Water and Human Rights

• It is fundamental right of the humankind to have access to safe drinking water. Unfortunately the charter of the basic human rights has not envisaged the provision of drinking water to the people. According to the facts and figures of the the world health organisation more than one billion people in the third world countries, that is 20 percent of the global population, have no access to secure drinking water . Only 46 % percent people of Africa have access to safe drinking water. Sometime only twenty percent of the population of some countries have the access to safe drinking water. 2.2 million deaths per year occur due to unhygienic water. Not to speak of human beings even the animals and plants are not getting enough water.

• Water should not have been a commercial product like that of a well known multinational corporation that is marketed and sold out all over the world via media. But the superior creature has established his hegemony over the natural resources due to its avariciousness. The sages of the times had not freed the water from the cruel clutches of greed.The scribers of the UN charter of human rights had also not included the access to clean drinking water in the list of basic human rights!!!

• Therefore it has become a multi- million business and no state or person seems in the mood to provide the people with the pure or impure drinking water on human grounds

• To assure freedom, justice, and equality to its people is the primary obligation of a state. These privileges destined for the citizens of a state are considered as the basic human rights. A social writer satirically explains these rights by saying that the citizens are free to die with hunger or thirst, state would not interfere in their freedoms.

• The common needs of the common lot are found in abundance in the nature. Air and water are its major examples.Nature has bestowed all the blessings on all the creatures, from a unicellular organism to human being ,without any any distinction of genre or species.Many organizations of world level are struggling to compel the UN to include the access to water in the list of basic human rights.

• The global water crisis needs a global resolution in shape of a United Nations treaty on water accessibility. People of the world have felt the urgency of the issue and are struggling for water rights. Different NGO, s and humanitarian organizations are trying to awake the conscience of the governments and business tycoons to except water from their monetary deals. They are striving rightly to invoke an international mechanism on the right to water. The too much industrialization had adversely affected the climate and water resources of the world. Water is scarce and its reservoirs are in danger of contamination and pollution. Moreover the people are obliged to get water from private corporations on high and exploitative prices. The efforts of the World Bank by privatizing the water services have failed due to towering water rates, non availability to the poor, inefficient services and pollution.

• The best way to solve the water crises is Covenant on water by the United Nation. It is the need of the hour to introduce a UN Covenant to re-affirm the vital role of government in supplying water to the people at affordable price or free of cost, if possible.

• The fact that water is not a recognized human right has given the chance to the private companies to exploit the situation. If the UN is involved in the water issue and the states sign a covenant on the water, this exploitation of the private sector might be reduced, if not completely eradicated. Although Covenant on water will not solve the world’s water crisis yet it would help the people and the states to stop the situation from going bad to worse.

• The two billion people living in the states without sufficient water would be able to make water a social and cultural asset instead of a commodity. It would also enable the states to prepare a fair system of distribution. The inclusion of water in basic human would help to work on a universal and coherent body of regulations for all countries. It would make clear that it is the task of the state to give fresh, reasonably priced water to all of its populace.

• It is high time for the UN also to include water in the list of basic Human Rights.