A project for portable water purifiers under the Jivamritam: Clean Drinking Water Project, the joint project of Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham, the Consulate General of Israel to South India, Bangalore, and Tel Aviv University, was inaugurated at the Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences, Kochi, on January 21, 2019. The formal inauguration was done by the Consul General Dana Kursh (Israeli Consulate to South India); Deputy Consul General Ariel Seidman, (Israeli Consulate to South India); Prof. Bhavani Rao, UNESCO Chair in Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment at Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham and Dr. Prem Nair, Medical Director at the Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences & Research Center. The portable low-cost filters from NU Filtration do not require electricity and can be mobilized quickly in disaster response.
Dr. Prem Nair, Medical Director at the Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences & Research Center, welcomed the guests to the Amrita Hospital and spoke about the importance of water purification projects for health and hygiene. He emphasized the innovation of the Jivamritam project as the NUF water purifiers, created through research from Tel Aviv University, repurpose sanitized kidney dialysis filters to make pure water from contaminated sources.
Prof. Bhavani Rao, UNESCO Chair in Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment and Director of Ammachi Labs, Amritapuri, presented the project overview of the portable water systems and detailed how the project came to fruition as an amicable research collaboration between Tel Aviv University and Amrita Vishwa Vidyapeetham. Consul General Dana Kursh reiterated that the name “Jivamritam” is so fitting as a project title because water is the very “nectar of the soul” and verily the source of life. Deputy Consul General Ariel Seidman was also present for the function and extended his full support for this endeavor.
This unique Indo-Israel research project will enhance collaboration between Tel Aviv University’s UNESCO Chair on Technology, Internationalization & Education and Amrita’s UNESCO Chair in Gender Equality and Women’s Empowerment. After the function, the Consular representatives unveiled the installation of the water purification system and sampled the water. They later toured the nanosciences lab and continued with collaborative meetings with teams from Amrita.
During the 2018 Kerala floods, many regions were faced with a drinking-water crisis due to the contamination of wells and damage to pumping stations. To help prevent this scenario from repeating in the future, five units will be installed in post-flood regions of Kerala by the Amrita’s Jivamritam team.
