Fresh research findings by Pakistan Council of Research in Water Resources blow the lid off as many as 27 different brands selling contaminated water under the smokescreen of “mineral water”. The council has recommended strict punishment for all those involved in making a quick buck.
People tend to buy these glistening branded bottles hoping to save their health but it transpires they get exactly what they are hoping to avoid; polluted content and a whole bagful of diseases. In the recent years the industry has flourished virtually by leaps and bounds; the factories have mushroomed and not only in shops and kiosk around market place in every nook and cranny of the country can one find these bottles but home delivery services are also picking up vogue; the fortune that is being made is just huge. And when law is ridiculed almost at every level, it does not come as a surprise that the culprits get away with selling dangerous diseases like hepatitis, diarrhea and cholera. No one from the official authorities is ever bothered. The authorities must mete out harsh punishments to the culprits in line with the recommendation of the PCRWR. They would have to do it if they intend to paralyse this obnoxious business. But also what needs to be done is provision of clean tap water. If the tap water is free of so many germs it usually contains, there is no bigger boon the consumers can hope to avail. More importantly, it will discourage other unscrupulous merchants from starting to make a fool of the public.
All things pure in general and pure water in particular are in short supply, in fact they have always been. Well who doesn’t know that when it comes to adulteration, we literally have no rival, from diary products to butter and cooking oil, no one is sure whether they are getting the right product. That too is a form of corruption whose roots lie in our outlook of life that each one of us nurtures but rarely realises.