Thousands of years ago, the rishi of a famous Ayurveda text

named Bhavaprakash stated that Water is life to creatures

Jivanam jivinm jivaha. In Sanskrit, there are 70 synonyms for
water. One of them is jivanam life. Why is water so central to
religious life? Water is a symbol of God and of life, as well as a
means of cleansing. It is a powerful purifying element and can
destroy evil and enemies. The shared belief is that water is a
mystically powerful element that, being connected with God in
some way, can cleanse inner and outer defilement, regenerate
the human mind, body, spirit, and ensure the fertility of the
land. You are 60% water. Save 60% of YOURSELF.
Little wonder that the ancient peoples of the world preferred to
settle

around

river

basins,

lakes

and

other

sources

of

freshwater. Some of these civilizations included those along the

mighty Saraswati and Ganga in India, the Tigris and Euphrates
in Mesopotamia and the Nile in Egypt and northern Africa. A
perennial source of freshwater for ancient man meant that he
could stop his incessant foraging for food and instead settle
down to produce crops through agriculture and irrigation. This
also left him with spare time for higher pursuits such as art,
music and religion.

Water, thou hast no taste, no color, no odor; canst not be

defined, art relished while ever mysterious. Not necessary to
life, but rather life itself, thou fillest us with a gratification that
exceeds the delight of the senses. Antoine de Saint-Exupery
Surface water and groundwater are important elements of the
earths hydrological cycle. Surface water includes rivers, lakes
and glaciers. Groundwater remains one of the least-studied and
most difficult water resources to determine. Water is used in
agriculture (irrigation), by industry (as a cooling and heating
agent) and for domestic purposes (drinking, personal hygiene,
washing, recreation, etc.). Nowadays, water waste and water
pollution are quite serious problems that may bring mankind to
the brink of catastrophe. Since we all use water, we are all
responsible for saving it. The two basic principles behind
maintaining water resources are: conservation and protection.
SAVE WATER Dont waste the worlds blood.
I am sharing a story of a man who changed life of Alwar
people by adopting and implementing conventional
Indian methods to conserve water.

Rajendra Singh (born 6 August 1959) is a well-known water

conservationist

from Alwar

district, Rajasthan in India.

Also

known as "waterman of India", he won the Stockholm Water

Prize, an award known as "the Nobel Prize for water", in 2015.
Previously, he won the Ramon Magsaysay Award for community
leadership in 2001 for his pioneering work in community efforts
in water harvesting and water management. He runs an NGO
called 'Tarun Bharat Sangh' (TBS), which was founded in 1975.
The NGO based in village Kishori-Bhikampura in Thanagazi
tehsil, near Sariska Tiger Reserve, has been instrumental in
fighting the slow bureaucracy, mining lobby and has helped
villagers take charge of water management in their semiarid area as it lies close to Thar Desert, through the use
of johad, rainwater storage tanks, check dams and other timetested as well as path-breaking techniques.
Alwar district, which once had a grain market, was at the time
largely dry and barren, as years of deforestation and mining
had led to a dwindling water table, minimal rainfall followed by
floods. Another reason was the slow abandoning of traditional
water conservation techniques, like building check dams,
or johad, instead villagers started relying on "modern" bore

wells, which simply sucked the groundwater up. But consistent

use meant that these bored wells had to be dug deeper and
deeper within a few years, pushing underground water table
further down each time, till they went dry in ecologically fragile
Aravalis. At this point he met a village elder, Mangu Lal Patel,
who argued "water was a bigger issue to address in rural
Rajasthan than education". He chided him to work with his
hands rather than behaving like "educated" city folks who
came, studied and then went back; later encouraged him to
work on a johad, earthen check dams, which have been
traditionally used to store rainwater and recharge groundwater,
a technique which had been abandoned in previous decades.
As a result, the area had no ground water since previous five
years and was officially declared a "dark zone". Though
Rajendra wanted to learn the traditional techniques from local
farmers about water conservation, his other city friends were
reluctant to work manually and parted ways. Eventually with
the help of a few local youths he started desalting the
Gopalpura johad, lying neglected after years of disuse. When
the monsoon arrived that year, the johad filled up and soon
wells which had been dry for years had water. Villagers pitched

in and in the next three years, it made it 15 feet deep. These

facilitated a rise in the groundwater levels and helped turn the
area into a "white zone".
Anything else youre interested in is not going to happen if you
cant breathe the air and drink the water. Dont sit this one out.
Do something. Carl Sagan