He is the primary reason why an enterprise as big as the Indian Premier League had to move out of Maharashtra. But ask Surendra Srivastava, the man who filed the PIL against holding IPL in the state during severe drought, as to what made him take up this fight, he says, “I am only an ordinary man and saving water is the government’s responsibility. But when the government fails, the common man has to take it up.” Srivastava, who is also the founder of the regional Loksatta Party — a political and social entity, faced equal amounts of criticism and support from all corners in his fight against the IPL. But the man himself says that he had no grouse against the tournament or the game, but merely against the idea of wasting water.
He tells us what triggered the idea of filing a PIL against IPL, “Ironically, since the fight is partly against the ruling government as well, the idea itself was inspired by chief minister Devendra Fadnavis.” He further elaborates, “The idea came to me when the CM passed a rule, banning wastage of water in playing Holi this year. Water wasted during Holi is not the first thing that comes to mind when you talk about conservation of water. But I quite liked the idea, especially since it came from a BJP government and Holi was a Hindu festival. To me it felt like giving up something as a symbolic gesture to help those affected. In the same way, it is true that taking the IPL out of the state will not solve the water crisis. But it will definitely help.”
While he was initially impressed with the CM’s move, Surendra says, the way his PIL on IPL was dealt with by the government was something that left him disappointed. “It is ideally the government who should have done this. Events like IPL — which fall into the 4th category (recreation) of priority for water — should have been cancelled by the government without the court’s intervention, but the government completely left it to the judiciary to decide.”
And the reason why he thinks the onus of intervention should lie with the government is because he feels successive ruling parties are heavily responsible for the crisis since a long time. “Traditionally, the state has been successively ruled by the Congress and the NCP. And successive ruling parties have failed to address the water crisis in the long term. All they’ve ever done is take stopgap measures. As per the water policy, the first priority in water distribution goes to human consumption and sanitation, the second goes to agriculture and the third to industry. Recreation events such as IPL are only the fourth priority. So how can we conduct an IPL when the first priority is not taken care of in certain parts of the state?”
But it’s not the government alone. Surendra adds that everyone, especially urban dwellers need to wake up and see how bad the situation is in the state and do something about it. “I have been closely watching the situation in Latur and Marathwada and it is terrible. But you don’t even need to go there to know how bad the water crisis this year actually is. Even when I look at my own building, which is getting water through tankers, it is enough to know that people elsewhere are suffering a far worse plight, especially the farmers,” adds Surendra.
So while he himself agrees that the IPL alone won’t salvage the water situation, what does he think needs to be done by the state? “I am pushing the government to take both short term and long term measures. And the sugarcane industry is something I do have a grouse with. Sugar is a water guzzler and the statistics that I found during my team’s research before the PIL reveal this very clearly. Almost 70 per cent water used in agriculture is taken up by the sugar industry.
But the even more disturbing fact is that sugar is only four percent of all agricultural produce coming from the state. So the remaining 96 per cent of the state’s agriculture industry is basically getting only 30 per cent of the water, which is appalling. Something has to be done and we (Loksatta) decided that we’ll take up this fight.”
Taking IPL out of the state is just the beggining, adds Surendra. “IPL was the first step. The second step is better implementation of the water policy.
Loksatta has continuously been researching on this and we have come up with a document on how to go about it, which we’ll be submitting to the court in the second part of our PIL. The court will be hearing the PIL soon and we are hopeful about a positive development. In any case, we will not stop until this crisis comes to an end,” he promises.
