India

Message from Mr.Rama Mohan Centre for World Solidarity

In response to my letter petition filed as PIL in Hon'ble Supreme Court of India as WP(C) 36/2009 on 13.02.2009 requesting measures to prevent fatal accidents involving children falling in abandoned bore wells, the court has given certain safety measures / guidelines to all the States and UTs in India on 11.02.2010.

USAID’s ECO-Asia program, a regional environmental program based in Thailand, has released a Request for Proposals (RFP) for Grants for Promoting Access to Urban Water and Sanitation Services.

Rajiv  Gandhi  National Drinking Water Mission, Department  of  Drinking  Water  Supply,  Ministry  of  Rural  Development, Government   of   India,  funds  research  and  development  project proposals  from established  institutions  and universities. The project must be related to rural drinking water and sanitation. Please see below the priority areas identified by the Department in respect to research and development in sanitation.

The Maternal and Child Health Sustainable Technical Assistance and Research initiative, known as MCH-STAR, is a multi-year project funded by USAID/India.

The Comptroller and Auditor General of India (www.cag.gov.in) is starting a performance Audit on "Pollution of ground water, lakes and rivers in India". CAG has invited citizens to point out specific problems / issue regarding water pollution affecting them or the environment.

Guest post by Mr. Chetan Pandit who works for the Central Water Commission, Government of India

This blog is a condensed version of the paper published in the 3rd Round Table on Sustainable Consumption and Production, organized by the Ministry of Environment and Forests jointly with UNEP, at New Delhi on 11-12 Feb 2010. The views expressed in this article are author’s personal views, and are not to be taken as the views of his employers.

In any discussion about Sustainable Development (SD) the quantity of consumption is invariably the main concern. Perhaps this stems from the original definition of SD as the “Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs", which invokes the spectre of insufficient quantities of resources at some time in the future. This concern is invalid for water, because water is a dynamic and renewable resource. Every hydrologic year brings a fresh packet of water. There is no way to use in this year, the rainfall that is yet to occur in the next year, or next decade. Moreover, any unused water will flow away to the oceans. The storages capacities, whether in surface storages or in aquifer, are adequate for one year only, at the most a little carry over for the next year. With many basins already reaching “water stressed” status, the problem at hand is how to supply the needs of this year, and there is no question of storing the water for future generations. Thus, in the context of water, quantity of water used should not be the primary concern for SD.

This policy brief, prepared by Manthan Adhyayan Kendra, provides a bird’s eye view of the privatisation and reforms processes in the country.