Kerala women wield spade, shovel to dig wells
new delhi — Kerala is used to having good rains. But in the last few years, mostly on account of global warming, both south-west monsoon (June-September) and north-east monsoon (October-November) have failed rather drastically.
As a result, a region that used to take for granted drinking water has been going around with parched throats. Water bodies like ponds and rivers have dried up. Kerala has 44 rivers. Most of them are little better than canals now. One reason for this, besides climate change, is the huge amount of sands being ferried away from the river beds for construction activities. But the well in the backyard of a typical Kerala house still used to be full of water. Since last year, that too, has dried up. which is why, water has to be divined in new wells.
Because Kerala is used to the idea of good rains, water preservation has always been a low priority. There is, for instance, little or no rain harvesting. In the neighbouring state of Tamil Nadu, which is water starved, no new houses can be built without provision for rain harvesting.
The state now depends on rationing of tap water. It also imports water from neighbouring states by means of tankers. In this general desertification of what was once a green and a water-surplus state, a few women have been of late been coming up spades. Since last October, in districts like Palakkad, where ground water level has particularly dipped, women have dug so far 180 wells.
When the rains fail, two key sectors, farming and plantation, are directly hit. That means livestock, too. A lot of women work as labourers in these sectors. And it is these women who have now taken upon themselves to wear lungis and shirts, like men, and wield the spade and the shovel. In small towns like Ottapalam in Palakkad and nearby countryside, teams of women, totalling 300, get out early in the morning and start digging wells up to 40 metres deep in search of water.
Says Radha, a volunteer: “None of us knew how to dig wells. We just started shoveling the earth aside. At first it was scary, as the earth we put aside would come sliding back and we would run the danger of being buried alive. Or, as we dug deeper, we would think we won’t be able to get out. But with practice we have become pretty good at it.”
In Kerala, digging wells and laying concrete rings around the pit used to be male-specialty jobs. No longer. The need to find water for themselves and the family’s livestock have effectively wiped out gender differences.