If all the rain that fell in Goa during the year was trapped, the entire state would be flooded with water between seven and 10 feet deep, depending on whether it was a bad or good monsoon. That is the bounty nature has blessed this land with. Yet, today, we have a shortage of drinking water. Our cities get just a few hours of water supply a day, and many of our villages get water only once every alternate day, sometimes even less frequently during the summer. There could not be a contrast more stark. A study conducted jointly by the National Institute of Hydrology (NIH) at Rourkee and Goa University shows that our coastal areas could be under serious threat of saline water ingress into the natural groundwater aquifers if large hotels and luxury housing projects are allowed to indiscriminately sink borewells and buy well water from tankers for the 24-hour showering comforts of their guests and residents. The study notes that the coastal tracts of Goa are rapidly being transformed into settlement areas, and poor water supply facilities have encouraged people to create their own sources of water by digging or boring wells. It says that during the last decade, there has been large-scale pumping of groundwater by builders, hotels and restaurants; as well as by water suppliers to these businesses. Thankfully, seawater intrusion isn't yet a serious problem yet. But there are unmistakeable signs that in coming years it may lead to a serious crisis, if corrective measures are not initiated right now. Over three years, from 2004 to 2007, scientists studied how fresh and salt water move under various realistic scenarios of water being pumped out and naturally recharged, in the beach belt from Anjuna to Candolim, the very heartland of Goa's tourism industry. Using sophisticated software and monitoring wells in the area, they concluded that at present seawater intrusion in coastal Bardez is confined only up to 300 m from the coast under normal rainfall conditions (it could extend further in low rainfall years). But, they say, it may further advance inland if groundwater withdrawal by builders, hotels and other tourist establishments continues to increase in the coming years. The study recommends not only that the digging of wells and sinking of borewells be strictly controlled, but that the groundwater salinity needs to be continuously monitored in the beach belt, up to 2 km from the coast. Proper planning and management of groundwater resources in the area is a must, and corrective measures need to be initiated so that the area does not suffer from a major water quality problem in coming years. Unfortunately, our governments have been doing quite the opposite. Though Dr Wilfred de Souza's government passed a law strictly regulating wells and borewells in coastal areas, no government since has bothered to implement it. On the contrary, the age-old sustainable systems established by our forefathers are being abandoned. Nearly every single Goan village has a tank, or tollem, which was filled at the end of the monsoon and emptied in the summer. This ensured that all the wells in the village were properly recharged. Sadly, most of these tanks are no longer maintained. One of the main reasons for this