Aqua pura?

When something that appears as safe as bottled water is shown to carry pesticide residues at levels several times higher than those permitte...

When something that appears as safe as bottled water is shown to carry pesticide residues at levels several times higher than those permitted internationally, a public outcry is inevitable. The Centre for Science and Environment8217;s CSE8217;s recent study of popular bottled water brands sold in Delhi and Mumbai 8212; indicating that most of them contained significant traces of pesticides like DDT, malathion, lindane and chlorpyrifos 8212; has caused widespread disquiet.

Not surprising this, considering how dependent urbanites have come to be on bottled aqua to meet their drinking water needs.

While the manufacturers of bottled water had better get their act together if they do not wish to seriously jeopardise a Rs 1,000-crore industry, and the regulators evolve a more effective regime to protect consumers from such poisons, there is a larger issue that has not figured adequately in the debate.

It concerns the indiscriminate use of pesticides in the country. Take the use of a substance that goes by the name of Dichloro Diphenyl Trichloro Ethane, better known as DDT. Developed as the first of the modern insecticides in the human war against malaria and other diseases, as well as for agricultural purposes, it was later found to be something of a Frankenstein, poisoning the land, air, water.

While it was banned in the US in 1972, it continues to be in use in this country, even though there is a formal ban in place. In fact, organochlorine pesticides like DDT 8212; which had surfaced so alarmingly in the CSE study 8212; account for an estimated two-thirds of total pesticide consumption in India and it has seeped not just into every major river system in the country, not just into the food chain of birds like the vulture, driving them to the verge of extinction, not just into the tubewells of water bottling units, but even into what is commonly regarded as the world8217;s safest substance 8212; mother8217;s milk.

A larger clean-up, then, would necessarily entail a closer scrutiny of pesticide use in general, with particular emphasis on farm operations. We need to discover ways in which we can reduce and rationalise the use of these toxins. One of the important arguments in favour of GM cotton, for instance, is that it would require far less pesticides than conventional varieties. Hopefully, the present controversy over the safety of bottled water will not just be water off a duck8217;s back but will encourage more holistic action.