NEW
DELHI, OCT 25: The World Bank’s recent report on India’s water economy
has come under criticism from the civil society organisations.
The Delhi-based
Research Foundation for Science, Technology and Ecology (RFSTE) and other non-governmental
organisations have begun criticising the study, saying it is “a direct attack
on the country’s water democracy, water culture, people’s right to water
and sustainability of water resources”.
Addressing a press conference
in the Capital on Tuesday, Vandana Shiva of RFSTE said: “The World Bank’s
real intention is to initiate the process of privatisation of water by rendering
lip service to community rights.”
She said that what the World Bank
refers to as instituting “command and control” is for replacing the
existing community rights of people. Water is a property of the community and
no institution can own it she said.
Ms Shiva said that the World Bank’s
hidden agenda is clear when the report says “large number of people will
move from informal, self-providing, water economy into the formal service sector”.
Ms Shiva blamed the World Bank for falsely blaming the public sector management
as responsible for over exploitation of groundwater.
Pointing out that
it was the World Bank, which had in the past promoted over-exploitation of ground
water, she said it had financed boring of deep tube wells in UP, Bihar, West Bengal,
Gujarat, Maharashtra.
She said that after pushing its agenda of corporate
control of water through gigantic projects, the World Bank now wants to transform
its failure into success.
Citing failed projects like the privatised Sonia
Vihar plant in Delhi from which not a drop of water has reached the citizens of
Delhi, she said that big water projects have displaced millions of people from
their homes.
The World Bank’s privatisation recipes have failed in
Bolivia, Argentina, South Africa, The Philippines and Ghana as a result of peoples’
resistance, she added.
India, Russia agree to develop energy cooperation
Moscow:
Giving a new dimension to their strategic partnership, India and Russia on Wednesday
agreed to bolster trade and economic cooperation with the focus on developing
energy sector, including nuclear, diamond trading and joint ventures in high technologies.
India will also go beyond large investment in Sakhalin-1 oil field, visiting
External Affairs Minister K. Natwar Singh announced here after the 11th meeting
of the Indo-Russian Inter-Governmental Commission.
"India is technically
equipped and financially capable and willing to jointly work with Russia to make
our energy cooperation an important and mutually beneficial dimension of our strategic
partnership," the minister said, adding that it has decided to invest more
in Russia's oil and gas sectors. He said that political decisions have been made
and specifics will be worked out by the Indo-Russian summit in early December
when Prime Minister Manmohan Singh is scheduled to visit Moscow.
"Two
economies are consistently growing, offering new opportunities on both sides,"
he said. The Minister, who arrived here on Tuesday on a four-day visit, said that
such areas including Information Technology, bio-technology, commercialisation
of Russian or jointly developed technologies and some frontier areas of science
and technology deserve greater substantive joint action.
