#SaveWater4CoronaCare; PRCI, NatConnect launch joint campaign

• Focus on vanishing wetlands, too

MUMBAI: Aligning itself with the UN-driven World Water Day being observed on March 22, communicators’ national body Public Relations Council of India (PRCI) and environment NGO NatCnnect Foundation have launched a campaign to save water for corona care, while addressing the issue of vanishing wetlands and the increasing menace of effluents.

“Such events involve group meetings and gatherings, but in view of the COVID-19 threat across the world, we cancelled our ground events and launched online campaigns to increase awareness about saving water,” said B N Kumar, director of NGO NatConnect Foundation.

“We also seek to focus attention on the need to take preventive care against the deadly virus by regularly washing hands with clean water,” said M B Jayaram, PRCI Chairman Emeritus and Chief Mentor.

"Moreover, when we are faced with climatic change conditions, we firmly believe that conservation of water will help us fight the crisis, as the UN campaign stresses" he said.

The World Water Day website says Climate delay is almost as dangerous as climate denial.  Every country in the world must work more quickly. Extreme weather events are making water more scarce, more unpredictable, more polluted or all three.

It is in this context that the online campaign #SaveWater4CoronaCare assumes significance.  

The campaign also speaks about the need to increasingly use recycled or STP treated water for non-potable purposes and even toilet flushing and conserve precious drinking water, said Kumar.

Governments and civic bodies should also take rain water harvesting and charging the ground water seriously, Jayaram said.

Another environment focused NGO Shri Ekvira Ari Pratishtan has also joined the campaign calling for saving wetlands “as our national treasure” and maintain ground water tables.  “We need to save wetlands and village water bodies which are being wiped out due to urban and infrastructure development. Wetlands do help in maintain ground water tables and our so-called planners take pleasure in their short-sighted approach of filling the water bodies under the guise of development,” said Nandakumar Pawar, head of Shri Ekvira Ari Pratishtan.