, then we can correct the human element of this disaster.
India is moving towards a paperless society, I think as the IT hub of this country, we should be the first and the most successful ones to embrace this idea. “Water is the elixir of life”, it is true but is incomplete. “Water is the elixir of all life”, is more appropriate as in theory sea creatures were one of the earliest known beings and although we haven’t even explored even 50% of our oceans but ISRO, sitting right here in Bengaluru launched the Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM) which had one of its objective to trace out water in Mars. If that doesn’t tell us the value of water, then in my opinion nothing can. No piece of fact, evidence or literature can convey the urgency of our situation, but if we can find a reason to make it urgent for us, then maybe this situation will improve over time.
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| Image Source: www.kannadigaworld.com |
A Write Up by,
Jaideep Jayaprakash,
Christ University, Hosur Road
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