While issues relating to sharing of the Indus and its tributaries are undoubtedly important, let our focus on IWT not undermine some of the equally important water problems facing South Asia.
We need to invest more time, funds and efforts in understanding water problems from a multi-disciplinary perspective rather than entirely focusing on the notion of‘sharing the rivers’ and their ‘securitisation’.
One of the most important issues that South Asia is likely to face in the next few years is water scarcity.
In historical terms, never before has our population lived in cities as much as it does now.
Where would we find water to support cities?
This is not only about feeding the population, but also finding adequate water to service the entire urbanisation process.
Our cities are likely to appropriate more water, at the cost of spending the same on agriculture.
We need to ‘democratise’ the debate, as our region seems to have abdicated it to war mongers.
Political and community leaders are better suited to discuss such problems.
From a multi-disciplinary perspective, we need more institutions supported by regional dialogue.

Graphene Sieves Could Remove Salt From Water And Make It Drinkable.
Scientists have demonstrated how a graphene sieve could be used to remove salt from water and provide clean drinking water to millions of people.
The groundbreaking new finding comes from a group of scientists at The University of Manchester, published in the journal Nature Nanotechnology.
They investigated the possibility of using graphene membranes, thin layers of the material, for water filtration.
Previously, researchers had found that making these membranes resulted in them becoming swollen, allowing smaller salts through.
This latest research, however, was able to prevent this swelling by using walls of epoxy resin on either side of the membrane to stop the expansion, noted BBC News.
It’s slightly different than the single-layer graphene that was shown off in 2004, also by the University of Manchester.
This type of graphene can more easily be made permeable, allowing holes smaller than one nanometer to be made, which are necessary to stop the flow of salt.
“This is the first clear-cut experiment in this regime,” Professor Rahul Nair, at The University of Manchester and a co-author on the study, said in a statement.
But water filtration is notoriously difficult, requiring costly desalination plants.

Water scarcity at Sabarimala.
Sabarimala is in the grip of acute water scarcity.
The Kunnar dam that has been catering to the water needs of Sabarimala Sannidhanam too has dried up.
Engineers attached to Travancore Devaswom Board told The Hindu that the gravitational flow of water from the Kunnar dam has completely stopped with the dam turning dry three weeks ago.
The temple devaswom authorities struggled to find water for washing the temple premises and the ‘18 steps’ prior to the Padipuja on Monday evening.
Requirement Sabarimala Sannidhanam requires 20 lakh to 30 lakh litres of water a day during the monthly puja period.
Akhila Bharatha Ayyappa Seva Sanghom vice-president D. Vijayakumar said the KWA should ensure uninterrupted water supply to Sabarimala as the pilgrim centre will witness increased pilgrim flow during the ensuing Vishu festival.
The low water level in the Pampa in the foothills of Sabarimala has been posing difficulty to the pilgrims for having their customary dip, Pampa Snanom, before undertaking the trek to the hillock.
Skin ailments Meanwhile, the release of water from the Kullar dam has slightly raised the water level in the Pampa bathing ghats on Tuesday.
The State’s second largest tribal settlement at Attathode situated on the banks of the Pampa downstream the Pampa bathing ghats too is facing water shortage, not to speak of the pollution arising out of the flow of filth into the river from the pilgrim centre.

Researchers have tapped into graphene-oxide membranes as a new source to produce clean water.
A team from The University of Manchester have demonstrated the real-world potential of creating adequate clean water sources using graphene-oxide for new filtration technologies.
Graphene-oxide membranes have previously shown potential for gas separation and water filtration and graphene-oxide membranes developed at the National Graphene Institute at The University of Manchester have already demonstrated the potential of filtering out small nanoparticles, organic molecules and large salts.
However, prior to this study, graphene-oxide membranes could not be used for sieving common salts used in desalination technologies, which require very small sieves.
Previous research at The University of Manchester found that if immersed in water, graphene-oxide membranes become slightly swollen and smaller salts flow through the membrane along with water but larger ions or molecules were blocked.
The research team have now further developed the graphene membranes and found a strategy to avoid the swelling of the membrane when exposed to water.
The pore size in the membrane can be precisely controlled, allowing the sieving of common salts out of salty water, making it safe to drink.
When common salts are dissolved in water, they form a ‘shell’ of water molecules around the salt molecules, which allows the tiny capillaries of the graphene-oxide membranes to block the salt from flowing along with the water.
“This is the first clear-cut experiment in this regime.
However, the researchers believe that this technology has the potential to revolutionize water filtration across the world, particularly in countries that cannot afford large-scale desalination plants.

Graphene sieve that turns seawater into drinking water could be a game-changer.
By using a graphene sieve to turn seawater into drinking water, millions of lives could be saved all over the world.
Time and time again, the ‘wonder material’ graphene has shown itself to be a potential game-changer for many industries due to its superconductive properties, at only one atom in thickness.
A new discovery by a team from the University of Manchester (UM) – the very place that gave birth to graphene in its latest form – has found that its applications in the real world could have even greater effects.
Controlling the pores In a research paper published in the journal Nature Nanotechnology, Jijo Abraham and Dr Vasu Siddeswara Kalangi, along with their team, have shown that a graphene-oxide membrane has exciting potential for gas separation and water filtration.
While graphene-oxide membranes have already proved to be promising in filtering out small nanoparticles and organic molecules, they couldn’t be used for sieving common salts used in desalination technologies, which require even smaller sieves.
With this latest breakthrough, however, salt water can be sieved through the graphene membrane to create clean, potable drinking water that could potentially benefit millions of people around the world.
Timely in face of climate change The graphene membrane would originally swell allowing smaller salts to flow through, but the team found a way to prevent this by precisely controlling the pore size.
Prof Rahul Raveendran-Nair of UM said: “Realisation of scalable membranes with uniform pore size down to atomic scale is a significant step forward, and will open new possibilities for improving the efficiency of desalination technology.
We also demonstrate that there are realistic possibilities to scale up the described approach and mass produce graphene-based membranes with required sieve sizes.” By creating smaller-scale graphene sieves, the hope is that more drinking water will be available, with predictions that 14pc of the world’s population will experience water scarcity by 2025 in the face of climate change.

