Water Projects are indeed more of social projects than commercial ones: Arun Lakhani, Chairman & MD, Vishvaraj Group

In an interview with Rusen Kumar, Editor, India CSR; Vishvaraj Group’s chairman and managing director, Arun Lakhani, spoke about the potential of wastewater recycle and ESG-focused water utility, key initiatives undertaken in this area, experience with water supply projects, major challenges and plans. Excerpts of an interview:

Give us a brief overview of Vishvaraj Group? What are its different focus areas? 

Vishvaraj Environment, the flagship company of the Vishvaraj Group, is an ESG-focused water utility. We are social entrepreneurs who contribute to Water Sustainability, Wastewater Treatment, and Reuse, leading to water security. Our vision is to align with the larger cause of public benefit. This has helped create not only sustainability for all but also a sustainable business for Vishvaraj. 

With more than 20 years of experience, we are spearheading social change through the water to improve the lives of over 43 million people in the country. We have a combined operating capacity of over 3,057 MLD across 42 water and wastewater treatment & reuse plants. Recently, we expanded our footprint overseas by winning a marquee project in the Maldives. Today VEPL is amongst the top 50 global private water operators (GWI ranking) and has received several awards, including one for best practice by the Prime Minister of India.

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How Vishvaraj Group is helping to achieve SDG 6 target for India – Clean Water and Sanitation? What are the major contribution areas? 

India still has 666 million people without access to safe drinking water and 20% of deaths are due to water-borne diseases. So, the success of achieving SDG6 targets by 2030 (and thereby the water action decade and the last decade of action) largely relies on its success in India.

We are working towards building a society where every person receives access to a 24×7 uninterrupted supply of clean and safe drinking water. We pioneered India’s first successful PPP full city project – a 24×7 water supply to Nagpur, benefiting 2.7 million people. We are focused on building positive water security cycles through infrastructure. 

We also are promoting the idea of reuse of treated water for industrial and agricultural purposes, to achieve water sustainability in the country. We pride ourselves on executing the largest PPP STP project in India that provides tertiary treated water to thermal power stations, freeing 190 million liters per day (MLD) of freshwater that can take care of population growth for the next 35 years of the city of Nagpur. Another 50 MLD STP with reuse is under construction.

What are the important aspects when it comes to water management and sustainability? 

Supply and demand management and reuse are essential parts of the sustainable water cycle. In supply we are dependent on local conditions and availability of resources, however, the demand can be managed with efficiency increase and reducing the Non-Revenue Water (NRW) in any supply network. For achieving this replacement of old leaking assets, metering and telescopic tariff are essential.

On the sewage side, the treatment and reuse for all non-potable uses like industry, construction, gardening are essential to release/swap the same amount of fresh water which can be used for drinking.  

Thus, in sustainable water management, essential steps are reducing NRW, 24×7 supply, metering, telescopic tariff, 100% treatment of sewage and reuse of sewage treated water for all non-potable use. Thus, releasing the swapped fresh water for drinking purposes.

Tell us more about the 4P model? Given the social nature of the sector, how do you ensure the trust of the common people? 

Water Projects are indeed more of social projects than commercial ones. When we say we are working towards a 4P model, we mean the participation of the citizens in the scheme itself. When people see tap water running in their homes, they realize the true benefits of the 24×7 water supply program and it frees up their time to be gainfully deployed. They become part of the program, supporting it and helping resolve difficult situations encountered in the field. Ultimately our work increases the happiness quotient of the people, and this is the true success of a 4P model.

The biggest challenge with the 4P model is the time required to develop trust. We spend considerable time working with the communities, solving their everyday problems, to build a relationship of trust. We involve the local community through “Mohalla meetings”, we visited schools/colleges and have contact with over one lakh students, participate in local community building projects and we also set up a mechanism to get any feedback which is related to our project specifically and also related to the general wellbeing of the locality, and then we help solve the issues.

The 4th P the people are the largest stakeholders in the water project. Keeping them as the center of all planning and their on-boarding and support is essential for any PPP project to succeed.

