"Water literacy is as important as financial literacy to preserve and develop existing waterbodies," said K. Satya Gopal, former Additional Chief Secretary, Government of Tamil Nadu, and former member of National Green Tribunal.

Speaking at 'Madurai Symposium 2025 - Advancing Development: Enabling Development Partnership', organised by DHAN Foundation here on Wednesday, Mr. Satya Gopal said the importance of waterbodies and their preservation should be taught to children as part of school curriculum.

"In the last three to five decades, waterbodies have been severely disturbed due to the exploitation carried out by human beings," he noted.

As the public had started taking waterbodies for granted, they had turned them into dumping sites for household waste, sewage and even biomedical waste, he said.

Stating that encroachments on waterbodies had become rampant, Mr. Satya Gopal said even the government lacked awareness of the dangers of encroachments on waterbodies. As a result, he said, many government projects, including bus stands and offices, were raised on waterbodies.

"Though the governments got sensitised to the importance of preserving them, the officials' hands were tied by courts in initiating action and removing encroachments," he said.

However, of late the judiciary had been coming down heavily on encroachers and even passing strict orders to rejuvenate waterbodies. "A Supreme Court's order has even prevented the governments from using waterbodies that have dried up. The SC even added that the governments have no rights to alter the character of a waterbody," he added.

The National Green Tribunal, acting on a waterbody at Velachery in Chennai which was reduced from its original area of 253 acres to just 53 acres due to encroachments, directed the State to find an alternative space, double the size of the lost waterbody, to create a new water source, he noted.

"The symposium which has made water literacy a key topic has taken forward the awareness to the next level," he added.

He suggested that DHAN foundation could organise a similar technology-based symposium to provide farmers an opportunity to display their creative technologies.

"As sustainable agriculture has become an important area to be learned to tackle the effects of climate change, the platforms provided to the farmers would enable them to develop their ideas," Mr. Satya Gopal said.

B.T. Bangera, chairperson, DHAN Foundation, and M.P. Vasimalai, Executive Director, among others spoke at the event.

'Water literacy indispensable to preserve existing waterodies'