Water

Country Water Action: India
Access to Water, Access to Education
October 2007

Two Bangalore slum communities have asserted their rights to water so that their children can attend school and secure a better future. One has already achieved some success; the other is still working on a solution. Will the concerted efforts of the public water utility, a nongovernment organization, and community women speed up the delivery of water and education to these neglected slums?

Contents A Tale of Two Neighborhoods Bringing Water to Bangalore’s Slums Water and Education for MRS Palya Water Yet to Come in Sundamnagar

It is often said that social taboos hinder girls’ education in India. But lack of access to water can do that as well, as indicated by the experiences of two slum communities in Bangalore.

In MRS Palya, residents now regularly get two hours of water a day. It’s not much from many’s standpoint, but it’s better than having no water at all. “That is more than enough for each family,” says Rahat Begum, a community organizer and coordinator of the Association for Volunteer Action and Services (AVAS), a nongovernment organization. “They have time to sleep, take a bath, and do all the housework.”

“Before, we could not send our children to school because we had to fetch water at midnight,” said Muniamma, a 40-year-old mother of two and resident of MRS Palya. “Today, the children go to school regularly and they are doing well.”

“The environment is very clean; there is no pollution. We used to get many diseases; now we are getting trained in computers, in management, and many are getting college degrees. I’m very happy,” said Murthy, a youth leader who has already completed one year of schooling towards a hotel management diploma.

The same, however, cannot be said of Sundamnagar, another slum community of around 300 households mostly involved in casual labor and the services industry. Sundamnagar residents still have no access to water, much less educational opportunities for their children.

AVAS, the Bangalore-based nongovernment organization that helped bring water and sanitation facilities to MRS Palya, is now helping Sundamnagar achieve the same.

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Now known as India’s information technology capital, Bangalore boasts of new buildings that house high-tech local and foreign companies. Employing thousands of graduates from India’s elite technological institutions, these corporations’ services extend to global markets, including the United States and Japan.

A stone’s throw away from these new establishments is a reminder of old India—the slums that house the poor untouchables shunned by the rest of the city, with no water and sanitation services and low literacy rates. Bangalore has about 365 slums, which are home to a fifth of the city’s 6.5 million population.

Salma Sadhika, a social development specialist at the Bangalore Water Supply and Sewerage Board (BWSSB), observed, “The contrast between the two only serves to reinforce the enormous difficulties faced by the urban poor and the urgent need for new initiatives to address the situation.”

The BWSSB could not give water and sanitation connections to these informal settlements because the latter do not have land titles. Years of lobbying by community-based organizations like AVAS finally persuaded public authorities to find a way around this legal requirement. Through the efforts of BWSSB’s Social Development Unit, the land title requirement was waived, and ration cards or voters’ IDs are now accepted as proof of residence. As an added bonus, BWSSB also reduced water connection fees.

AVAS was able to buy land and work out a collective land title for MRS Palya. It also provided collateral to the bank so that each family could borrow up to 20,000 rupees (US$500) to build a house.

More importantly, AVAS community organizer M. Nagarajaiah explains, “We want to build people before building houses. We have to build, empower, organize, and educate them.” AVAS gives emphasis to women’s education, particularly in water and health management, and sets up a water and sanitation (WATSAN) committee in each community. And most WATSAN committee members are women.

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Women in MRS Palya faced a lot of hardships before they got their regular 2-hour water supply. Muniamma recalls, “Women used to travel two to three miles to fetch water. Girls and women used to do this work. To wash clothes on certain days, we had to start walking at 1 a.m. We were not able to send our children to school because they had to come with us to fetch water.”

“There was no peace in this community those days. Women had to queue all night to get a bowl of water. Some young girls who went there get raped,” Begum said. “Most of the men watch TV at home all day, and those who work spend most of their money on alcohol,” she added.

Today, MRS Palya is generally clean because there are toilets inside the houses with adequate water supply, and because, Begum said, it is the women who maintain the system. “If the water doesn’t come and leakages happen, they immediately take it up with the concerned authorities,” she said.

“Society thinks that we are a poor slum class, that we will not get our children educated, and that we will allow them to just roam around the community,” said Vanitha, another resident whose two children have already completed high school. “We are proud to say that since we got this water facility, our children have been doing well. Many of them are going to pre-university college, technical education. All the residents are happy,” she said.

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Sundamnagar was supposed to be the site of a BWSSB pilot project for connecting the urban poor. “Today it is a collapsed project,” said Nagarajaiah. “Water is not getting into the homes and people are refusing to pay.”

The women in the WATSAN committee, with AVAS’ support, took the case to the chair of the BWSSB. The problem, BWSSB said, was that water was being diverted to other communities and water pressure was not enough to bring water into their home taps. The BWSSB will have to dig pits in front of people’s houses to get water from underground pipes.

“Monthly meter readings are also not being done, and we refuse to pay bills for service we are not receiving as promised,” said Josephine, a water and sanitation committee member and community health coordinator. “But water is essential for us, so we are trying to work out a solution.”

“Politicians used to think that people are too poor to pay for water services, so they put up taps in the streets,” said Begum. “We have shown that by organizing and motivating the community, informing them about the norms, rules and regulations, they will not only pay, but will also help maintain the systems properly.”

Hopefully, the women of Sundamnagar will soon get the water they need so they can send their children to school.

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