Water problem may lead to evacuation in Bengaluru in 10 years: Azim Premji

IT czar and Wipro founder Azim Premji today said the IT city would have to be evacuated within next ten years due to water problems and in a lighter vein suggested throwing garbage in face of the person who throws it into a pond.

"Well it is an extremely critical problem ... Unless we address the water problem - in reality terms we have to evacuate Bengaluru within next ten years. It is as serious as that in our major cities," Premji said while responding to a question from school children on water problem during 'Wipro Earthian 2014' programme. Asked why cities suffer from acute water problems despite an educated population, Premji said, "People of the city are educated on wrong things," sending the audience into peels of laughter.

When asked how to stop someone who throws garbage into the pond, Premji, in a humorous vein, said "You tell them not to do it. When you see people throwing garbage into your pond, pick that up and throw it on him."

Asked what should be done to get results out of meetings held on this issue of climate change, Premji said a person who is attending such conference should be empowered and given the authority to say yes or no. "We should empower a person who is attending such conferences. In many of the conferences we attend, we are not giving a person authority to say or no - This rips the whole issue and bring things back from where we started," he stated.

Asked how to overcome the problem of over-population, Premji said educating girl child is the best solution to put a stop to it. "The best control of overpopulation comes from educating the girl child because when she grows up she is much more conscious of a smaller family," he said. "The girl child is conscious of a family she can look after well, not creating a family which is something too large and unmanageable," Premji said. Corroborating his point, Premji said the population growth rate of Kerala and Tamil Nadu was the lowest in the country because of the high literacy among the girl child.