By Keya Acharya
MULBAGAL, India, Nov 27 1999 (IPS)

An intense sea of village women listen quietly to speakers from the city seated on a podium. “You are woman power, you are India,” thunders a high court judge.

But the women, seated cross-legged on the floor, are clear they want to hear more than words. “We want recognition, not praise,” says Pappamma, 36, secretary of the Grameena Mahila Okkutta or the rural women’s federation.

The 4,000-member group of barely literate women, which is still growing, has just presented a memorandum to the government, wanting the traditional village water tanks, where rain water is stored, de-silted.

The meeting in Mulbagal village was called by the village women, who invited the speaker of Karnataka’s state legislature, M.V. Venkatappa and High Court Justice Gopal Gowda to persuade them to take up the matter.

It could be raised as a PIL or public interest litigation, the judge explained to the women. “Come to me with your petitions. I will personally look into it,” he promised.

Since 1997, the federation has been mobilising the women to collectively raise their voice in demanding the government take responsibility for cleaning the village water tanks, on which poor people are dependent for drinking and irrigation water.

For the first time last year, they wrote to the local government official in charge of development to release to them the funds allocated for de-silting. The officer, a woman, said “she will look into it, but has done nothing,” says Pappamma.

The assertive women are not prepared to wait indefinitely. Early next year they plan to picket the state government office in Bangalore, the capital of Karnataka state, if their request is not taken note of.

The water tanks are the life of arid Kolar district, where some 4,500 centuries-old tanks were until 1947 maintained by royal patronage. But neglect has choked the sluices and silted the basins, causing a more than 50 percent loss in storage capacity affecting the rich paddy and sugar-cane harvests here.

Since India’s independence in 1947, the state Irrigation Department has not once cleaned the water tanks, though the state’s financial outlay for irrigation this fiscal year is about 420 million dollars.

“Because of its belief in mega-water projects, the government has totally neglected minor irrigation,” observes Jayalakshmi Rao of Gram Vikas, a rural NGO in Mulbagal that helped set up the Federation.

In 1981, Gram Vikas started mobilising marginalised women and children into self-help groups which grew in time to address natural resource problems.

While the rich farmers sink tubewells to grow cash crops, the poor farmers in rural India depend on rainwater.

A 1998 study on the status of rural women in Karnataka undertaken by the Bangalore-based National Institute of Advanced Studies, shows that though only 2 percent of women use tanks or rivers for drinking-water, over 61 percent of all women are seriously affected by the seasonal availability of water.

India’s total groundwater need was assessed at 64 million cubic metres (mcm) in 1998, while it had only 43 mcm available. While Karnataka’s groundwater recharge is about 50 percent lower than current consumption, the situation countrywide is as grim.

Across the world, all over South Asia, in Sub-Saharan Africa and in the Middle East regions water tables are falling dangerously. Disputes loom large over water-usage, especially in the Nile and Jordan basins, where millions of small farmers’ livelihoods are at stake.

In Kolar too small farmers’ lifestyles have deteriorated. “Many farmers have left to work as ‘coolies’ or daily-wage workers in Bangalore,” says Muni Venkatappa, a small farmer.

Venkatappa who owns 4 acres of dryland ekes a subsistence from growing millets and groundnuts. His land is not near enough to be irrigated by the village water tanks, but he is among those keen to have them in working condition.

“Even if they fill up, my land won’t get water, but I’ll get work from farmers near tank-areas. I will also get water for me and my cattle and make money from the desilting-work,” says Venkatappa.

Gram Vikas feels de-silting will alleviate many problems in

any dryland area. “The water-table will rise, marginalised farmers will manage two annual crops, fish-rearing in the tanks and dairying from generated fodder will bring some money and fields will get nutrients from the silt,” says M.V.N. Rao.

In 1997 the Federation mobilised local labour to de-silt three tanks, and to prove that it can be done. A 11-acre tank took three months to clean, with 120 people dredging and loading 25 cart-loads of silt daily. It cost about 120,000 dollars.

“Tank desilting is beneficial to an entire socioeconomic infrastructure. It is therefore unfair to expect the families directly benefiting to bear its costs,” says Rao.

The women’s Federation intends to force the government’s hand. “We need government help,” asserts Pappamma. They intend to fight for it.

