Indian Express 05.05.2010
Water World
EXPRESS FEATURES SERVICE Tags : talk, kolkata Posted: Wednesday, May 05, 2010 at 0231 hrs
Filmmaker Tarini Manchanda was faced with water woes almost every day since childhood, despite living in upmarket Vasant Vihar. “There was never enough water for our daily needs. I have seen my family queuing up to fetch water from the municipal water tankers,” says Manchanda, who, along with two American friends, Katie Gillet and Mariah Mason, has made a 36-minute documentary, Groundwater Up , on the water problems in the city. The film explores the water situation in Delhi and offers practical solutions to revive the water table in the city.
Groundwater Up focuses on the predicament of various families who are affected by the water scarcity and are forced to rely on tankers. Through case studies and experts working on the issue of water conservation, the film-makers portray the apathetic water management in the Capital. “There is no water shortage in this city, but we are still relying on groundwater. Studies suggest that by 2015, the groundwater levels will be exhausted and there will be severe crisis,” says Manchanda, 23.
After returning from the US in 2007, where she was pursuing a graduation programme in environmental policy at the Colby College at Maine , Manchanda enrolled for a long-distance programme on globalisation from an institute in Boston.
During the two-month course she came across Gillet and Mason and together they travelled through India, doing research for the documentary, which they finished shooting in February this year. “The idea was to raise questions about the water supply in the city and explore the futility of the few government initiatives,” adds Manchanda, who is working on her second documentary, again on water crisis.
