WATER is life’s matter and matrix, mother and medium

“Water is life’s mater and matrix, mother and medium” said the 1937 Nobel Laureate Hungarian biochemist Albert Szent-Gyorgyi. It is indeed the element that creates and sustains life not only on land but also under the dark unknowns of ocean depths, indeed, the quest for water has taken man not only to the extremes of earth but now also to the lands beyond our planet. India’s Chandrayaan I mission with the aid of NASA’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper (M³) in 2008 did yield critical data that provided irrefutable evidence of the presence of water on the moon.

[caption id="" align="alignnone" width="591"] Water is life’s matter and matrix, mother and medium. There is no life without water.
~ Albert Szent-Gyorgyi[/caption]

Today as we cross the first decade of the 21^st century, India’s economy has soared at the rate of 8% every year for the last five years and is projected to be the second largest economy in the world by 2050. The growth has been fulled by the innovations in the service sectors such as in the Information technology Industry. However, the backbone of India’s economy is still agriculture which accounts for 52% of total employment and nearly 15% of India’s gross domestic product (GDP).

Given the dependence of such a large portion of India’s GDP and labour on the four-month monsoon season, water storage and conservation is of paramount importance for our economy as well as the health of the nation. The government spends billions of dollars for water treatment and storage and distribution infrastructure to quech the needs of millions across the nation. Ironically, this most important resource is wasted everyday due to negligence and lack of awareness of the efforts and costs required by the government to provide water so economically for everyone.

In recent times, it has become even more important to closely guard the quality of water since it is one of infectious diseases. Furthermore, the treatment of poisoning of our vast water resources by anti-social elements and terrorists has been a major concern of the administration. The development of new methods and devices for monitoring the quality of potable water therefore assumes great importance.

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