Enact 'Right to Water' as basic human right: Ghosh

Hyderabad, Dec 15, (UNI) Co-author of the 2006 Human Resource Development (HRD) report, published by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Arunabha Ghosh today said it was imperative that every country should enact the 'right to water' as a basic human right.

Participating in a workshop on 'Water for Life and Livelihoods', organised jointly by the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly and the United Nations here, Mr Ghosh observed that India was facing water scarcity and lack of sanitation, which resulted in the death of 4.5 lakh children due to Diarrhoea.

Only one in every three Indians have basic sanitation facility, he added.

Observing that India was giving low priority to water despite allocating funds to provide water to the poor in the budget, Mr Ghosh said economic growth would not solve the persisting water crisis in the country.

Suggesting solutions to solve the water problem, he said access to water was every human's right.

He said a national strategy on water, ground water regulation, low cost interventions to conserve water and attention to sanitation would address the growing-water crisis in the country.

Mr Ghosh said the HRD report on 'Energy and Climate Change' would be released next year.

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