Just came from a jog and saw the notice board of my society.
There were at least two messages asking me to play a dry holi as there would be
wastage of water otherwise. The morning newspaper also had a couple of
advertisements to the same tune. Though
I get the concern of the individuals is simply to save water but its
unfortunate that most of the people don’t question this illogical environmentalism.
So, let me make it simple. Holi is a festival of colours and
its traditional to play with water. Until you are dipped in a water pool on
Holi…its not really a holi. And its not wastage of water by the way…its
judicious use of water for entertainment purposes.
If the citizens of this country do not use water on Holi,
its not that we are going to save a huge amount of water to solve the water
crisis of this nation. I don’t have the statistics but I can certainly state
that if all citizens played a dry holi the water saved would not even cater to
.5% of the water gap that we have. By the way I couldn’t find a single piece of authentic research to
show the amount of water wasted on Holi.
Then why this tamaasha. Let the people enjoy. Instead of
putting a ban on wet holi…lets concentrate on more sustainable practices of
water resource optimization like rain-water harvesting , water reuse and
measures to minimize distribution losses of water. While I support a wet holi I also support
using organic and natural colours. That for sure is healthy and good for the
environment.
And mind it, its not just Holi, this illogical
environmentalism has taken the toll on many a festivals. I have been part of
some of the largest environment education movements of this country and one of
the things where the same mentality is at play is during Diwali.
It’s a trend for everybody to join the anti-cracker
campaign. I say let the kids have fun for a day at least. Climate change is not
going to happen if we light crackers on Diwali or may be a week before it. The
amount of air pollution that we do by our crackers is nothing as compared to
what we do by taking out our cars whenever we have to buy a pack of milk.
This reminds me of a popular Centre for Science and
Environment’s report on pollution in Yamuna. The report was name the Sewage Canal. It clearly asked the
authorities to point the finger at the right place. If you were to give the
topic of river pollution in a painting competiton of kids. 99% of the paintings
would show a factory spewing its affluents in the river and people throwing
stuff in the river. That’s the world we live in whereas the reality is that
it’s the sewage from our civilized population, which causes that pollution…it’s
the sewage not the affluent or what we throw, which is the real culprit. It is
at max 5% responsible.
So, its good to save water but lets look at the right place
rather than play spoilsport on Holi.
Let environment not come in between our festivals…let
environment be our religion instead…so that we live it every moment rather than getting sceptic on festive
days.
Wish you all a happy and wet Holi. Let the Rang Barse.