Harvesting Happiness

Mumbai-based rainwater-harvesting consultant Dr Ajit S Gokhale is working on the same for setting up the plants. Speaking about the project S B Mujumdar,president and founder director,Symbiosis Open Education Society says,“Considering this one as our pilot project,which has proved to be successful,we plan to replicate it in all our branches like Hinjewadi,Vimannagar,Khadki to name a few. Infact,even at our division in Bangalore,we will get a similar water recycle plant installed. Hopefully,we will start the work by next academic year,”

Symbiosis International University (SIU),Lavale,is spread in an area of 300 acres,which houses a total of 1539 students besides the teaching and non-teaching staff whose strength is 210. Around 3 lakh litres of water is used every day at the SIU campus,under which there are four other centers – SIBM (Symbiosis Institute of Business Management),SIMC (Symbiosis Institute of Mass Communication),SITM (Symbiosis Institute of Telecom Management) and SIT (Symbiosis Institute of Technology).

“Since the institute is situated in a remote area,where there is no water resource,it used to be a costly and cumbersome affair for the institute to meet up with its water requirements which was a huge quantity,” says Dr Gokhale,who works on giving site-specific and user-friendly solutions for water recycling,which are also low on operating costs and technical manpower. The water treatment plant was installed in the year 2006 and involves no recurring cost. Total cost incurred for setting up the plant was Rs 3 crore 9 lakhs owing to which close to a total of 2 crore liters of water can be harvested.

“Now this three lakh litres of water which gets used everyday,is channelised into reed beds,where it is treated naturally. The process requires no electricity or manpower. 80 per cent of the water is reused in other areas like gardening,” says Col Kadam,project in-charge at the Lavale Symbiosis University,adding,“The only process that requires electricity is while pumping the treated water out.”