The continuing insensitivity towards water and its judicious use will soon make it a rare commodity in India and many other South Asian countries. The eroding respect for water would lead the South Asian communities to an unmanageable disaster. Portentous signs and collective concern about forthcoming water-crises are now clearly visible in many parts of India. The per capita availability of water is believed to become less than 1,000 cubic metres compared to the current 1,950 cubic metres. The per capita availability of water was 5,000 cubic metres at the time of Independence when the population was only 350 million. Frequent water crises are now a regular phenomenon in Indian society. At least 30 per cent of the population in China, Indonesia and Mexico is expected to face severe water crises. Authorities in America, Canada, Germany and Israel have made it mandatory for citizens to harvest rain water by voluntary adoption of water conservation mechanisms.

About 2.5 billion Indian people would have no access to safe drinking water by 2010, according to experts. India will have to increase socio-political consciousness to consider water as an economic resource. Though the resolution of the Cauvery water dispute was indeed a landmark achievement, inter-State disputes over the sharing of water wealth still continue. Recently, Rajasthan requested the Centre to ask Punjab to give it its due share from the Indira Gandhi Canal Feeder. Undoubtedly, inadequacy to meet requirements of water will lead to disputes among the States. Kerala sought ten thousand million cubic feet of water from the Parambikulam Aliyar project controlled by Tamilnadu.

The greatest attitudinal flaw in the Indian masses is that they overexploit what is available to them in abundance until a crisis hits their lives. Water is no exception. The loss of respect for natural resources in the last few decades has compounded ecological problems. All the river systems suffer unchecked pollution due to unruly modern urban life. Half of the river systems are drying up due to expansion of industries polluting them. About 30 million litres of pollutants flow into major Indian rivers every day in the absence of environmental management of city garbage. The greater concern is the shifting of half of the global population to urban areas in the next five years.

Increasing human greed to extract the optimum from the benevolent Mother Earth has endangered the aquifers, which have been exposed to the harmful chemicals used in many forms by profit-oriented fertiliser manufacturers. There is no remedial mechanism to purify the groundwater reserve once it is polluted. A close study of the data supplied by the United Nations Environment Programme leads to the conclusion that geographical areas with less per capita availability of fresh water are expanding very fast. A section of the Chinese leadership has even gone to the extent of suggesting shifting the capital, Beijing, elsewhere apprehending chronic water shortage in the future. Such fears continue to be reported from many South Asian and European countries. Shrinkage of the Aral in the former Soviet Union is the best example of a man-made ecological disaster. In order to irrigate cotton fields, some insensitive planners diverted the course of rivers flowing into the sea. Of course, the yield of cotton crop now remains enviable but the Aral system suffered serious ecological problems. The growing water crisis in developing countries has turned out to be a potential business opportunity for the multinational companies.

The French multinational group, Vivendi, whose annual turnover exceeds $40 billion, is planning to enter the water selling trade in India. It has already taken up a waste management project in Chennai and a water treatment plant at Bangalore. Monsanto, which is already into seed, plant and bio-tech business is now bidding to monopolise the water sector, estimating that it would earn $68 million in the next six years from the water business in India and Mexico. Other MNCs endeavoring to dominate the global water trade mainly include SAUR (France), Enron(USA) and RWE(Germany), Thames Water (UK) and United Utilities (UK). Fresh water sources can no longer resist the growing biological pressure until revived and renovated with respect. India has only four per cent of the world’s freshwater resources, though its per capita water availability is still far better than Israel, Belgium and Singapore. Jaisalmer in Rajasthan receives only 100 mm rainfall but withstands drought conditions, thanks to the profound respect for water and the practice of the traditional wisdom of water harvesting of the desert inhabitants. Experts warn that the constant melting of the Himalayan glaciers would affect water supply across the South Asian region and, ironically, India has limited knowledge about the behaviour of glaciers.

A mechanism of providing facilities could well create a crisis unless modified to suit the changing perspective. Tubewells served people well but finally they proved disastrous for the groundwater reserve. Adoption of the National Water Policy is reflective of a national concern for equitable distribution of water and sustaining water resources for the future. Now it is up to the States to chalk out area-specific action plans. Many States have water policies of their own. Andhra Pradesh has banned sinking of borewells within 250 metres of existing street taps. Rajasthani people have done a heroic job in water conservation. The Government of Gujarat took up Sardar Patel Jal Yatras last year urging people to respect water and use it judiciously.

The most encouraging example comes from Madhya Pradesh where people donated Rs. 100 crore for construction of water harvesting structures under a widely acclaimed Pani Roko Abhiyan or Water Conservation Campaign last year.