BANGALORE: The Ministry of Water Resources has come up with a draft of the National Water Policy 2012. Addressing delegates and other stakeholders, Joint Secretary of Ministry of Water Resources Sudhir Garg spoke about the salient features of the draft. “The draft has been prepared after much deliberation by a completely unbiased panel. The draft identifies the key concerns, evolves basic principles and arrives at a basic draft policy recommendation. There is an immediate need for National Water Framework Law,” said Garg.
The draft highlights that a provision should be created for setting up of water regulatory authority and adequate water pricing to incentivize recycle and reuse. On being questioned about whether the increasing water wastage in the country would be accounted for - representatives from the ministry said they would look at the possible solutions. The total annual wastage of water from Bangalore amounts to 400 mld. While about 75 percent of this waste water is collected, Bangalore has a capacity of saving and working on only 290 mld of wasted water. Overall almost around 9275 mld of water is wasted in India and only about 80.6 percent is collected. The rest that is wasted amounts to crores of rupees that is uncollected.