Help a community get access to water by ASSIST

With the help of this program, all the beneficiaries near Chirala in the Prakasam district of Andhra Pradesh state in India who were unable to get daily potable water or communities who must walk long distances to fetch potable water are provided access to drinking water by installing borewells in their communities with the support received from the generous donors of GIVE, India. During this reporting period, 275 beneficiaries were impacted under this programme.

Most of the beneficiaries impacted under this programme are daily wage labourers who must work every single day to put food on their table. Covid-19 has made their lives miserable as they are unable to get work and, in addition, they are unable to get potable drinking water. Though the problem isn’t resolved, the people in the community didn’t bring the problem to the authorities or any donors, as they were more concerned about getting sufficient work and feared catching COVID. One of the village leaders explained their problem to the ASSIST field officers working in those areas. After receiving a request from the people, ASSIST field officers enquired about the problem and identified areas to install borewells.

After installing the borewell, the beneficiaries in those areas no longer need to worry about access to water and can concentrate on their work and lead a comfortable life. The programme has reduced the burden of the many daily wage labourers as they no longer need to walk distances to fetch water or wait in long lines to skip work to bring water to their homes. The beneficiaries conveyed their gratitude to the donors from GIVE India and appreciated ASSIST for the support.

From its inception, providing poor and marginalized communities with access to water is one of the major objectives of ASSIST. With the support of GiveIndia and its generous donors, many beneficiaries all over the target areas have been provided access to water and the impact created through this program is vast. This work is more important now than ever since clean water is essential for handwashing and disinfection to prevent the spread of diseases like covid-19. During the Period (January to June 2021) 250 families were impacted through this program.

The major hurdle during this pandemic is reaching out to the people in need as mobilization has been halted and the country went under a lockdown for containing the virus. ASSIST with the help of donors have provided basic cooking essentials to all the affected families. Though the country was under strict lockdown, ASSIST volunteers have kept track of water needs in the communities, so immediate help can be provided once the curbs have been lifted. The goal of ASSIST is to reach as many communities as possible for creating a major impact.

Walking for water determines the future of many young girls in the backward communities in are Chirala area. Since most of the families depend on weaving as major means of income, the adults in the family start working even before sunrise. Since most of the adults are working, they send their children to bring water early in the morning. Most of the children in the weaving community mainly girls wakes in the dark to make their first walk of the day to collect water. Though the children need to walk in the dark they need no flashlight as they are walking the same path every day for long but the safety of children is a matter of concern for the parents as the children need to walk long distances in the dark on to collect water. There is no happiness among the families as they need to worry daily about the water and safety of their children as well. Through this program, borewell has been provided near their houses to lift the burden to worry for water every single day and the young girls yearn few more hours of rest which helps them to do better in their grades.

This programme have a longer impact on the beneficiaries as they are supported in getting easy access to water for regular domestic usage. The beneficiaries no longer need to work hard with their aching backs to fetch the basic human need “water”. The communities have suffered a lot before the implementation of this programme in their areas. A weaver cannot work on his livelihood without worrying about the water and a working family cannot rest happily on a day off with the family members without worrying about fetching water for the daily usage. After the borewells were installed in their community, a weaver need not spend most of this time in bringing water and a daily labourer need not worry about water after a long day at work. In the current pandemic, this programme have served more than its purpose. Availability of water borewell nearby the beneficiaries house had ensured that there are no people gathered at one place for water, which helped in maintaining social distance and reducing the virus in the rural areas. If it isn’t for this programme the situation would be worse during the lockdown for people to fetch water and get infected in the process.

Water bringing in happiness in the community

Program Update

Under this program to cater the domestic water needs of the communities bore wells are drilled such that the people in a particular community do not face any difficulties to get access to water.
The process of selecting a particular community to drill a bore well depends on the request received in the form of general applications from the community, political representatives and if ASSIST feels there is definite need in a particular community.
The implementation of drilling a bore well is done along with the little help received from the community while drilling the bore well and after the completion of the bore well the VDS, Elderly people and Head Master (if it is a school) takes the responsibility to maintain the bore well to keep it in a good shape and accessible to all. The community in which a bore well is drilled feels the responsibility to take care the bore well because as there is no other source available for them to cater their water needs.
The purpose of the program is totally served as the bore wells are drilled in the places where the community is in a dire need to get access to water.

Story from the field

105 leprosy families are living in a colony near Changheez khan pet village of Edlapadu mandal in Guntur District. As, they are all victims of leprosy they cannot work and earn money for their livelihood. Government is supporting them with 35kgs of rice to each family. In addition to rice Government is also giving Rs.500/- towards monthly pension to those who badly affected. Small percentage of persons goes to agriculture works.

46 families are separated from 105 families due to some problems emerged among themselves. They came out of the colony and put up small tents adjacent to hillock and living separately. They are facing severe problem for shelter and water. In order to get the housing plots from the Government, some of them approached the District Collector and briefed the problem that they are facing. Later the District Collector has sanctioned individual pattas of 1.5 cents land for construction of house and 0.50 cents land for agriculture purpose. Accordingly, they constructed small houses with asbestos sheets in the given land. But, the water problem is still remained unsolved. They have to walk one kilometre to fetch water.

At this juncture, colony members have requested ASSIST to drill a bore well in the new colony. After their request bore well was laid in a common place. After drilling a bore well in their colony, villagers felt very happy that they need no. Now they are using the bore water not only for drinking purpose, but also for domestic use. They are extremely happy that water is available in their locality. They express their gratitude to ASSIST for providing bore well in their vicinity because of which they can easily access the bore well for their domestic and drinking purposes. This support has helped them in leading a normal life with basic human needs.

Program Update

The main aim of this programme is to ensure that communities are able to access safe drinking water. This focuses primarily on renovating old bore wells or installing brand new bore wells for vulnerable families that are suffering. ASSIST has done business for many years now with the contractors in different areas that carry out the implementation work. The main process is that once the funds arrive, ASSIST calls for tenders and quotations and then the best one is selected by the purchase committee. After this, work begins immediately and a new bore well is installed or an old one is properly renovated.

Story from the field

The village Macharla Mohan Rao Colony is located at Akkaya Palem Panchayath of Vetapalem Mandal in Prakasam district. The village consists of 99 families. The total population of the area is 324. The main occupation of the people in this village is of weaving and masonry labour. Some people in the village work as salesman in textile shop. In this society there is an Anganvadi centre where children were provided with a drinking facility, however this was also suffering because of a lack of water. In this village near the bazaar there is one main road and three crossroads. They were spending a lot of time during the day only collecting water. There is no water supply on the third cross road so the residents from there are collecting water from the first crossroad. The Sangam saw the problem and requested ASSIST for a bore well. ASSIST staff went to the area and identified the problem. After this a bore well was drilled on the third crossroad near the house of Mallela Ludhiamma, W/O Abraham. Now 25 families are using the water from the new bore well. The problem is solved and the families are extremely happy and are thankful to ASSIST and GIVE India for their support. The children are happy because now they are using their free time for studies. The parents are also satisfied because they can go about with their livelihood activities and earn a living for themselves and their families.