Documenting Indigenous Water Management Systems

Session 102 summary

Raja Varun, helped by a couple of friends, research partner etc., has just started documenting Indigenous water management systems this year (2022) and since it is a personal project it is running a bit slow. It is still in the beginning stage and they are still reading, researching, trying to meet people and interviewing them, and trying to know more about the very intricate relationship of water and communities. Varun is a documentary filmmaker, he travels across communities, meet the people and try to understand; their outlook towards world, life and the things happening around them, the intimate relationship between them and the natural resources, and other factors that involve them. Ideally on assignments they have a task to do but as explorers – people who want to know stuff, they set out going into various dimensions of the stories and when they go out in the field there they find an abundance of stories – be it culture, be it food, be it systems, their own personal stories, the struggles, even the challenges that communities face in such situations.

How are they doing this? They are doing it step by step every day, every week as they go and travel to those sensitive places. They have been to one of the harshest places in India and to places which are more climate sensitive like; Bihar – frequented by floods, Odisha – often experiencing cyclones, Himalayas – a lot of impact of climate change amidst the communities, Bundelkhand (Madhya Pradesh) – facing acute water crisis and a high rate of migration because of water. They go to places like these and document stories.

Varun volunteered for an organization 5 years back, who were working for land rights then. At that time Varun was not aware of cameras, photographs, films etc. he was still exploring what to do. The organization went to those communities, to those places where there was the problem of land rights. Varun as an urbanised person didn’t have the slightest idea of what forest rights are, what land rights are and why are there communities fighting for it. So, to understand and realise that there is an other side of “what you know” really baffled him and then he thought that as creators, as someone who knows art, someone who can do things – people have to bring those stories here – to friends, to the people who do not go and meet such people. For that fact Varun always believed that art is a privilege where one has a certain talent that is regarded and if they are using that privilege to tell stories that need to be told, which needs to be done. That was the whole idea of exploring, it was not just only to get these stories from here to there, but it was also a sense of trying to understand and discover himself (Varun) personally also.

People behind all the pictures/ guiding forces in this journey: Anima Kerketta who did her masters in Social work (friend and mentor), Shobha Tirkey, a PhD scholar at TISS, works mostly on gender based themes (currently doing a project together which is documentation of indigenous healing systems which is becoming rare nowadays – they are trying to find women healers amidst the communities) and Seema Ravandale. Together they are currently working in the indigenous water systems which is part of a larger project that they are doing which is to discover the connection of human and water and tracing it back in history and trying to find out how civilizations revolved around water and their relation (water and humans).

Discovering stories: While on and outside projects they tried to understand that why a certain thing is at a certain place like; he took pictures of clusters of thin sticks drying at roadside. Varun asked the person who was drying them about those sticks, who replied that that was the plant from which jute is extracted and during monsoon communities across Northern Bihar engage in the process to extract jute from the plant and then that jute is taken to Nepal where it is woven into beautiful artefacts. So, the stories are right in front of us whenever we travel, it is just a matter of taking a break/pause and trying to understand why a certain place is there. He also took a picture of a person from Birhor community (Bihar) who has a metal tool, (when asked he said that before metal they used to have bamboos) which is a hunting instrument for small animals – in the jungles they lay those traps and capture small animals. It is everyone’s responsibility to bring out stories and not just that but also tell them sensitively. Whenever they are in a team there is always a person from the community to guide them so they are able to ask more questions and uncover more stories. One time while documenting indigenous healing systems he came across a white “fluffy thing” and it was interesting that it was on a kujur (date) plant. The kujur plant is an essential part of the healing systems in the northern part of Chhattisgarh (Jashpur). On a closer look he discovered that it was a very beautiful insect which on seeing someone coming would just burst out with the “fluffy thing”. So, Varun felt that snowfall was taking place right in front of him. Those insects are called Apple aphids as they are usually around apple orchards. Varun tried to figure out what were Apple aphids doing around Jashpur, Chhattisgarh and then he found out that there are apple farms in Jashpur, which amazed him as he used to think that apple orchards were found in Uttarakhand, Himachal and Jammu & Kashmir. He also took a picture of a storage house in Andhra Pradesh and Varun loved the architecture and how the people used the available resources to build houses there. He also took pictures of the house of a person from Katkhari community, Thane, Maharashtra, it was during the team’s documentation when they members from Kohli, warli and katkhari community. It is a basic house and it is told in Maharashtra that the Katkhari communities are economically not doing well. He was also able to take a sweet picture while he was in Korba district Chhattisgarh. There he saw a house where two people were sleeping and along with them a dog was sleeping and Varun thought that that was his picture for coexistence. Varun also met the family of Prakash, who is from the warli community. Prakash has a limb disability but he is a very hardworking person and he motivates people around him to do the same. While visiting Maharashtra, if there is a chance to meet a person from the warli community, one must visit their house. Inside the house there is this one wall painted all red with Warli art, Prakash’s house was the same. He also took a picture of a traditional healer – female traditional healer, in the morning she goes to the forest and try to pick those roots and herbs which she would be using to treat people. Varun took a picture in Latehar, Jharkhand with an interesting story attached to the community in the picture – the community was making earthen dams but since there are long and harsh monsoons, their dam got broken out. They decided to approach the authorities for making a concrete dam but since the land has a coalbed/belt under it, the place would be transferred to a coal company and so a lot of infrastructure development is not taking place here. Hence they were constantly applying for a concrete dam but it was not being accepted. One day a person from the election committee went to the village and asked them; “there is very less voting from your area. Why is it like that?” Later the people decided that around 20% – 30% people are coming during elections to question them for votes, so if they boycott the election then what will happen? So, they actually staged a protest and they boycotted the elections and stated that their work is not getting done – the dam is not being made – first to make the dam then they will vote. Immediately the BDO (Block Development Officer and the Collector), went and sanctioned 31 lakhs for constructing a concrete dam. So, it is the power of community itself that if they stay together they can accomplish anything.

