Chennai: Averring that time has come for the people to realise the gravity of the water situation, Vice President M Venkaiah Naidu has called for a nation-wide campaign on water conservation and urged each citizen to become a water warrior in saving every drop of water.
It is time for everyone to realize the gravity of the situation and adopt water-saving measures at the earliest or else the world would face severe water shortage in the future, he said in his virtual address at the Mission Paani’s Jal Pratigya Diwas event in Chennai.
Stressing the need for taking collective action to avert a major water crisis. Naidu lauded the initiative by News 18-Harpic and called it a step in the right direction.
Noting that only 0.5 per cent was available for drinking of the three per cent of freshwater that was available on earth, the Vice President said “India has more than 18 per cent of the worldâs population, but has only four per cent of the worldâs renewable water resources”.
Citing a UN report, he said around 2.2 billion people currently did not have access to safely managed drinking water and around 4.2 billion, or 55 per cent of the worldâs population, were currently living without safely managed sanitation.
Drawing attention to the adverse effects of water scarcity on women and children, Mr Naidu said women spend over 200 million hours every day to fetch water from distant places.
Sharing the burden with their mothers, globally children spend 200 million hours each day for collecting water, he added.
Pointing to some of the factors leading to water crisis, the Vice President said “rapid urbanization, growing population, expanding industrial and agricultural activities, indiscriminate drilling of borewells, climate change and careless use of water are some of the factors leading to water shortages.”