As important water and sanita- tion programmes are being implemented in India, there is need for better and increasing community mobilization on these issues. In this context a programme of creating a cadre of rural women vol- unteers on water and sanitation being implemented in the Bundelkhand region in central India has attracted much attention. These volunteers are called jal sahelis in Hindi, translated as Friends of Water. The programme has been started by a voluntary organ- ization Parmarth.

Chattarpur district (Madhya Pradesh) in particular has been in the limelight because of the exemplary work done by several jal sahelis here. In Agrautha village of Bara Malhera block, an effort of women motivated by a student, Babita Rajput, led to the restoration of a neglected tank. To bring water to this tank, a 107 meter canal had to be dug across a moun- tain to bring the water available in a nearby forest. The women had the courage to launch work that was so difficult that it had not even been con- sidered earlier. However, seeing their hard work and determination, others also joined and water finally reached the village tank.

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In Chaudhri Khera village of this same block, another village tank had been neglected despite water scarcity because of certain superstitions attached to efforts to reclaim it. This was so until a courageous woman named Ganga appeared on the scene. True to her name, she was determined to end the water scarcity in her village. Encouraged by the support she had received for her ideas in a training pro- gramme, she challenged the supersti- tions which had no basis yet were allowed to stand in the way of finding solutions to water scarcity. She gath- ered a few more courageous women to start the work of cleaning and repairing the tank. Then they had to create a temporary bund on a rivulet to get water to fill the tank. Soon the villagers regretted their earlier super- stitions as this water helped a lot to reduce several problems of villagers.

Recently I went to Chhatarpur to meet several jal sahelis who had assembled there for a training pro- gramme. One aspect that emerged from this conversation was that the jal sahelis are very active in preventing any wastage of water. One of them, Betibai, said, “I do not mind if some- what less water is supplied to us but the most important thing is that water should not be wasted.” Several jal sahelis spoke about their efforts to spread kitchen gardens to utilize waste water for growing vegetables.

Jal sahelis have played an impor- tant role in mobilizing village com- munities for taking up conservation work on rivers like Paniyal and Kathan. Sacks filled with sand were placed in an effort called bora band- han to ensure that water in the Paniyal river does not flow away too rapidly in the rainy season and some water remains to increase the water level in the village and in wells, resulting in more irrigation and higher farm pro- ductivity. This is particularly helpful at a time when the water level has gone down a lot in recent years.

One problem that this river faced was that some irresponsible villagers had taken away the gates installed here. This was a sensitive issue but the community helped by jal sahelis made an effort to get back most of the gates and the people were then mobi- lized to install the gates again.

A bora bandhan or sack bunding effort was made on Kathan river as well in which a jal saheli named Rani Aharwar of Devraan village made a particularly important contribution.

Several tanks have been cleaned, desilted and their water retention capacity increased with community effort. These include tanks of Sijwaha, Mankari, Dhardati, Katora and Badera. Kirri village has traditional water structures going back to the times of Chandel kings. Restoration and repair work was taken up here.

Jal Sahelis have also been very active in the open defecation free or ODF campaign. They agreed that sev- eral households, particularly the poor- er ones, needed more help to con- struct toilets but at the same time there were also some behavioral prob- lems among some villagers which came in the way of proper utilization of toilets, they stated. They said that they were working to help change this. All the jal sahelis were united in saying that toilets represent an important need of villages.

Jal sahelis have also been very enthusiastic about tree-planting. Jal sahelis from Sendhpuri say with pride that tree planting near homes, in schools and elsewhere has made their village so green and beautiful that the village is being discussed widely and even at the state level as a model.

Several of them have been work- ing to improve waste management in villages and some have taken up cleaning work on their own when this was urgently needed.

With their important contribu- tions to water and sanitation, these jal sahelis have set a fine example of vol- untary work to create cleaner villages and reduce the possibilities of water scarcity. In conversation they time and again refer to the great importance of water conservation as a base for sup- porting life and livelihoods in villages. This reality is rooted in their experi- ence of frequent droughts leading to large scale distress migration from Bundelkhand. These water protectors are now trying to ensure that the pos- sibilities of such distress can be mini- mized. The importance of this effort in times of climate change cannot be over-emphasized.

(The writer is Honorary Convener, Campaign to Save Earth Now. His recent books include Planet in Peril, Man over Machine and A Day in 2071.)