Her parched truth

For Samina 55 resident of Panwadi village in the Phulambri taluka of Aurangabad district four days of the menstrual cycle appear ldquolike four dreadful yearsrdquo After Diwali Saminarsquos village ceases to get even the irregular water supply on public taps Women queue up at neighbourhood wells or fight endlessly for a few litres of water from tankers arriving at erratic hours Every morning begins with a search for water required for a household filled with children COVID or no COVID hell descends on earth once a month when she has little water and less time to wash her inners She cannot afford sanitary pads which basically means she carries on unwashed with her chores on heavy bleeding daysSamina is not the only one who shares the unspoken ldquoperiodrdquo truth Hers is among the 400odd voices documented in a new researchbased book on the droughtaffected women of Marathwada a region like Vidarbha associated with farmersrsquo suicides in the public consciousnessWomen from Panwadi village in the Phulambri taluka of Aurangabad district have to travel long distances to draw water from wells The village made it to prime time TV news in June 2019 when seven women fell into a well and injured themselves severelyDushkalat Tichi Horpal Her Plight in the Drought Aastha Publications by the Aurangabadbased scholarfeminist writer Dr Arteeshymal Joshi 42 showcases the regionmdashessentially eight neglected districts of Maharashtramdashthat accounts for around 17 per cent of Maharashtrarsquos population not to forget 30 per cent of the statersquos below poverty line households In normal conditions which are rare Marathwada receives 650 mm daily rainfall in the four monsoon months In 2016 the year of the drought the region recorded 450 mm rain which caused severe depletion of groundwater levels and little storage in the damsWhile the vagaries of nature impact men and women equally author Joshi sensitises the reader to the invisible and underrecorded burden carried by women of all ages in the droughtridden geographies Her earlier research initiatives are also defined by a similar lens like her study of women ragpickers or the impact of the lockdown on womenrsquos mobility She treats womenrsquos status as a decisive factor in assessing the impact of a drought or any other crises be it an earthquake floods riots or a pandemic A gendersalient approach is an inconvenient one as it adds another layer of complexity and also adds to the nature of the relief work Dr Joshi asks Which policy document or commission of inquiry on Maharashtrarsquos water resource management addresses a menstruatingpregnantdehydrated womanrsquos predicament Is there a count of the abortions caused by the heavy waterfilled utensils carried by women on their heads Which White Paper has recorded water paucity as one of the prime reasons for womenrsquos aversion for bedtime sex in droughtaffected territories ldquoNeither the ruling government nor the central bodies nor the AdministratorCollector office ever acknowledge these naked discomforting truths as if they donrsquot existrdquo says the enraged researcherWaterfilled handas mounted on a cycle in Indapur village Osmanabad district bear testimony to the water storage responsibilities on the shoulders of womenDushkalat Tichi Horpal in fact focuses on womenrsquos discordant sex lives in the context of the drought Dr Joshi has interviewed women who consider marital sex a punishment in the sweltering heat 42 degree Celsius She cites the tragic words of newly married Lakshmi Ghansawangi Jalna district which haunt her often ldquoThe day goes by in transporting water and the husband wants me to surrender to his demands at night My genital areas experience extreme itchinessredness due to dehydration I have to often beg him to stop the intercourse Added to that problem is the inlawsrsquo refrain for a grandchildrdquo Lakshmi cannot think of running away to her mother as the latter also suffers due to water shortageUnlike Lakshmi some women in Undri Beed and Rui Jalna have another problem of nausea during sex Women usually cannot bathe leisurely in the open a daily bath is a privilege due to which their sweaty bodies donrsquot look forward to any physical togetherness in the day One married couple decided to bathe in the night just to feel energised but became a target of ridicule in the family circle recounts Dr Joshi adding that many women were hesitant about sharing their marriage woes Some shared their collective pain with other female sufferers of the village They felt cathartic in publicising their family names in the context of the unending hardships especially accidents near wellsResearcher Dr Joshi seen with women from Panwadi in 2019 another devastating drought yearIn Dharmewadi village Beed a 79yearold aaji fell into a well and was handicapped for life but that well till date remains the sole water source In Dhorgaon Nanded an elderly woman with severely bruised knees has taken on the responsibility of bringing water as her daughterinlaw wouldnrsquot otherwise be able to cook the mealsmdashthe