The Current State: Traveling to various places, going to the most interior parts, to places where not many stories come from and places which are sensitive to climate, the team tries to know what is happening there and try to bring in those stories. The climate crisis is hitting very badly, it might not be very visible to people in urban areas, but when going to the most fragile places or the places where the ecosystem is very fragile – one starts to notice the difference.

Recently from his Bihar documentation, he saw two sides of Bihar. The northern part of Bihar has an issue of indentation, there are floods and every year 3-4 months communities are on their toes and preparing themselves for the oncoming flood. He took a picture of the river Ganga with houses on the verge of the banks of the river. But the communities are fighting there, they have certain systems in place – like having raised platforms or medical emergency places where, in case of an emergency they can stay in those places. He also took a picture of the people from Nawada village, Gaya district, southern Bihar where there is the issue of drought. Both the north part and south part faces different natural disasters, these are very fragile places, if it rains too much then there is the flood and if it doesn’t rain enough then there will be the drought. In such cases people from the most interior places have less access to the remedy. He also took picture of the Gandhak River in Bihar which they recently covered while doing a documentary on the floods in Bihar. Varun took pictures of a person belonging to the community, who is actually responsible for recording the levels of the water. And there is a separate group inside the community called “Suraksha Dal” who record levels of water and warn the communities in case of an impending flood.

Uttarakhand crisis – This is more documented and available on the news etc. as every year one hears the news about Uttarakhand floods. Varun’s team was making a documentary in 2019 about the communities of Uttarakhand and Himalayas, and were going through some reports. Varun was baffled to read that villages across Uttarakhand are becoming ghost villages – even after going there he found that the people said the same thing. They said that; went it rains, there is floods and in some places where there used to be annual snowfall, there hasn’t been snowfall for four years which is directly effecting the region. But indirectly how it does effect: there are certain crops which the people are dependent upon e.g. Uttarakhand is known for its plums, apples and certain fruits which are very sensitive to temperature. Since the temperature is increasing, it is effecting the crops and the pests are infesting the crops and this is happening not every 10-15 years but it is occurring annually. There the weather is very unpredictable, due to which there is mass migration and people are migrating to plains, doing odd jobs and due to this there is feminization of agriculture because women are mostly in the villages. Which leads to other problems which is related to health and nutrition of women and a lot of other stuff.

Out there at the Chilka Lake the climate change effects is visible: the frequent cyclones. The cyclones break the barrier between the lagoon and the sea, the fisher folk community is the most affected. Industrialization of fishing is also a major reason and many species and dolphins are at the risk of going extinct. People from these places, have lesser carbon footprint than the people who live in the cities. But they are the people who are at the receiving end of climate change. So, whatever is leading to the climate change is now affecting those communities who were never responsible for the climate change in the first place.

Cyclone Gulab and Shaheen (2021) – usually when cyclones occurs on the shores, after few 100kms they just subside and disappear. But for the first time a cyclone travelled across the land and reached to the Arabian Sea. Frequent cyclones happen due to climate change and this was very alarming. At that time Varun’s team was in Odisha but on the northern part of it, and the cyclone affected mostly Northern Andhra Pradesh and Southern Odisha. Varun sees it as a warning as due to climate change that for the first time a cyclone travelled across land and went on to other sea. Imagining what would happen 20 years later is terrifying.

In all these stories water is at the centre of the crisis. Water and human civilizations have a very on and off effect, all the major cities in the world have evolved on water, so to separate water from human civilization will not work out. Hence water being the centre of crisis, it is either the excess of water or the scarcity of it, because water is necessary at the end of the day.

