Role of Women in Resident Welfare Associations
Gita Dendukuri In several states of India, Residents Welfare Associations (RWAs) have gained importance in governance at the community level. They represent the interface between the Government and the citizen. The role of RWAs in improving the quality of life for community living, whether in apartments, colonies or gated communities is growing by the day. It is a well-recognized fact that those communities which take initiative and persevere in ensuring that common interests are met, enjoy a significantly better quality of living and have f…
Water Conservation: Everyone’s Responsibility
Manu Goel The 3 rd World War, they say will be fought on water. Weird, as it may sound, this statement could well come true if analyses the current water situation across the world, particularly in India and few Third World countries. Water is one commodity which only nature can provide and we need to respect it and use it with utmost care. In India, the water situation changes from region to region and is different round the year. At times, due to heavy rainfall, there are floods and at other times there is drought. It is the duty of the Gov…
Gokul Nagar Welfare Society, Tarnaka, Secunderabad
G. Jagadeswara Rao In my last Status Report I detailed the struggles and efforts made by the Gokulnagar Welfare Society to evict encroachers from open space and to develop into a playground. The following photographs depict the picture when the open space was under encroachers and after transformation into a beautiful playground. The untiring efforts of the Society continued to improve the living conditions in the colony. The colony park is now renovated and a new lawn and several more plants have been added. A walkway is to be lai…
Interlinking of Rivers, a Possible Panacea to Water Shortages
G Chandrasekar The focal and central theme of the 7 th Conference in Delhi is WATER MANAGEMENT. Over the last decade, lot of educative information and statistics on this crucial theme have been relayed by various organizations throughout the globe. Rightly, the entire world recognizes there is an urgent need for effective management of water resources, their prudent use and recycling of wastewater. Without further elaborating on this, let me submit a few vital points in this regard relating to India. Average rainfall in India generates about…
The Water Paradox – Scarcity Despite Copious Rains
Sagaram Sreedhar Most cities in India are facing a drinking water crisis. A Niti Aayog report released last year predicts Day Zero for 21 Indian cities by next year. Day Zero refers to the day when a place is likely to have no drinking water of its own and Bengaluru, Chennai, Delhi and Hyderabad are among the most susceptible. The government has created a new Jal Shakti ministry to deal with drinking water crisis. India is the biggest user of groundwater. It extracts more groundwater than China and the US, among the biggest users of groundwat…
Community Managed Lakes to Make Sustainability a Reality
Madhuri Subbarao World over many decentralized systems of lake management by communities can be observed. Water bodies in the community enhance its beauty with pristine and healthy lakes making life around the community green, fun, sustainable and scenic. In India simple solutions can change the eco-system of the lake. Every city is endowed with hundreds of lakes. When the government finds it a challenge to maintain these water bodies, by default the RWAs must hold hands with the Government to manage lakes around them. A complex interdepende…
Water Conservation – Some tips for households and RWAs
Joseph Varghese 1.Tips for Outdoor Water Conservation in Households and RWAs Avoid lawns, non-native ornamentals, and water hungry plants. Water plants early in the morning during the summer months to reduce evaporation losses. Use a watering can or mug instead of a hose and pour water around the base of the plants avoiding the stem and leaves to prevent leaf burn or primary root rot or stem infections. Water soil only to the point that the top 3-5 inches of soil are damp if watering daily and ensure avoiding over flow or over satu…
Regenerative Lifestyle for Better Health and Healthy Environment
Ranju Minhas Alarm Bells! We humans are the most intelligent creatures on Earth and this also brings huge responsibility. Ecosystems are a shared resource for all creatures. Our traditional lifestyle was nature-based and there was space for wellbeing of all creatures. Over exploitation in the name of development has disturbed nature around us. We have forgotten that we, in our greed are exploiting the limited natural resources which we are to share with the plant and animal kingdom, and have taken it for granted for far too long. As we entere…
Better Waste Management for a Better Living
Anil Gupta Waste Disposal Practices. There are eight major groups of waste management methods , each of them divided into numerous categories. These groups include: source reduction and reuse, animal feeding, recycling, composting, fermentation, landfills, incineration and land application. How is solid waste being managed in developed cities with special reference to NCR? Issues in Current Methods of solid waste disposal and management are as below: Source Reduction : Much has been spoken about at various national…
Let us Make our Planet Earth Habitable
Suresh Goel The world came to know of Greta Thunberg in August 2018 as a Swedish High School student who protested outside the country’s Parliament with a sign reading “School Strike for climate change”. It’s a measure of how much traction her message got among the youth around the world that within a year she got a respectful hearing from the U.S. law-makers. The impact of her initiative is so great that on Friday, 20 th September, 2019 millions of children around the world played truant from school. Instead of spending a day in the class…
Eternal and ever-growing problem of encroachment on footpaths
By J.M.S. Nagarjunan Population has been steadily increasing. So has been the encroachment of public places, particularly PLATFORMS/FOOTPATHS, ROAD SPACES, etc., not only by the Vendors/Hawkers, but also by rich shop-owners, political groups and also a section of the Governmental agencies like Electricity Department, Telephones, Police, etc., besides places of religious worship. Flag posts, banners, hoardings (commercial and political), hawkers, shops, places of worship, eat-outs’ chairs/tables, tea/coffee shops, storing of construction mater…
Golden Rules for Better Water Management
Sharak Kumar Water is important for every citizen. There are two aspects of water – one is natural water from rivers and dams and the second is rain water. Of late as a result of scanty rainfall many places are facing drought. In this context it is significant that the NDA 2 government under the stewardship of Prime Minister Narendra Modi felt it important to create a separate Ministry of Jal Shakti in May 2019. This was formed by merging two ministries – the Ministry of Water Resources, River Development & Ganga Rejuvenation and the Mini…
RWAs Demand Constitutional Recognition and Rights
A Brief Report on the 7th National Conference of RWAs (7th NCRWA 2019) By Col. Tejendra Pal Tyagi, Veer Chakra Chief Convener, 7th NCRWA 2019 The 7th National Conference of Resident Welfare Associations (NCRWA), was held on November 16-17 at the Andhra Association, Lodhi Institutional Area, New Delhi. The two-day conference which was attended by over 357 delegates from across the country was inaugurated by Hon’ble Member of Parliament Rajya Sabha Shri Vijay Goel ji and Joint Secretary of Ministry of Housing and Urban Affairs Smt. D Thara. Memb…
A Thesis to Treat the RWA as the 4th-Tier of Governance
Dr Rao VBJ Chelikani During the 19 th and 20 th centuries when common people wanted to have a share in the governance, electing a few representatives to rule at central and state levels was considered adequate. Having accomplished it, the political institutions in the Western European countries have been evolving along with the changing times. What is certain, to-day in India that the democratic spirit is well ingrained in the psyche of an average Indian, though not as much as that is desirable after seventy years of democratic experience. B…
RWA Mission Statement
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