City's water woes

Every summer, Dhaka city faces an acute water scarcity. Polluted water carrying germs of water borne diseases make the crisis even worse.
The root of the crisis lies in imbalanced use of ground water vis-a-vis surface water. Reportedly, 85 per cent of the city's water demand is met by ground water sources. This excessive dependence on the ground water has caused its rapid depletion and put a severe strain on pumping out of water. Shortage of power and numerous illegal water connections only exacerbate the problem.
On the other hand, increased rate of urbanization, illegal occupation and encroachment have reduced the amount and volume of surface water bodies around the city. And existing sources like Buriganga and Sitalakhya rivers are so polluted that it needs high capacity water treatment plant to make the water usable which the WASA utterly lacks.
Thus, to ease the pressure on ground water, the government should facilitate utilisation of surface water. To do so, we have to opt for de-polluting existing surface water sources, reclaiming encroached sources and establishing adequate water treatment facilities.
The government should also take up innovative water management techniques like rain water harvesting, water recycling that have been widely practiced and recommended around the world.