Class 5 EVS

Every Drop Counts

Water is essential for everybody. No living being can survive without water. Life on earth is not possible without water.

We use water for many purposes. Some examples are given below.

This chapter has been named EVERY DROP COUNTS. This means that in this lesson, you will learn about scarcity of water. You will also learn about water harvesting.

Distribution of Water

Pitcher

India is a huge country. Every year, during the rainy season, some parts of the country get plenty of rainfall. But some other parts of the country get negligible rain. When there is flood in Assam, Bengal and Bihar there can be drought in Rajasthan. This means that availability of water is a problem at many places.

There are many big rivers in India. These rivers are filled with water for the whole year. But there are many other rivers which become dry in rainy season.

Sources of Water

Today, people of most of the towns and villages face the problem of scarcity of water. In most of the cities, water comes to people’s homes through pipelines. But very few homes get regular supply of water. In some neighbourhoods, water is supplied by tankers. Whenever a tanker comes, hundreds of people have to fight with each other to get water.

Some people have other arrangements for getting water. Rich people have bore-wells in their houses. They use water pump to get water from bore-well. Some people use hand-pump to get water from under the ground. Some other sources of water are, well, river and pond.

Water on Earth

Earth has plenty of water. But most of the water on earth is in oceans and seas. Water from ocean has lot of salt. In other words, it is saline water. Saline water is not fit for human consumption. Very small portion of water is in the form of freshwater. We need freshwater for drinking and for all other purposes. Freshwater is available in rivers and ponds and under the ground.