‘Access to safe water is a human right’-World waterday awareness.

‘Access to safe water is a human right’ World Waterday awareness was created in SEVAI Shanthi Matriculation Higher secondary School in Pettavaithalai (www.shanthischool.in). SSMHS School Watershed Awareness Project model has developed by school pupil R.Sophia and she enlightened her work to the visitors and more to her mother, Elizabeth Mary. Student R.Sophia enlightened her mother that this water conservation technique development is to Increase the scope and clarity of materials on the concept of watershed, adding supporting watersheds surrounding of Thottiyapatty and Dasilnaickanoor,the dry belt area, to develop new materials for the sketch that would increase student awareness of the intersection of watershed  topography and nonpoint source pollution and to expand use of the land  as a resource by working one on one with teachers in area schools, identifying and overcoming barriers. Sophia said’ although everyone lives in a watershed, most people don't know the actual meaning of the word. Put simply, a watershed is all the land that drains into a given body of water. This body of water can be a creek, pond, river or ocean. Generally speaking, the larger the body of water, the larger is its watershed. The Thottiyapatty watershed, for example, covers 412 hectares’ which has been reclaimed with contour bunds, gully plugging, water harvesting,checkdams and percolation tanks and contour trenches and also green coverage with nitrogen fixation plantation for water and soil binding.

Access to water is an important way to reduce poverty in many ways. Safe access to water would avoid more than two million preventable deaths a year, increase many persons’ ability to work, and reduce child labour and school absenteeism. Lately, more attention has been placed on the need to adapt to climate changes because they will affect the availability to provide water for all..SEVAI Shanthi Matriculation Higher secondary School organized a week long exhibition on water for drinking and agriculture operations for the observation of world waterday. School chemistry teacher Mrs.Meena prepared the school pupils and developed exhibition of drinking water and also watershed project for water conservation for recharging water bodies for ground water and also for irrigation projects, with a focus on Rain Water Harvesting (RWH) (an Eco Club lead school) on March 16-22^nd 2011. The target group included teachers and students from 10 the schools in and around SEVAI Shanthi Matriculation Higher Secondary School. The school pupils brought their parents to the exhibition for water conservation, when it rains making running water walk. Tuesday, March 22 marks World Water Day, a day set aside by the United Nations General Assembly to focus on the international water crisis. The water conservation and RWH focused primarily on water management and rainwater harvesting. The exhibition outlines the water scarcity in India and reasons of scarcity amidst plentiful rains. Uncontrolled exploitation, rampant usage, polluted water resources are not new in most of the urban areas. Concepts and principles of RWH was explained by narrating the rich traditions of rainwater harvesting that existed in India right from the Indus valley civilization.Mrs.Mallika, the Principal of the school gave an introductory speech on water and Environment, education and biodiversity.

The Programme was focused to introduce the students, parents and teachers, the varied environmental problems. Prolonged mining and lack of water conservation activities has adversely affected the hydro-geological regime of the area. This is clear from the fact that despite receiving an annual average rainfall of 900 milli metre, these villages do not have enough water for drinking or irrigation. Most of the hand pumps in the area have failed. So is the case with open wells, which serves 90 per cent of the drinking water requirement of the villagers. The SEVAI Shanthi Matriculation Higher secondary School Students sensitized the participants especially parents on the need for adopting rooftop rainwater harvesting at the household level which can ensure water availability during lean periods. RWH techniques like storage and groundwater recharge, the implementation strategies and precautions to be taken were discussed in detail. This basic preparation for water awareness campaign provides basic information on the water scenario, hydro-meteorology, RWH techniques. 23 models of water harvesting techniques have been displayed as their original work of conservation of water for drinking and domestic purposes.-Etram News Service.