Xylem eyes water metering business in India

US-based Xylem is eyeing the water metering business in India and in talks with various municipal corporations and civic bodies, a company official said on Monday.

Citing global studies, the company said over 50 per cent of supplied water from civic bodies gets wasted, and ground water levels in most Indian cities are depleting.

"We are targeting the wastage of non-revenue water (NRW), which is huge in India. At present, we are working with Larsen & Toubro for installing water meters in the Pune municipal corporation area," said Amit Vaidya, Director-India, Strategic Customer Team.

He said NRW is the part of supplied water that is not billed by municipal corporations for raising revenue.

Vaidya said schemes like AMRUT and similar ones funded by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and other multilateral agencies would give a boost to the smart water distribution network across the country.

Quoting a study by the NITI Aayog, he said that 60 crore Indians are facing extreme water stress, and about two lakh people die every year, owing to inadequate access to safe water.

Twenty-one cities are likely to run out of groundwater by 2020, Vaidya added, quoting the study.