How does the water crisis hit the rural communities? The water crisis is affecting the communities who were actually never prepared for such sort of crisis ever – they have long been dependant on natural sources, especially the natural sources of water. But now when there is an increase in temperature and the ground level water is decreasing; there are mining activities going on, the water from the rivers are being taken and supplied to the houses in the urban areas, how does water crisis hits the communities? In the team’s observation, when they went to those places, they found out that women are the most affected part of the community during any crisis. Women have a major role in a community lifestyle, starting from morning till the late night they are always involved in taking care of the house: the chores, the children, the men and then they go to the field as well as they have to source food for the cattle and people. In this process there is this little part called sourcing water. During monsoons and winter, nearby wells are recharged so they have water there, but as summer approaches they have to go to further places which means more time in sourcing water which affects the rest of their schedule and for that process they need more energy. As it is known that the nutrition levels of women in the rural areas is concerning which directly affects them. Children are also affected by water crisis in these communities, because a lot of their time is involved to be with the people. The kids would usually go to school after sourcing water in the morning and after returning from school they would do other household chores. On analysing and trying to understand a child from an urban place and a child from a rural place thinking that the competition is same but rural kids are more engaged in sourcing those resources which are readily available in the urban place. In addition during summers for 4-5 months when the water is scarce there is this objective in mind to have less water. Having less water invites more diseases, and adding to the fact during summer people really do anything to find water e.g. if there is a muddy well, they would take out that water filter it with their clothes and drink it which invites more diseases which would then lead to the medical cost of that. So, these crisis they all lead to this very hostile condition and then these families migrate from the place because those resources are available in some other places – hence it also induces migration. They were traveling across various parts of Bundelkhand for 4 days and every time they would start at 5 o’clock (a.m.) and return to their base at 7 o’clock (p.m.) and wherever they went they would be watching women doing something or the other all the time, e.g. they can be seen with utensils and cans at the time when the monsoon has just ended, trying to source water.

Indigenous/Traditional Systems: When Varun talks to people, they always ask him; what is this system and why there is a system at all? Varun tries to rephrase it in a manner that the systems have been existent always, we see system in government setup systems etc. but before the government, before the monarch, before the kings and queens, the communities existed, the forests were there, water was there, how to utilise it was the system that was there, always. So, there were the indigenous and traditional systems, wherein there were certain rules, norms and ethics and certain notions to be followed by communities. Interestingly these are unwritten and passed on from one generation to the other. Even though it is mostly verbal, these are phenomenal systems which the ancestors had observed for 100+ years and then came up with those systems, knowing that all the parts of an ecosystem, not just humans but animals were affected by that. He met a community who dug up a pond two years back so that more rainwater can be collected. Varun asked them that when they were making the pond deeper what were they thinking when doing so? For them a pond is not just for consumption, it is for the wellbeing of all, the person quoted/put it very beautifully; “If the water is there then everything will be okay, everyone’s houses will also be okay no one will suffer. Water is not just for them but as there is also a forest there, the wild animals also come there and so we also have to save water for them. When people come there and see the water filling pond, they sit down beside, have a chat.” So, these systems somewhat looks over the physical wellbeing, the mental wellbeing and the whole community wellbeing. All these resources are not only about claiming, it is also about managing them and everyone should benefit with them.

Van Panchayat: When Varun first came to know about van panchayat it was mind boggling for him. Van Panchayat is a system among Uttarakhand communities near forests. Since Uttarakhand is blessed with Himalayan forests, so the communities there who are living along the forest they have Van Panchayats. It is like a normal panchayat and only the issues of the forest are addressed there. They have rules, they have teams who monitor the health of the forest e.g. are there some pests infestation there. Interestingly in 1920, during the British government, Van Panchayats received approval from the britishers, they recognized and documented them at that time and the forests. There was a division of rights and the van panchayats were legalised at that time and a certain portion of forest were given to the colonialists and it was exploited that way. So, there is a constant tussle between the communities and different departments wherein who owns the rights to the forests. There, the community which they met was all made up of women and they were very much connected to the forest. Women and Forests: often it is seen that the connection of women with the resources is very sensitive, very fragile and very intimate. So, during the team’s interaction with these communities, they were talking to the women and the women told them that, “these jungles, they are our first (mayka) paternal house, it is like our motherland.” It is their love for the forest, which can be seen by how the chipko movement came from that region – the communities. This is their lifeline and especially for women the forest is an integral part of their life. In Uttarakhand the communities after finishing their work, all of the women form a cluster and go to the forest and do all the weeding – people can see them clearing the weeds. This is because there are two species of pine trees found in Uttarakhand; one is the deodar and the other is the ‘english’ pine which was put up there by the britishers to produce wood which would then get transported to Europe. So, the pine leaves fall and make the soil acidic so no other plants are able to grow. The women take up this job upon themselves and go to the forest to clean the fallen leaves so that the forest is breathing, alive and healthy.

