Articles by Akshita Nagpal

The newly elected Bharatiya Janata Party at the Centre has announced the launch of ‘Nal Se Jal’, a poll-promise from its 2019 manifesto, to ensure piped water to every household by 2024. How big is the task? In India, only 32% households have tap water supply from treated sources, as per Census 2011. 18 percent or 6,25,000 households in the capital city, home to the nation’s rich and influential, do not have piped water supply. Yet, this city has one of the highest percentages of households with piped water among India’s 35 states and union territories. Only seven of these…

Kanika*, a 15-year-old girl, carries her two-year-old sister Alisha in her arms. The portions of her hands and arms visible outside her half-sleeved magenta kurta are full of abrasions. “I’ve shown it to the doctor many times and he’s given me medicine but it remains itchy,” she says. She attributes the itchiness to the purportedly contaminated water in her home of one and a half years, in Anand Parbat transit camp. Her move to this central Delhi neighbourhood -- five kilometres from her former home – was forced and put her out of school, Kanika recalls. “Alisha was an infant…