The next time you buy a bottle of drinking water, you need to pause and think. I know you wouldn't even bat an eyelid shelling out Rs 15 for a litre of bottled water. But what you do not realise and that is why you need to think is that you are actually paying over 4,200 times of what you normally pay for a litre of tap water.
The economics of drinking water has always baffled me. The business of bottled water is still more intriguing. What is perplexing is that the same class of people – the average urban middle class – squirms and protests if the Delhi Jal Board, for instance, tries to “nominally” raise the price of tap water. Paying a little over one paise for three litres of tap water (DJB prices tap water at Rs 3.50 per 1000 litres) they feel they are already being made to pay through their noses.
At home, they want to get water almost free of charge. They think it is their fundamental right, and any upward revision in the pricing of water is an infringement. The moment they step out of home, they realise that any claim to human right will not quench their thirst. They pay, and pay through their pockets. In trendy restaurants, they end up paying even more. No questions asked, no scope for protests. Nor have I seen anyone seeking an economic justification for the hefty price bottled water is priced at.  
Price being of little constraint for consumers, the global bottled water industry is galloping. In 2004, the world consumed 154 billion litres, of which India’s share was 5.1 billion litres.
Expected to grow at 40 per cent annually, the Rs 1800-crore bottled water industry is in the midst of an unprecedented boom. Bottling water is becoming a brisk business with over 1200 water factories scattered throughout the country. That is why within a short span of five years – between 1999 and 2004 – India’s consumption of bottled water multiplied almost five times. India now is amongst the top ten bottled water consumers.
Blame it on the safety and quality of the pipe water supply, the fact remains that municipalities are faced with an unprecedented resource crunch. The quality of tap water can certainly be enhanced to the level of filter water provided the consumers are willing to pay more. After all, we have no reason to complain about the quality of piped water supply if we are spending only one paise for every three litres of water.
If you think bottled water assures you of purity and safety, it is time you think again. With over 2000 companies seeking ISI certification from the Bureau of Indian Standards (BIS), the quality of bottled water supplied remains under a scanner. Studies have already shown that the quality of bottled water often fails to meet the prescribed standards. In the US, one of five states has actually no regulations for bottled water. In India, the BIS has no mechanism for inspecting the quality of bottled water. 
Shockingly, what is little known is that more than five litres of water is required in the manufacturing process for every litre of packed water. In other words, 770 billion litres of water were used to produce and pack the 154 billion litres of water that the world consumed in 2004. In India, 25.5 billion litres of water were wasted in 2004 in the same process. What a colossal waste of water by any standards.
Bottled water also has additional hidden environmental costs. According to the Pacific Institute in California, the entire process of making plastic for the bottles requires huge energy. In America alone, where nearly 26 billion litres of bottled water was consumed in 2004, an equivalent of 20 million barrels of oil was required every year to manufacture and transport the bottles. The accumulation of plastic bottles in the landfills also adds to global warming besides contaminating the groundwater.
But is there a silver lining? Are people beginning to see the damage being done by the bottled water industry? Yes, more and more people are now awakening to the threat. A number of restaurants and hotels in the United States for instance have begun to serve only filtered water to customers. Some of them have even taken off bottled water from the menu. Restaurants in Minnesota, Salt Lake City and elsewhere have taken the lead. It is time the top restaurants and five-star hotels in India too set an example. 
City authorities are also waking up. More recently, in San Francisco, Mayor Gavin Newsom has through an executive order issued in July banned city departments, agencies and contractors from using city funds to serve water in plastic bottles and in larger dispensers when tap water is available. His argument is that for the price of one litre of bottled water local residents can purchase 1000 litres of tap water. Prior to him, the Mayor of Salt Lake City had also issued a similar notification.  Is is not  time to launch a similar initiative in India?