Water activists slam World Water Council, accuses its president of bias against India

"This attempt to marginalize India at the water’s biggest forum has intensified ever since an Indian, Prithvi Raj Singh, – who belongs to an erstwhile royal family of Rajasthan- managed to get elected to the WWC’s Governing council in 2015 through his 'foreign' friends in the Council," sources in WWC representing India said. 

Till recently, before this year's March World Water Forum, which is organized by the WWC every four year, India had no say with only eight members (that means only eight votes) in the over 300-member WWC which till now was dominated by France (40 members) and Brazil (33 members).

India’s elevation indeed made the caucus that rules the WWC, uncomfortable, said activists now taking on its president for its alleged bias against India. 

"This unease was reflected way back in 2016 itself when a lowly rank officer of the WWC, Patrick Johann Schindler, who was the personal assistant of WWC President Dr. Benedito Braga, who himself is a secretary of state ranked officer for sanitation and water resources for the Brazilian state of Sao Paolo, threw protocol and international diplomacy to the winds and threatened that Braga would 'decline all meetings' with the Indian Prime Minister and other cabinet ministers if Schindler was not included  in these meetings during a visit by a high-level World Water Council delegation to India," said an Indian member of the WWC.

Finally, the meeting with the Indian PM could not materialize because of this high handed approach of the WWC, Prithvi Raj Singh stated in his correspondence to the WWC Board of Governors, which is in possession of IBNS.  

IBNS also in an email sought a response from the WWC on the charges by Indian members. Any response from WWC is awaited. 

It was in 1996 at Rio Earth Summit that the World Bank, United Nations, IUCN, ICID had proposed the formation of a World Stakeholders' Association focussed on water and sanitation. The founding members of World Water Council were Egypt, France, and Canada.

In 2018 though India has emerged as the largest group with 48 members in the Council because of the efforts of Prithvi Raj Singh, it has made the existing Council members concerned as they fear to lose their dominant position in the cash-rich Council, alleged the activists.

"Hence Braga has kept 26 more membership requests from India pending. It is clear that various dominant lobbies within the Council are wary of India. There is no rule in the WWC Constitution that can restrict the number of members," a source among Indian members said.

"But this is not enough. The Council under Braga is missing no opportunity to slight India and Indians, directly naming them in their correspondence. The most recent is denying to renowned water conservationist Dr. Rajendra Singh, an entry into its ensuing Board of Governors’ meeting in Dakar, Senegal on May 22  this year," the Indian member said.

"Singh’s contribution in the field of water conservation is well known. He is an advocate of treating water as a natural resource and is against the commodification of water," said the member.

He was awarded the Stockholm Water Prize – considered the Noble in Water – by the King of Sweden in 2015. He had shown his willingness to attend the Dakar meeting as an observer.

His application to this effect before the WWC was made in the capacity of the International President of London based Flow Partnership. "However, Dr. Braga did not allow him to participate and this has created heartburns among water activists across the world and more so in India," an Indian member alleged.

In a strongly worded mail to the WWC Board of Governors where he has recounted instances of continued discrimination against India, Prithvi Raj Singh, has said: “The WWC Secretariat telephoned Flow Partnership to enquire if he was an Indian… thereafter we received the mail…that he cannot attend and later after reference to Dr. Braga for reconsideration, his decision not to permit Dr. Rajendra Singh as an observer was reconfirmed…”

Terming it as an insult to India, senior Indian journalist Deepak Parvatiyar, who was made a member of the World Water Council this year, too has shot off a mail to Dr. Braga, where he has asked Braga to “recuse” himself from “any WWC Committee(s)  that concerns decisions on Indians as your bias may affect the dignity and self-esteem of our country”.

“As an Indian, I feel very strongly about your decision of declining invitation to Dr. Rajendra Singh, who is a very respectable figure in India and who has done so much for resolving water issues across the globe in a peaceful manner. As you are aware, he has even undertaken water for peace foot march in over 60 countries to spread water literacy and prevent conflicts,” Parvatiyar said.

Meanwhile, Prithvi Raj Singh, in his mail to the Board of Governors, further highlighted the discrimination against India at the WWC: “…as 35 new Indian members were inducted in Brasilia, I am informed President Braga and some Governors had an emergency consultation on the sidelines of Board meeting in anxiety that the Indians have become a threat to the Governance of the Council."

"Thereafter, it was decided to bring the Governance Commission recommendations for a vote by the Board when in earlier meetings it was agreed that as per the Constitution, the Board cannot vote on changes in the Constitution or by-laws and they should be directly referred to the members in an extraordinary meeting… Meanwhile, 12 more members from India applied and the President did not permit discussion on the merits of these organizations but kept their approval in abeyance on the basis of their nationality…”