Watery grave

The Karnataka government’s plan to set up a ₹5,912 crore multi-purpose dam across the Cauvery at Mekedatu, some 110 km from Bengaluru, is a spectacularly bad idea. The point is not whether Tamil Nadu, which has moved the Supreme Court to stay the Centre’s permission, will be deprived of its due share. The problem lies in the very conception of the project — meeting the drinking water needs of Bengaluru and Ramanagaram district. In order to meet the demands of a city of about 8.5 million that does little to conserve its water resources, about 2,500 acres of forests will be submerged. The Karnataka government has blithely said that no environmental clearance is required for a drinking water project — which shows that politicians remain indifferent to the disruptive consequences of large-scale deforestation.

The reliance of urban sprawls on water that is stored and transported across long distances must stop. Instead, cities must invest on conserving their water bodies, storing rainwater, recycling waste water and addressing the phenomenon of ‘unaccounted water’. Water utilities need to generate resources to meet rising water needs. Bengaluru’s lakes should be cleaned by setting up sewage treatment plants. But for that its citizens must pay the right price for water. As water experts have pointed out, there is no reason why a household which pays a monthly electricity bill of, say, ₹3,000 should cough up just a few hundred rupees for water. Recycling water costs money, but if Israel, Singapore and even Namibia are doing it in a big way, not just for non-potable use but also for drinking, so can we. Unaccounted water, too, is a problem of utilities not having the funds to maintain its decrepit infrastructure.

Urban India has been pampered for too long. Rather than focus merely on ‘environmental awareness campaigns’, water should be priced rationally so that it is conserved and recycled. That would effectively rule out alarming ideas such as Mekedatu.

A SrinivasSenior Deputy Editor

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