men of the house do not share the water duties Panwadi a village comprising 1200 residents mostly Muslim made it to prime time TV news in June 2019 when seven women fell into a well and injured themselves severelyDr Joshi shared a select list of women who were further open to talking to this columnist about either instances of domestic abuse or unfair treatment in the context of the water crisis The experiences of these bravehearts are shocking to say the least In fact they bring home the million hidden ways in which the lack of water can narrow down livelihood options and compel families to relocate to metros Households run by single widowed women are particularly vulnerable many of these family units abandoned their labourintensive traditional occupations farming and took to manual labour Resham 25 from Osmababad city falls in this most defenseless category After her husband committed suicide she started working as a domestic help to feed and school her two daughters At one pointshe was raped by her fatherinlaw after which she relocated the girls to her sisterrsquos place As the sole earner R5000 monthly she has forsaken her claim over the agricultural land which doesnrsquot reap much during droughtsDr Joshi has a nuanced understanding of the region she surveys Having been raised educated and married in a waterscarce city with fixed water hours she is particularly sensitive to limited storage She recalls one phase when she missed her lectures in BAMU Dr Babasaheb Ambedkar Marathwada University where she graduated in Fine Arts and postgraduated in Womenrsquos Studies as she waited for the municipal corporationrsquos water connection After launching the nonprofit Aastha Janvikas Sanstha with her journalisthusband Mahesh Joshi in 2010 her interaction with rural Marathwada intensified in the form of timebound research projectsldquoTo have a tap at home Thatrsquos a privilege taken for granted in metros But my visits around 40 in the last five years to rural Marathwada opened my eyes and ears to women who walk 3 to 4 km daily to draw water from wells or lakes They work so hard for this unpaidunsalaried chorerdquo she shares Dr Joshi and her husband have walked with the villagers to gain firsthand experience of droughts which occurred in 2016 and 2019 As she recounts the road trips to some villages were eyeopening For instance therersquos no paved road to Hatkarwadi in Beed district and a ghat section renders the water tanker service impossible The villagersquos hand pumps were also unusable Result No girl of marriageable age considers Hatkarwadi as an option In other words families lose their social standing because of their residence in a waterless village Laturbased Sunanda Sathe 48 says a household with an ancestral well is perceived as a ldquogood catchrdquo in the marriage marketWater has a direct bearing on the health of women and men Dr Joshi travelled to villages which received muddy water She says the red colour of the water in Injanpur village Hingoli left her shocked ldquoIt was the water one wouldnrsquot use for mopping the floor it redefined my markers of potabilityrdquo Not just in remote mofussil Marathwada but some suburbs of Aurangabad too like Jaibhim Nagar have been receiving contaminated water for years citizens are unable to awaken the municipal body to the broken drain pipesDushkalat Tichi Horpal bares the broken backbone of rural India It demonstrates the hollowness of the slogans raised in praise of a swacch selfreliant forwardlooking Bharat We peep into an exhausted lowenergy India which is perspiring unclean and devoid of storage avenues Men and women lock their tanks in the fear of water theft Some indulge in barter exchanges to guarantee water in their homes Women in their 30s look for reasons to remove their uterus just to get rid of periods Youth call themselves ldquocursedrdquo like the Class X student Kajal Nirmal from Injangaon Kajal says she wants ldquoto run away from the village as soon as she gets a degree and a job in a cityrdquo She dreads climbing down the steps of a deep well every day Her elder brother Rahul however ldquoregretsrdquo being the man of the house ldquoGirls can at least marry and relocate but boys are cursed with subsistence farmingrdquoBe it the lack of public water taps or the government delay in digging bore wells women are the prime sufferers in Marathwada Itrsquos not surprising therefore that women are at the forefront of protests and agitations centred around water The book cites womenrsquos handa ghagar morchas thiyya andolans and violent breakthefurniture outbursts in many gram panchayat offices Women though exploited at home and often not permitted to join the protest marches take on a lead role in waterrelated agitations As the book sufficiently demonstrates women want the rulers of today to put water management on top of the governance agenda Their belief in corrective action is consistently visible Thatrsquos the oasis amidst the droughtSumedha RaikarMhatre is a culture columnist in search of the subtext You can reach her at sumedharaikar middaycom