Crystal
droplets fall from above
Besides skipping the statistical data and relying on the health organizations, have we ever thought of taking an initiative in improving the present situation?
Reminds me of a saying by Martin Luther King, Jr. "Why should there be hunger and deprivation in any land, in any city, at any table, when man has the resources and the scientific know-how to provide all mankind with the basic necessities of life?"
Make
earth lively and spread love
Such
are mother nature's abundances for everyone
How
can we divide rich and poor and deprive someone
Water
has always been taught as one of the basic necessities of life. The
quality of water? It still is a question mark for the slum and
poverty-stricken areas. Lack of clean drinking water is becoming
lethal for human beings. According to the United Nations Children's
Fund (UNICEF), more than 750 million people don’t have access to
safe, clean water. Every day, nearly 2,000 children under the age of
five die from diseases directly linked to contaminated water. As per
World Health Organization (WHO), 1.6 million people die every
year from diarrhea and other water borne diseases attributable
to lack of access to safe drinking water; mostly in developing
countries.
Besides skipping the statistical data and relying on the health organizations, have we ever thought of taking an initiative in improving the present situation?
Suprio
Das, working as an engineer as quite a few of us, quit his job of
twenty years to work for a bigger cause: creating low cost devices to
provide potable water for people living in poverty. He worked in slum
areas near Calcutta to have a deeper understanding of the challenges
faced by the slum dwellers. He had to overcome various challenges in
his quest to provide chlorinated water namely the various sizes of
containers used to fill water, the varying flow rate of water found
at different sources of water, unreliable electricity in most slum
areas, no repairing facilities hence no moving parts to be used,
accurate dose of chlorine and no behavioral change in the method of
water collection.
Suprio Das with his dream
Though
it was not an easy task but within a period of three years Mr. Das
invented the Zimba chlorine doser. His work was acknowledged by MIT
and Stanford University co-studied the device's technical viability
in the slums of Dhaka where it has, now, been providing clean water
to slum dwellers for the past 10 months.
Simple functioning of Zimba Chlorine Doser
It would not be an exaggeration to say that Suprio Das has done a recommendable work for the people dwelling in areas with little or no aid of potable water. He has also set an example for the educated youth busy climbing the corporate ladder to spare some time and think of the challenges faced by the other parts of society. His work inspires us to take initiatives beyond regular 9 to 5 routine in order to lead a meaningful life.
While
most of us think that developed
countries have better technologies and resources to overcome these
challenges. Suprio Das has given a challenge by providing clean
drinking water at the minimal expense of Rs 5 or $0.09 for treating
10,000 liters of water compared to the cost estimate by the
WHO (shown below).
(source: official WHO website)
Reminds me of a saying by Martin Luther King, Jr. "Why should there be hunger and deprivation in any land, in any city, at any table, when man has the resources and the scientific know-how to provide all mankind with the basic necessities of life?"
No pay check can ever bring satisfaction as deep as these smiles... Being the reason behind, what could bring more meaning to our eyes and lives.
Watch the speaker narrate their riveting story of innovation on: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=pvJVL6ECGLg#at=428
Franklin
Templeton Investments
partnered
the TEDxGateway Mumbai in December 2012.
