Minister for Public Health Engineering Choudhary Chandrabhan Singh has instructed the officers concerned to ensure availability of spare parts required for repair of hand pumps to proper drinking water supply during the summer season. He directed that the hand pump technicians should be assigned works with spare parts and vehicles. The Minister has also asked the Chief Engineers, Superintending Engineers and Executive Engineers to ensure storage of necessary material for repair of hand pumps to meet any emergency situation.

The worst fears about the Garden City's once salubrious temperature rising beyond comfort levels appear to be coming true... A recent study by the Centre for Ecological Sciences, IISc, has revealed that the temperature has shot up by an alarming three degrees in the past decade alone! The study, conducted by scientist Dr T V Ramachandra and research scholar Uttam Kumar has cited the loss of vegetation and water bodies and rise in anthropogenic pressure as the prime factors behind the temperature rise.

Planet Ark April 15, 2008 Melting Mountains A "Time Bomb" For Water Shortages AUSTRIA: April 15, 2008 VIENNA - Glaciers and mountain snow are melting earlier in the year than usual, meaning the water has already gone when millions of people need it during the summer when rainfall is lower, scientists warned on Monday. "This is just a time bomb," said hydrologist Wouter Buytaert at a meeting of geoscientists in Vienna.

Three hours drive beyond Hosur from Bangalore, the popular picnic spot Hogenakkal

Mideast Can Avert Impending Water Crisis - World Bank MOROCCO: April 11, 2008 RABAT - The Middle East is overusing limited water resources and the amount of water available per head will halve by 2050, leading to social strains as more people quit the countryside, the World Bank said on Thursday. But a crisis can still be averted if governments seize the opportunity to repair water networks, build new infrastructure including desalination plants and educate people not to waste limited resources, according to a report by the bank.

The water industry has a lot of work to do to prepare for the introduction of a new UK carbon trading scheme. That was the message for the industry from consultants and regulators speaking at a one-day conference organised by environmental consultancy and training firm Aqua Enviro. Organisations were warned that they need to measure and reduce their greenhouse gas emissions ready for phase one of the Carbon Reduction Commitment (CRC), which begins on January 1, 2010.

Spread over 140 sq km, East Kolkata Wetlands (EKW) is the kidney of Calcutta. Listed as a Ramsar site (an international convention on conserving wetlands), it is a mosaic of ponds, lakes, canals and swamps

Jain Irrigation Systems is the second-largest drip irrigation company in the world and one of the largest suppliers of ducting to telcos globally. Now, it's eyeing revenues of $1 billion, krishna gopalan

The Canadian government is being urged not to sell huge volumes of water to the parched USA as NGOs warn that, despite appearances to the contrary, the northern neighbour is not a 'great green sponge'. The USA faces severe water shortages in three distinct regions - the South west, Midwest and South East. Canada, on the other hand, has a water resource comparable to that of the USA but only 10% of the population.