I Am Water – Part 2
By Dr. Rajendra Singh*
(Translated from Hindi by Deepak Parvatiyar, Member World Water Council)
Also read: The story of water – 1
Fountain-head of Perpetuity
I am equally required by all. In fact I make a discrimination-free world but today’s market based economy has snatched away this moral authority from me. Today I have become hostage to the market. It is this market which has divided the world to loot me.
My whole existence is now under a threat because of the loot by private companies. This loot is dangerous. This doesn’t have an old history. Until 200 years ago, I used to spread the message of “Vasudev Kutumbakam” (The world is one family). However with industrial revolution in North and West, the countries there started occupying me.
Hence, first their own rivers became polluted. This resulted in spurt in diseases and when they started feeling helpless, they had to start treating me in their rivers. Hence, they could make their own rivers healthy again but poor nations made me polluted in their rivers. These poor countries did not know the process and technology to treat me. Hence today I am sick in most of the African and Asian countries. In the name of treating me, a big company Veolia is today doing brisk business. In the name of making me pollution free, it is making huge profits. For this it is even using the World Water Council. Many big water companies today control the World Water Council. These companies have joined hands to overthrow water communities that used to take care of me. It seems as if the World Water Forum has become a forum to privatise water.
Water communities have of-late got organised and challenged the World Water Council in a court of law in France in a bid to save me. There should not be my privatisation but there should be my communitisation. Those who want my communitisation want to ensure a shared future. They want to ensure that everyone has a right on me. Private companies’ motive is only to make profit.
My purpose is not profit. My purpose is auspicious. That is why now in the whole world people are raising voices against my privatisation, more strongly. These are the voices which learn from me and get inspired by me and work for the betterment of all. They protect me from encroachers, polluters and exploiters.
In this 21st century, a war is going on between those who want to loot me and those who want to save me. Simultaneously efforts are being made to ensure that this war does not take the shape of the world war. The World Water Peace Walk is on since 2015. So far this walk has already taken place in over 90 countries. This journey has made people aware of the threat that I face today. A book too has been published on this journey.
My social, cultural, and spiritual forms are transparent and clearly visible. I belong to all who learn from my transparency. They too belong to me. We share the same health. If I am healthy then I keep healthy all of them who I provide life. My health is proportional to the world’s health. But today people are forgetting to take care of my health.
I am the last letter in the word BHAGAVAN (GOD). N stands for Neer. I am Neer which means water. I am the connecting link between the five elements. If I am not there in the Earth then there will not be mud. If I am not there in Sky then there will be no rains. I tolerate the energy released by Fire, absorb it and create life out of that. I mix with Air to make it breathable and alive. That is why I create climate. I keep the climate balanced. I cure the fever of earth and make it green and improve the mood of seasons. I create shower and drought from time to time. I make everybody water rich. Water rich means I connect the five elements with nature and planet to instil life in them.
I am life. I make Neer, Janani, Nari (Water, Mother, Woman). They are procreators. I give motion to everything that is born. I make rivers that are responsible for development of civilisations and culture. That is why I am the spirit which keeps the mother alive. Knowledgable persons also call me Neer- Nari- Nadi (Water-Woman-River). All these three forms have life, respect and flow. I am the balm that heals lives. I am what I am. I am water.
I make my own way. I generate energy in water falls, carve out a way in the Himalayas and become Ganga on the plains. In the form of Bhagirathi, Alakhnanda, I flow down from the Himalayas after caressing its green vegetation. When I want to move up, I climb the tree and reach the summit through its roots, shoots, branches and leaves. I become cloud in the ocean and move up. There I come in contact of fresh breeze and go wherever I want to go. But I move up by loving and respecting all. I don’t pull down anybody to move up. I don’t kill anybody to move up. But I only come down when I kill someone, or make someone fall. I move up by giving whatever I have, to others. I myself decide my levels. I don’t have the greed to move up. I am not afraid of coming down.
Greedy man pulls me down. When I rain, I immediately go down the drain on naked earth. On the way I also erode soil, stones and take the along. I deposit them on low land and move forward. When such deposits are raised, I change my course and enter cities and villages. People call this floods. Whenever I rise from the ocean in the form of clouds and then move forward, people say clouds had come but were angry and so they went away. So placate them by performing yagnas etc. They keep talking about me.
I take offence when the earth suffers from fever. Then I become angry. Then I disturb seasons. Then I become uncontrollable and that results in unseasonal rains. At that time no body has idea that where, when, and how much I will rain. Or whether I will even rain or not. Then all scientific calculations fail. No body can control me.
*Dr. Rajendra Singh is an internationally acclaimed water conservationist and is also known as the Waterman of India. The views expressed are personal.
