India Water Week to be celebrated as annual international event

New Delhi, Apr 9 (ANI): The Ministry of Water Resources since this year has endeavoured to celebrate India Water Week annually as an international event to focus on water issues.

It would provide a global platform for water related issues that will bring policy makers, industry leaders, experts, professionals and practitioners together to address the challenges, showcase technologies, discover opportunities, recognizing the excellence of professionals/organizations and celebrate their achievements.

As a part of the event, besides the technical and special sessions, there would also be an exhibition to focus on the various aspects of the main theme.

The first international event in the series of India Water Week on "Water, Energy and Food Security: Call for Solutions" will be organized during April 10-14, 2012 at New Delhi. Prime Minister Dr. Manmohan Singh will inaugurate the event at Vigyan Bhawan.

A book on award winning children' paintings on Water Conservation will also be released by the Prime Minister besides presentation of National Water Award.

In all, there shall be 15 parallel technical sessions during the three-day event from April 10 to 12, which will cover various issues/challenges faced in the water sector. On April 13th there shall be special sessions on Water Policy, water treatment as well as National Ground Water Congress.

Technical visits are also proposed on April 13 and 14 to IRI and IIT at Roorkee and Central Soil Salinity Research Institute at Karnal and Hathnikund Barrage.

An exhibition 'Water Expo 2012' is also planned during the India Water Week as a technology show case to meet future challenges for the overall development of water, food and energy sector. A significant exposition of WARIS (Water Resources Information System) - a fully web based information system for India will also be showcased.

Minister of Water Resources and Parliamentary Affairs Pawan Kumar Bansal will inaugurate the exhibition, which is being held at Pragati Maidan, New Delhi, tomorrow.

The event is patronized by all concerned Ministries such as Ministry of Agriculture and Food Processing Industries, Ministry of Science and Technology, Ministry of Panchayati Raj, Ministry of Rural Development, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Ministry of Environment and Forest, Planning Commission and others.

State Governments and their units handling major water resources projects are also participating in this event.

About 1000 participants including 43 from abroad are likely to participate in the event where about 200 experts including 30 invited speakers drawn from across the world will make presentations on various issues.

High-level delegations from Tanzania, Oman, Nepal and other countries are also participating. Two important publications, 'Water Resources Development Scenario in India' and 'History of Irrigation Development and Management in India' have been prepared for the occasion.

The outcome of the event is expected to pave way for generating new implementation strategies for the ongoing programmes and also provide an insight into the approaches for framing future programmes. (ANI)