Thursday, November 10 2005 18:03 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

New Delhi: Government proposes to launch a massive 'People's Water Conservation Mission' in the face of loss due to run off being as high as 75 per cent, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said today (Nov 10, 2005).

"Given the fact that 75 per cent of water received is lost in run off, we have huge opportunities for people centered water conservation at the local level," he said here at Green Governance Awards function organized by the Bombay Natural History Society.

"In response to this need, our government is proposing a massive People's Water Conservation Mission," he said.

The Prime Minister said the mission would be people's movement led by panchayats, using the funds of the National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme to harvest every drop of water that falls.

Stating that this opportunity for local-level water augmentation had been unprecedented, he said, "Through this we hope to revive our tradition of harvesting water."

This people-centric approach could also be used to replace country's lost forest cover, he said.

"A massive programme of greening degraded forests can be undertaken again using the National Rural Employment Guarantee Act," he said.

Warning against blindly copying western lifestyles and consumerist ways of living, the Prime Minister said such an approach would lead to 'prosperity for few and misery of many.'

"Developing countries must strive to avoid the development trajectory of the developed industrial economies because these have been far too wasteful and harmful to the environment," he said.