In Chennai, I installed rain-water harvesting system in place over 10 years ago, much before our former CM, late Ms. Jayalalithaa, made it mandatory for buildings to have rainwater harvesting facilities installed at the time of construction itself. I live in Sankar Nagar, Pallavaram, an area that is in the valley of surrounding hills. When I moved in here in 1996, there were only 120 independent plots and less than that many houses. Since I installed the rain-harvesting system, the water table is getting charged well, and my well, which is only about 18-20 feet has water most of the year around. I have a borewell which is about 110ft deep and so far that's been giving water without trouble. However, last year, 2017, for the first time, I had to buy two tanker-loads of water because there was a severe shortage of rain last year, during summer. In 21 years of staying at Sankar Nagar, and 29 years of staying in Chennai, last year was the first time that we bought water!!! Now, my area, Sankar Nagar is also getting filled with flats - nearly 1000 flats have been built in the area by Appasamy builders in the last 5 years. The water problems pointed out by Ms. Seema are genuine and grave. But many solutions have been suggested - one of the best being what late Dr. Abdul Kalam said about linking rivers. If done carefully and with proper plan (and most importantly honestly, without corruption!!), it can divert water that floods states like Bihar during monsoons to water-starved regions of Orissa and Tamil Nadu and same may be said for other states too. Dr. Abdul Kalam did a brilliant presentation to the Bihar assembly when Nitish Kumar invited the then President to address the assembly. I don't think Bihar state leaders knew how many water bodies, rivers and lakes were there in Bihar; but Abdul Kalam was meticulous in his presentation. I should say, I am disappointed with the present BJP government too; despite having a great mandate, the government has failed to address adequately this grave concern of the country as a whole. My suggestions are as follows: 1. The first and foremost thing, we MUST CURTAIL OUR POPULATION GROWTH!! I know, unlike China where the one-child policy for about 20 years has substantially lowered population growth, in India such regulations cannot be brought in. But citizens must take it as their service to the nation and curtail the number of children every family has. There being a limitation on all our economic resources, population cannot grow indefinitely 2. The next thing is for the government to fast-track river linking projects, taking into account all environmental aspect into consideration. Ideally, rivers must be made national assets and brought under a central regulator, and avoid all these centuries-long fight going on between states that don't want to help each other. Water must be made available where it is most needed. 3. Every citizen must take it upon himself/herself to install pipes to harvest rain water and make sure all water goes underground and not just flow out on the roads or finally into the sea 4. All western inventions like shower, washing machines, dishwashers, western toilets with flush tanks, etc., etc., are all water guzzlers!!! I am not saying we should not have all these. Let's carefully manage all these things at our homes to minimize water consumption.
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