Do

Do I care?

When, I get up in the morning, collection of water is the last thing which comes in my mind. The only thing related to this aspect which bothers me is going downstairs and getting my bottle filled by landlady which takes maximum of 5 minutes and it really irritates me as I consider it a mindless job which I need to do everyday for my survival. And here I come to college and do literature survey for my M.Sc(Natural Resources Management) dissertation which is on ‘Right to information and access to water’, I find following horrifying facts:

The safest source of water which a lady in Ghana can think of is a muddy puddle and when you ask her about the health concerns, she answers, ‘it’s clean, even animals drink from the same source and I can’t see any winged animals inside. An additional fact that adds to my discomfort is, she travels some 1 Km or more to get this water everyday.’

She does not seem irritated.

In this initial phase of my dissertation, I really don’t know whether I’ll ever file an RTI to safe access to water. I think I am privileged but then lady in Ghana also thinks the same. I pity her from my frame of reference. Somebody must be pitying me from their frame of reference. It is all relative.

Imagine a day, when you get up, collection of water is the only task which you have to do and while going to bed you sleep with the fear or thought of tactics to collect water efficiently for the next day. The collection of water I am talking about here is not for the luxuries but only about drinking water for survival. (Water for hygiene excluded).

WHO, 2003 report divides the people based on water accessibility section into four parts, no access, basic access, intermediate access and optimal access. To my surprise though staying in a developing nation I fall into optimal access category. When I see the map representing the global water supply coverage, my country (India) is in the second worse group in terms of water supply and my continent (Asia) fairs the worse. Another fact says, poverty means degradation in quality of life which, to a large extent depends on water availability. Out of 1.3 billion people living in abject poverty, 70% are women. So here I am belonging to all the three affected categories.

Datas are not false, I am privileged. As, a normal middle class Indian, I don’t see my soul aim for a day being water collection. I am here staying in the national capital for past 6 years and with the kind of water accessibility I have I find it pretty ok. I feel dissatisfied only when I read about the level of water consumption in developed nations. Actually, I get jealous. I feel like entering into higher order of this privilege hierarchy.

However, the biggest dilemma which surrounds me is whether to think about entering the higher order of hierarchy or helping someone like lady in Ghana to enter a better level of hierarchy. I ponder everyday and I am happy that I have started to ponder.