Although we tend to think of oil as perhaps the world’s most valuable liquid resource, the real truth is more likely that water is.
While oil may help us transport ourselves and our food around the world, water is necessary for us to live—we need to drink it, we need it to grow crops for food and animals and we need it for sanitation purposes. Generally speaking, we take the idea that water is readily available in America for granted.
Though it goes without saying, this is often not the case in many parts of the world.
If you take the global view, water access is a serious worldwide problem.
According to research from the World Water Council, nearly 1.1 billion people don’t have regular access to clean water. Beyond that, 2.6 billion people don’t have access to healthy and clean sanitation services. Both of these are clearly intertwined problems, often caused by extensive water pollution. While pollution is a global issue primarily caused by huge industries, there are still some things we can do locally to help.
This story of a man in India shows that reality all too clearly.
It all started when 26-year-old Ramveer Tanwar went back to visit some of the lakes and ponds he used to play in when he was a kid.
Needless to say, he was shocked at what he discovered. When it all began, Tanwar saw that the local wetlands and all of those lakes were seriously polluted. Instead of using them as a play area or a real water source, people had been using them as a dumping ground for their garbage. Because he was so unhappy with what he found, he took it on himself to talk to the villagers about how they could change the situation.
Unfortunately, the initial talks didn’t go as well as he’d planned.
Although people in the village perhaps wanted things to be different, the process of teaching them different habits was difficult.
Tanwar started by trying to reach the children and students in his village, telling them to warn their parents about the issues. This strategy also failed—older villagers didn’t believe Tanwar any serious changes needed to happen, or that they would ever run out of water. Finally, Tanwar decided that he would have to go from house to house to explain the issue to each person individually. He also organized students to gather every Sunday to brainstorm ways to conserve water.
Gradually, his efforts started to take hold.
The meetings that Tanwar organized started being called “Jal Chapuals.”
As a result of all his efforts, changes gradually started taking place. In 2015, Tanwar worked together with a team of students, volunteers and village parents to take all the garbage out of the local ponds. After cleaning up the water, they also planted many young trees around the pond to help restore the general area even further. After they completed the project, local government officials came around to see the results of all the effort.
Before long, other people from other villages were coming through to ask Tanwar for his help restoring their lakes.
Because of his initial efforts in his own village, Tanwar has been at the head of an organization to clean out many more lakes and ponds.
Using the same methods as before, Tanwar works with volunteers not only to clean the lakes and the water inside them, but to dig out areas where garbage can go separately. After that, they also develop filtration systems using wooden planks and patches of grass to stop garbage from flowing into the water. Each of the pits and the filters are changed regularly, and his mission is only growing throughout India.
Needless to say, Tanwar’s efforts have made a huge impact.
As a result of everything, India’s government has helped Tanwar set up the “Groundwater Army.”
What it is is an organization in every district of Tanwar’s state designed to promote water conservation and help with projects like those mentioned above. Because the government has no official fund for programs like these, it is largely a grassroots organization and has cost Tanwar a significant amount of his own money. Still, his efforts have been so positive and so impactful that they’re worth spreading, don’t you think? After all, the more people know about how serious of an issue water preservation and sanitation is, the better a place our world will become.
Congratulations to Ramveer on his incredible success in helping so many people throughout India!
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