Thousands of people in India living around Coca-Cola’s bottling plants are challenging the company for creating water shortages and pollution.

Coca-Cola has located many of its bottling plants in drought-prone areas – areas that were already experiencing water shortages.

Coca-Cola’s bottling operations – which extract hundreds of millions of liters of water from the groundwater resource – have significantly worsened the water crisis as groundwater levels have dropped sharply since Coca-Cola started its operations.

The company has also indiscriminately dumped its toxic waste into the surrounding areas – polluting the water as well as the land.

The results have been drastic.  Tens of thousands of farmers around Coca-Cola’s plants have lost their livelihoods as the water has been depleted and the land and water poisoned.  Wells have run dry and women now have to walk miles further to access potable water for daily use.  Children are frequently taken out of schools to assist the family in accessing water for daily needs.

Coca-Cola’s abuses have been well documented by various government and independent studies.  A study paid for by Coca-Cola itself concluded that Coca-Cola has located its plants strictly from a “business continuity” perspective without taking the wider impacts on the community into consideration, and recommended the closure of a bottling plant.

A formidable community-led campaign has emerged in India to hold Coca-Cola accountable for its abuses.  Two Coca-Cola bottling plants have been shut down already, and two vibrant campaigns continue to get stronger in challenging Coca-Cola.

Coca-Cola should never have located its bottling plants in India in drought-prone areas.  Access to water is a fundamental human right, and Coca-Cola is denying communities in India their fundamental human right.

In response to the growing international scrutiny on its unsustainable operations, Coca-Cola has embarked upon an ambitious public relations drive – corporate social responsibility – to manufacture an image of itself as a “water steward.”  Nothing could be further from the truth.

It is clear that the community needs water for and Coca-Cola’s thirst for water cannot co-exist in drought-prone areas of India.  One has to go, and it must be Coca-Cola.