Excerpt:

By Keya Acharya
MULBAGAL, India, Nov 25 1999 (IPS)

An intense sea of village women listen quietly to speakers from the city seated on a podium. “You are woman power, you are India,” thunders a high court judge.

But the women, seated cross-legged on the floor, are clear they want to hear more than words. “We want recognition, not praise,” says Pappamma, 36, secretary of the Grameena Mahila Okkutta or the rural women’s federation.

The 4,000-member group of barely literate women, which is still growing, has just presented a memorandum to the government, wanting the traditional village water tanks, where rain water is stored, de-silted.

The meeting in Mulbagal village was called by the village women, who invited the speaker of Karnataka’s state legislature, M.V. Venkatappa and High Court Justice Gopal Gowda to persuade them to take up the matter.

It could be raised as a PIL or public interest litigation, the judge explained to the women. “Come to me with your petitions. I will personally look into it,” he promised.

Since 1997, the federation has been mobilising the women to collectively raise their voice in demanding the government take responsibility for cleaning the village water tanks, on which poor people are dependent for drinking and irrigation water.

For the first time last year, they wrote to the local government official in charge of development to release to them the funds allocated for de-silting. The officer, a woman, said “she will look into it, but has done nothing,” says Pappamma.

The assertive women are not prepared to wait indefinitely. Early next year they plan to picket the state government office in Bangalore, the capital of Karnataka state, if their request is not taken note of.

The water tanks are the life of arid Kolar district, where some 4,500 centuries-old tanks were until 1947 maintained by royal patronage. But neglect has choked the sluices and silted the basins, causing a more than 50 percent loss in storage capacity affecting the rich paddy and sugar-cane harvests here.

Since India’s independence in 1947, the state Irrigation Department has not once cleaned the water tanks, though the state’s financial outlay for irrigation this fiscal year is about 420 million dollars.

“Because of its belief in mega-water projects, the government has totally neglected minor irrigation,” observes Jayalakshmi Rao of Gram Vikas, a rural NGO in Mulbagal that helped set up the Federation.

In 1981, Gram Vikas started mobilising marginalised women and children into self-help groups which grew in time to address natural resource problems.

While the rich farmers sink tubewells to grow cash crops, the poor farmers in rural India depend on rainwater.

A 1998 study on the status of rural women in Karnataka undertaken by the Bangalore-based National Institute of Advanced Studies, shows that though only 2 percent of women use tanks or rivers for drinking-water, over 61 percent of all women are seriously affected by the seasonal availability of water.

India’s total groundwater need was assessed at 64 million cubic metres (mcm) in 1998, while it had only 43 mcm available. While Karnataka’s groundwater recharge is about 50 percent lower than current consumption, the situation countrywide is as grim.

Across the world, all over South Asia, in Sub-Saharan Africa and in the Middle East regions water tables are falling dangerously. Disputes loom large over water-usage, especially in the Nile and Jordan basins, where millions of small farmers’ livelihoods are at stake.

In Kolar too small farmers’ lifestyles have deteriorated. “Many farmers have left to work as ‘coolies’ or daily-wage workers in Bangalore,” says Muni Venkatappa, a small farmer.

Venkatappa who owns 4 acres of dryland ekes a subsistence from growing millets and groundnuts. His land is not near enough to be irrigated by the village water tanks, but he is among those keen to have them in working condition.

“Even if they fill up, my land won’t get water, but I’ll get work from farmers near tank-areas. I will also get water for me and my cattle and make money from the desilting-work,” says Venkatappa.

Gram Vikas feels de-silting will alleviate many problems in

any dryland area. “The water-table will rise, marginalised farmers will manage two annual crops, fish-rearing in the tanks and dairying from generated fodder will bring some money and fields will get nutrients from the silt,” says M.V.N. Rao.

In 1997 the Federation mobilised local labour to de-silt three tanks, and to prove that it can be done. A 11-acre tank took three months to clean, with 120 people dredging and loading 25 cart-loads of silt daily. It cost about 120,000 dollars.

“Tank desilting is beneficial to an entire socioeconomic infrastructure. It is therefore unfair to expect the families directly benefiting to bear its costs,” says Rao.

The women’s Federation intends to force the government’s hand. “We need government help,” asserts Pappamma. They intend to fight for it.

Excerpt: