Piramal Sarvajal, the safe drinking water initiative of Piramal Foundation launched a tool named Composite Water Vulnerability Index (CWVI) at its recent Webinar on ‘Sustainable Water Security for Urban Under-Served’ hosted in association with Center for Water and Sanitation (CWAS) and Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology (CEPT).

The CWVI tool is designed to rank slums on various parameters such as Availability, Accessibility, Reliability, Quality and Burden of Disease. This tool designed by Piramal Sarvajal in partnership with CWAS was demonstrated through a Pilot study in 23 slums of Nagpur, in alliance with the Nagpur Municipal Corporation (NMC), that has led the way in smart-city thinking. As opined and agreed by the panelists during the Webinar, this tool could be replicated in ten smart cities in Maharashtra and then scaled-up and administered across various smart cities in India.

The CWVI tool will go a long way in defining and identifying highly vulnerable communities and their specific areas of challenge. This will further help governing bodies to take a more robust approach to resolve the current problem of provision of reliable and safe drinking water to urban beyond-the-pipe communities. Leveraging technology and innovation along with cloud computing, digital finance and development finance will better equip the country to resolve water management problems. These solutions will also lead to women empowerment by mobilizing them towards community engagement in water.

The speakers at the Webinar on ‘Sustainable Water Security for Urban Under-Served’ included Dr. Swati Piramal, Vice-Chairperson, Piramal Group and Director, Piramal Foundation; Shri Mahesh Pathak, Principal Secretary, Urban Development Department, Government of Maharashtra; Hitesh Vaidya, Director, National Institute of Urban Affairs (NIUA); Dr. K. Viswanath, Lee Kum Kee Professor of Health Communication, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and Director, Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health - India Research Center; Dr. Meera Mehta Director, CWAS, CEPT and Anuj Sharma, CEO, Piramal Sarvajal. The webinar was moderated by Prof Dinesh Mehta, CWAS, CEPT University.