The publication issued in September 2003, by BIS (Bureau of Indian Standards, 2003) which set the desirable limit of arsenic in drinking water to be 10 g/l. and a recent publication in Toxicology discussed about implications of drinking water standards in developing countries especially on magnitude of cancer risks. In the concluding remark the authors suggest raising the guideline value to 50 g/l in case of developing countries. This paper lists the reservations of school of environment on the above publication and how it stresses on developing strategies to supply safe drinking water to people in developing country following the present WHO guideline value.

Reprinted from The School of Environmental Studies, Jadavpur University, Kolkata, India