Water purifiers developed during Rajasthan deluge delivered to flood-hit Assam
GUWAHATI A set of specialised water purifiers developed during the 2006 deluge in Barmer, Rajasthan, has been delivered to the flood-hit districts of Charaideo, Jorhat
GUWAHATI A set of specialised water purifiers developed during the 2006 deluge in Barmer, Rajasthan, has been delivered to the flood-hit districts of Charaideo, Jorhat, and Sivasagar in eastern Assam. On Sunday (August 9, 2026), two scientists from the Nagpur-based Council of Scientific and Industrial Research– Environmental Engineering Research Institute (CSIR-NEERI) began distributing 100 units of the emergency insta-portable water purification system. The system is called NEERI-ZAR. CSIR-NEERI’s Atul Maldhure and Kumar Amrit assembled the filtration units at the CSIR-North East Institute of Science and Technology in Jorhat.
These will be distributed by Monday (August 10). “Of the 100 units, 25 are community-based, and 75 are household units. Collectively, they can produce 2,500 litres of purified water per hour, require no electricity, and have no operational cost,” Mr. Maldhure told The Hindu. “The best thing about these gravity-based units is that they can purify ambient water from rivers, ponds, and wells by removing suspended matter, turbidity, and microbial contamination,” he said. According to the scientists, the NEERI-ZAR unit meets the requirements for drinking and cooking water in emergencies and will ensure a stable drinking water supply in flood-affected regions.
“Designed for easy operation, the unit is easy to transport and install, making it extremely useful in emergencies and flood-affected regions,” Mr. Maldhure said. The technology was developed in 2006, during the Barmer floods. It was improvised and deployed during the 2009 cyclone in the Sundarbans, Uttarakhand (2013), Chennai (2015), Kerala (2018), and Bihar (2019). The scientists said the filtration units would go a long way in addressing a challenge posed by plastic pollution from thousands of units of bottled water and soft drinks distributed as relief to flood-affected people since the disaster struck the eastern Assam districts on July 19.
“Water in plastic bottles is a quick-fix solution in disaster zones, but they come at a cost — environmental and financial — unlike the NEERI-ZAR,” Mr. Maldhure said.
The BriefWire