Govt sweats to achieve water goal

washington — The standard of drinking water in India has improved in the last five years but a lot of work still remains to be done, the head of the World Water Council has said.

World Water Council (WWC) recently carried out a major survey on water awareness in major parts of the world, including India.

The survey was done ahead of the 8th World Water Forum that is scheduled to take place in the Brazilian capital Brasilia in March 2018. As per the survey, more than one-third of Indians think that not enough is being done to achieve the UN’s sustainable development goals to make water and sanitation for all a reality by 2030, World Water Council president Benedito Braga said. “There has been some work done in the past five years to improve the drinking water standards in India. Of course, there’s still a lot of work to do there,” Braga said.

Braga said more than three quarters of the Asians were convinced that governments need to lead the fight to make global access to safe drinking water and sanitation reality. According to the survey, 31 per cent of Indians said they had been in a situation where it was unsafe to drink water but they had no other choice and suffered from diseases like diarrhoea and gastroenteritis.

A majority (71 per cent) of Indians said that safe drinking water had improved over the last five years. The survey stated that 62 per cent of the Indians said they believed that the government was doing enough to support access to safe drinking water.