Even that is going out of reach as taps go dry particularly in summer. Cherrapunjee in Meghalaya, despite receiving the highest rainfall in India, now finds it punishing to feed adequate water to its residents.

The story across the country barring a couple of states is the same: no water, just one or two hours of water supply or poor quality water. And the water table in all cities is rapidly going down.

"Only about 40 to 50 percent of people in the country have access to good quality drinking water," Jeslin Jacob of the NGO Development Alternatives told IANS here.

Desperate city officials are resorting to desperate measures. In some cities, water is given out every second day. In other places there is a more severe form of rationing.

Privately owned water tankers have become a hugely profitable business - and a lifeline for many.

New Delhi is one of the worst hit. Those with access to municipal water often wake up as early as 4.30 a.m., when the supply trickles in. Even this lasts only for a short time, in many areas for just 30-45 minutes.

"This must be the only country which claims to be an IT power and a nuclear power but cannot provide water to its citizens," moaned R.K. Ishwar, a mid-level executive in a French company here. "It is a shame."

It is a sentiment widely shared across the country.

"It is a curse to be living in old Lucknow, where extremely poor water supply has made our lives hell," says Khwaja Mohammad Khalid, who like many others had expected an improvement when they elected Atal Bihari Vajpayee as their MP, a man who went on to become prime minister.

More than six million people in the IT city of Hyderabad and surrounding areas get water for just up to two hours, that too on alternate days. Even this is uncertain. A total of 76 of 121 towns in Andhra Pradesh, including Visakhapatnam and Guntur, face a water crisis.

The situation in Bangalore, the other Indian IT showpiece, is better. But elsewhere in Karnataka, many of the 208 towns and cities get water in their taps only every second day. The unlucky ones get it once in three days.

In Bihar, shortages have led to riots. "The situation may go out of hand if remedial steps are not taken," warned outgoing rural development secretary P.N. Narayanan.

In the hill resort of Shimla, taps are running dry despite a long and wet winter. "The current supply isn't enough to meet our demands. So we have decided to ration water," said Mayor Sohan Lal. Even tourists have been affected.

Chennai has been facing a water crisis for years. Some city areas have ceased to get municipal water supply. Most areas depend on wells and water tankers.

Although the situation in Mumbai is not as bad as Chennai or Delhi, it is worsening. According to an estimate, the metropolis gets 3,000 million litres a day, against a demand of 4,000 million litres.

"These days we thank god if we get three to four hours of water supply a day," said Mumbai housewife Subhasini Lokhande. "Some days we don't get any. Those days we buy bottled water."

In Madhya Pradesh, potable water has virtually disappeared, even in so-called posh urban areas. Rajasthan capital Jaipur is better off but Udaipur, known as the city of lakes, gets water on alternate days. Economically rich Gujarat went for water rationing a long time ago.

Only Punjab and Haryana seem to be smiling. There is no acute shortage.

But even in Chandigarh, there is a ban on washing of cars and watering of lawns during mornings.

In a bid to kill two birds with one stone, the Maharashtra government has put curbs on farmers using irrigation water. Kerala has made rainwater harvesting mandatory for new buildings. In Delhi, the government is urging people not to waste rainwater.

But all this is clearly not taking the authorities anywhere, leading to frustration.

Sarla Sharma is an anguished Shimla housewife: "Since we get water only on alternate days and for a short while, I try to fill up every utensil to meet the demands of my family."

Added another housewife, Rasheeda Bano: "We cannot sleep at night. We keep waiting for tankers through the night. The moment they come there is a riot-like situation." And Rasheeda is a resident of Bhopal, a city of lakes!

(With inputs from Jaideep Sarin, Anil Sharma, Lola Nayar, Baldev Chauhan, Rohit Ghosh, Sumeet Chatterjee, Sharat Pradhan, Imran Khan, Jatindra Dash, Mohammed Shafeeq, Sanu George and Fakir Balaji.)