The Enactus at St. Xavier’s College, Kolkata is part of a global devout student fraternity that seeks to bring about change by channeling social entrepreneurial skills of students onto real-world problems. We have two running establishments in Project Kalakriti and Project Shuddhi.
With about 7,80,000 deaths per year in India attributable to contaminated water and its ill effects, potable water and the inaccessibility of the same are some of the major loopholes preventing our nation from traversing the road to success.
To bring about a change in the present scenario, our team at Enactus, St. Xavier’s realized that there’s no better way to bring upon a revolution in the lives of the needy, than to address one of the most pressing needs of the hour: quenching the thirst of a million parched throats, who struggle to afford something as basic as clean water.
With a perfect blend of altruism and science, Enactus St. Xavier’s has set out on a path to create a low-cost gravitational filter that caters to the marginal section of the society by eliminating impurities, especially iron and arsenic from the water that they use for drinking and other purposes.
Project Shuddhi, a venture to contrive a gravitational water filter that aims to improve the water conditions by administering low cost filtration technique, is making each litre of refined water available at a nominal cost of ₹0.085, the most economical in the market.
The effectiveness of the filter has been duly tested under the facilities of credible laboratories located in Kolkata and we’ve subsequently received an IS 10500 certification. The project has already made way into many remote areas of the state of West Bengal, including the districts of Purulia, Nadia, and parts of North 24 Parganas.
The main beneficiaries of this project apart from the consumers of the filter are those hired workers whose jobs include being a link between the creators of the project and the consumers, taking and completing deliveries of orders of the product and other related activities.
One of their most active markets is present in Purulia. With a steady and efficient functioning of the beneficiaries, Purulia’s need for clean water is gradually being fulfilled by sale of Shuddhi water filters in the district. The members of Enactus have also held multiple awareness camps in other areas like Haroa and Nadia, in an attempt to tap into the markets there.
In the long run, the project is expected to expand with more developments in the filter and the system of operations, to reach a larger market thereafter.
Project Shuddhi has an idealistic water filter, executed in a manner instilled with thought, responsibility and change. Water is a privilege that not many in this world enjoy, when it should actually be a basic right. Enactus, St. Xavier’s College hopes to manifest this dream through Project Shuddhi.