Why is there a strong need for water treatment plants in the country? 

Water has been a greatly neglected subject in our country. Basically because of the predominantly rural population at the time of independence and abundant availability of water catering to a very manageable population size at that time. The Population growth, urbanization, industrialization and modernization of farming have led to immense pressure on water as a resource. 

Today 82% of water is used for agriculture where the efficiencies are abysmally low, resulting in pressure on industrial and drinking water. Improper/nontreatment of sewage, which is 80% of the water supplied to town, leads to contamination of freshwater sources and generation of methane and other greenhouse gases that negatively impact the climate. Unfortunately, sewage treatment is the last priority of any urban local body due to scarcity of resources, leading to a situation where 21% of diseases in our country are water born and over 100 million person-days are lost due to water-borne diseases.

In this scenario, planning the future supply for a 1.3 billion and growing population is a mammoth task, and to ensure this supply water treatment becomes critical. 

Sewage treatment and reuse are equally important, we would be doing a disservice to this natural resource unless we treat it and use it for non-potable purposes, releasing freshwater. 

We believe that the reuse and recycling of water is a must for us and only by being aware of the same, we can become ‘Sujjlaam, Suflaam’ which our country has always been.

How does Vishvaraj Group ensure community development through its projects?

We have always believed in active community involvement as per our 4P philosophy. We have been involved in many social welfare programs with NGOs in Nagpur and at our other project sites.

As mentioned before, we involve the local community by way of “mohalla” meetings, participate in local community-building projects, and set up a mechanism to get any feedback, which might be related to our project specifically but also about the well-being of the locality in general, and help solve their issues.

Some of the social work we have undertaken includes a collaboration with NGO Upay for education at Laxminagar slum area and livelihood centers at Ganganagar slums in Nagpur, we had organized Health Awareness programs in association with the Indian Cancer Society affiliated with Mure Memorial Hospital, Arogya Bharti and Deen Dayal Upadhyay trust for organizing health checkups and we have also installed an oxygen plant and oxygen concentrators for a Covid facility.

What is a circular sustainable economy? How can it be achieved?

The circular sustainable economy in short means building an economy where we could ‘use’ resources rather than exploiting them by ‘using them up and reuse them as many times as possible and thereby craft a sustainable model. 

As a consequence of population growth, climate change, depletion of natural resources, and pollution, we need an economic system based on sustainable practices to ensure future generations do not face severe crunches, particularly for a country like India, where we have a large population.

For the success of a sustainable circular economy, we need to make reuse compulsory, governments absorbing costs initially and slowly making it financially self-supported. It is crucial to promote the reuse of sewage-treated water for various applications like industries and agriculture. Options of EPC/PPP/HAM are all effective in India for these projects. Govt. should support such an endeavor of reuse of water.

A focused approach on improving agricultural water efficiency including cropping patterns and groundwater laws to make additional water available from the agriculture sector. 

To make pressurized water systems with metering and telescopic tariffs a must for all urban centers.

How can the government and private players work together effectively to ensure water security in India?

The biggest requirement for government and private players to work effectively together is to build a relationship of trust. For companies to have a successful long-term relationship with governments, both sides need to be transparent and clear about their roles and responsibilities. Kelkar’s report has very effectively defined the measures to be taken by the government to build this relationship shifting from transactional to more permanent, under the PPP model.

We still need a balanced concession agreement, which balances risks and revenue security for the private partner and deliverable guarantees for a public partner. Revenue assurance can be like the one given in the Namami Ganga program, where the central government has assured the payment which makes entrepreneurs and lenders comfortable to invest. 

Nobody can deny the need for this partnership in several critical sectors. The government is planning to bring in a policy to fast-track Public-Private Partnership Projects which is a welcome step, a must for the future of India. It will help speed up the projects and also ensure quality adding to efficiency and accountability. With Niti Aayog (we are an advisor for water projects) we have supported the PPP /HAM approach to keep the long-term interest of the private player- in the Ganga plan, and we have also presented the concept to the Hon’ble Prime Minister.