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This development in graphene technology could help millions of people across the globe who don’t have access to clean and safe drinking water.
The graphene oxide sieve could be extremely efficient in the process of filtering salts.
The researchers solved some of the challenges using a chemical derivative called graphene oxide.
Previous studies carried out at the University of Manchester showed that, when immersed in water, the graphene oxide membranes become a little swollen, allowing smaller salt molecules to flow through the holes in the membrane along with the water.
Water Scarcity And The Infrastructure Necessary To Overcome It The effects of global warming keep reducing the water supplies of modern cities, and wealthy countries have started investing in technologies that allow desalination.
The United Nations expects 14 percent of the world’s population to face water scarcity by 2025.
With the new graphene-based sieve, the world would be able to massively improve water filtration technologies and address water scarcity.

In a paper published in the journal Nature Nanotechnology, scientists from the University of Manchester revealed how they were able to create a graphene-based filter that can make saltwater drinkable.
According to a report from BBC News, this new graphene oxide sieve can actually remove salt from seawater.
"As an ink or solution, we can compose it on a substrate or porous material," Nair said.
"Then we can use it as a membrane.
In terms of scalability and the cost of the material, graphene oxide has a potential advantage over single-layered graphene."
However, when these membranes are immersed in water, they swell up, causing smaller salts to flow through the membrane with the water while larger ions or molecules are blocked.
Common salts dissolve in water and create a "shell" of water molecules around the salt molecules, according to a report from Phys Org.
Then, the capillaries of the membrane can keep the salt from flowing with the water.
"Realisation of scalable membranes with uniform pore size down to atomic scale is a significant step forward and will open new possibilities for improving the efficiency of desalination technology," Nair explained.
"This is the first clear-cut experiment in this regime."

Graphene-based sieve turns seawater into drinking water.
A UK-based team of researchers has created a graphene-based sieve capable of removing salt from seawater.
The promising graphene oxide sieve could be highly efficient at filtering salts.
Reporting their results in the Nature Nanotechnology journal, University of Manchester scientists, led by Dr Rahul Nair, show how they used a chemical derivative called graphene oxide to solve some of the challenges.
Until now, they could not be used to filter out common salts, which require smaller sieves.
Previous work had shown that graphene oxide membranes became slightly swollen when immersed in water, allowing smaller salts to flow through the pores along with water molecules.
By contrast, water molecules flowed fast through the membrane barrier, which made it ideal for use in desalination.
Current desalination plants around the world use polymer-based membranes.
"The next step is to compare this with the state-of-the-art material available on the market," Dr Nair said.
Ram Devanathan, from the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Richland, US, said more work was needed to produce graphene oxide membranes inexpensively at industrial scales.

Israeli firm to provide drinking water — from the air — for India and Vietnam.
Water Gen inked an agreement last week with India’s second largest solar company to produce purified water for remote villages in the country.
“The government of Vietnam greatly esteems the technological developments in Israel, and I hope that the Israeli technology that we supply to Vietnam will significantly help to improve water conditions in the country,” Water Gen President Mikhael Mirilashvili said after the signing in Hanoi, according to a statement.
Harvard Law professor Alan Dershowitz demonstrated Water Gen’s technology on stage at the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s annual policy conference in Washington, D.C., on March 26.
He touted the device, which he said can produce 15-20 liters of drinkable water a day, as a weapon against worldwide water scarcity and the Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions movement against Israel.
“There is no weapon more powerful in the fight against BDS than for Israel to develop technologies that the world cannot live without,” he told the crowd.
“You cannot boycott products that you can’t live without.” About 1.2 billion people, nearly one-fifth of the world’s population, live in areas of water scarcity, according to the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs.
Of India’s 1.25 billion people, 75 million lack access to clean water, the Water Aid nonprofit found last year.
Water Gen devices use thin plastic leaves to condensed water from warm, humid air.
In India, Water Gen is to deploy its technology to supply drinking water to remote villages in India with solar power from Vikar Solar.

Graphene sieve could make seawater drinkable.
(CNN)Researchers in the United Kingdom have developed a graphene-based sieve that can filter salt out of seawater, a development that could provide drinking water to millions of people around the globe.
Graphene — an ultra-thin sheet of carbon atoms organized in a hexagonal lattice — was first identified at the University of Manchester in 2002 and has since been hailed as a "wonder material," with scientists racing to develop inexpensive graphene-based barriers for desalination on an industrial scale.
Now, the team at Manchester has used a compound of graphene, known as graphene oxide, to create a rigid sieve that could filter out salt using less energy.
But researchers had struggled to move forward after finding that the membrane’s pores would swell up when immersed in water, allowing particles to continue to pass through.
Writing Monday in the Nature Nanotechnology journal, the team revealed it was able to restrict pore-swelling by coating the material with epoxy resin composite that prevented the sieve from expanding.
"This is the first clear-cut experiment in this regime.
We also demonstrate that there are realistic possibilities to scale up the described approach and mass produce graphene-based membranes with required sieve sizes," he added.
Boosting global access to water is critical.
Cities have been investing heavily in diversifying their water supplies, including developing new desalination technologies to make seawater potable.