India

• India experiences chronic water problems. In 2019, 70 per cent of surface water in India was unfit for consumption, caused by the quantity of domestic sewage generated by rapidly expanding towns and cities.
• A survey of 27 cities found that untreated sewage flowing in open drains was causing serious deterioration of groundwater quality with knock-on impacts to human health.
• Vector-borne diseases such as cholera and dysentery are widespread and water pollution was also found to be a major cause of poor nutrition and under development in children.
• According to WHO, more than 87 per cent of people in India's cities (compared to 33 per cent in rural areas) now have access to a toilet, but it is the leaking and incomplete sewage systems that are leading to the contamination of rivers and lakes.
• The World Bank believes that such a release of pollution upstream lowers economic growth in downstream areas, reducing GDP growth in these regions by up to a third.
• Prime minister, Naendra Modi, has made cleaning the Ganges (holy river) a key policy goal, increasing public toilets to prevent human waste running into wells and streams.