If not me, who?
If not now, when?
These are questions I ask myself every single day when someone comes and tells me, “Saving water? But you’re so young!”
Well, let me tell you something before I begin. Everything that you are going to read today is something each and every one of you already know or would have heard. I only beg you to differ in your resulting actions after I finish.
Water is a basic human right, and it is my dream to make this right a right practice.
From over 300 lakes in the 60’s to less than 15 today, 90% less groundwater and a population of 11 million, this is Bangalore, the ex-garden city of India, and next in line to run out of water after Cape Town. This is the city that I belong to.
I have been working for and towards the environment ever since I can remember, but it was at the age of 13 when I started the #saynotocrackers on Diwali campaign in my society. Then, at the age of 15, after a series of events, determined and inspired, I started an initiative called Why Waste? that aims to change the mindset of people towards natural resources. 14 million litres of water is wasted every year in simply the water that we leave behind in glasses at restaurants. These numbers spoke to me. I could emotionally connect with them and I knew that I had to bring about some kind of change.
It is easy to emotionally connect to initiatives which are directly related to humanity, people, gender and sexuality but people always fail to find that same passion for the environment. They fail to realise the importance of our planet earth. They fail to realise their duty towards their Mother Earth. It is our duty as tenants on this planet to give back what we have taken away from her.
And it is with this mindset that I started Why Waste? in July 2015. We started out with saving water in restaurants and recycling organic waste.
“What is it that a 15-year-old can tell us that we don’t already know?” This was the usual facial expression and reaction I used to get when I would try and convince restaurant owners and managers to become more cautious about the amount of water that is used and consumed. I would be questioned – “These are the years when you should be preparing for your entrance exams, and not spending time on things like this.”
I didn’t care. I naturally seemed to prioritise this over everything else. All I knew is that I had to do my bit in some way or the other.
Every day, we waste water in the most trivial ways possible without realising it. 14 million litres are wasted simply in the water that we leave behind in glasses at restaurants. I wanted to change this. My initiative Why Waste? aims at changing the mindset of people towards natural resources. I work primarily with restaurants to optimise water usage for them and have done so in over 130 restaurants across four states in India. My big idea of impact is The Half-Marked glasses – a glass with limited water (only half glass) filled through it and a quote inspiring people to save water – through a sticker halfway around the glass. This half-marked glass also teaches you to take only as much as you need. This has helped save thousands of litres of water. Having successfully visited over 130 restaurants, there seems to be a significant change in the actions and mindsets of people around us.
Once at a meal at a restaurant, I was sitting beside my mom’s friend at the table. While taking some rice on her plate, she dropped a couple of grains into her glass of water. The glass was filled to the brim and she refused to drink it even though the grains were of plain flavourless rice. So, I picked up the glass of water and drank the entire thing right then in front of her. That day I made everyone sitting at the table think about the amount of water they waste every single day.
Recently I started a petition that aims to prevent the wastage of this water that we leave behind in glasses at restaurants.
With this campaign, I hope to not only save this water in restaurants but also to urge people to become more conscious about the amount of water they use on a daily basis. It’s easy to realise its importance – try and live one day without water- it’s impossible.
Climate change is real. Ask yourselves every day, what am I doing to prevent it? Earlier, people could be excused for not knowing about climate change, but now we can’t. Every single person alive today is responsible in some way or the other for destroying this beautiful planet. It’s not about what, how or who, it’s about you. It’s about what you can do as an individual. And it is very simple. It is just asking yourself every single day – how much water did I save today? Think about it.
What I ask of everyone is simple –
Let’s not take this planet for granted. Give back whenever you can because if you don’t save today, you won’t have any water tomorrow. This problem is not going to affect our future generations, it is going to affect us.
Save water, it will save you later.