Community Management of Land: Varun was doing a documentary in Chhattisgarh about CFR (Community Forest Rights) and he was amazed to find out that there is community knowledge/traditional knowledge where they decide about the village land e.g. where the water body (pond/talab) be, etc. So every place, every village there is this system wherein they divide the area encompassing the village they put borders and they mark certain areas as ‘charadhar’ where the cattle can go herding, then a place for pond/talab, places for toilets – separate places for men and women, all this is managed and it is all decided in the Gram Sabha inside the villages. Varun never knew back then that such complex system of management is going on there which was fantastic and that is why there is a talk of ‘Pesa’ (which is an extension of Panchayat in scheduled areas) going on and which gives communities more rights over their resources. How do communities manage land to use it sustainably – in these communities where they are with the forest, there is this concept of regeneration of forests. So, for agriculture trees are cut down because with the increase in population there is more use of agricultural land but they also believe that for every plant/tree that they cut down, they plant five more trees so that the balance is maintained. Of course with water also they have to leave some water all the time so that it can recharge itself, so that the other wells of the villages they can also recharge the ground water.

Women and Land: Varun got an interesting insight when interviewing Shipra Dev who has worked extensively on the theme of women and land. She is currently in charge of the ‘Women and Land Division of Landesa Organization’. In an interview she mentioned that while in the field she met a lady from the seheria community (an indigenous community in the northern Madhya Pradesh with some parts of Rajasthan and Uttar Pradesh). While having a conversation about zameen (land) Shipra asked her who beautifully replied that “Elder sister, the land is not ours. We are of land.” (Didi, zameen hamari nai hai. Hum zameen ke hai). So, the entire concept of claiming the land, using the land and taking it under one’s name, apart from all this there is this traditional community knowledge, systems where they do not claim the land and they understand that the land has given them things and they are in gratitude. Varun finds it a very insightful thing he has heard and it is mind bending.

Community Management of Water: there are places where communities are living extensively around water, they have these systems in place where they can mark how much usage of water they have done, they also have, while keeping in record that how much rainfall has fallen this season, so that they use a limited amount of water and save the rest. It is done so that the wells, ponds and hand pumps can be recharged. If there is fishing going on, there are certain rules in the community wherein they try to minimise, they do not let people focus on profit making rather than the survival of ecosystems, so that the coming generations, they can also see what they see and feel what they are feeling and be involved in the process.

Women and Water: Just like “Jal, Jungle, Zameen”, for women it is absolutely different, there are very less materials online where they explore the intricacies of women, land, forest and water. Interestingly for water, in these parts, the entire onus of collecting water is mostly on women. One can always see the women going with their group, gathering water and return. It is an entire process for them. They have this connection always and they cherish that during that time. It is two-ways mostly, there is this consuming fact and there is also the giving fact. He got a chance of taking pictures of women collecting water in Raisen district and interestingly in those water collecting places where there are only women, they would talk about work, they would talk about what is happening in the village and their life, etc. It is a sort of an outing from their real life.

Indigenous Water Management Systems:

The “Naulas” of Western Himalayas – it was one of the interesting things which they observed in Uttarakhand, it is called “Naulas” it is basically naturally-occurring water aquifers. These are usually aquifers inside the land, and the water seeps in from the sub-terrainian level of land and it comes up naturally. Ideally/traditionally, people would do mud embankments around them, nowadays it is more like a cemented embankment so that water is collected and rest of the water is allowed to let go because if not then the water will be stuck there. These traditional naulas are seen across Uttarakhand but not in major areas because it is now not used because of its very low production of water. For communities in places which are very interior, it is enough for a village because it comes out and flows and it is recharged again and again. It is a natural spring, and there are rules around it just like a traditional system, of how much one can take and even when there is an event at the house, then the entire community goes to fetch water because it is ideally on the base of the hills, which is where the aquifer can come up, as water springs are hardly seen up on the hills. In those parts where the hill and the ground touches and where the aquifers are. It is still prevalent there where there is abundance of water but due to climate change the ground water is really going down, so in the next coming years it will be hard to find such spots. Before building an embankment they test it for hundred years, if it stays there the entire time then the village builds an embankment around it.

The “Dobha” of Jharkhand – it is also a natural aquifer and it is also at the base of a little mountain. So, across plateaus, across little hillocks, one can see natural seepages and the colour is always blue due to the water coming out from the roots and there are certain algae inside but communities use it for drinking (as drinking water) and they have been using it so for generations and they say that the water is rich, full of good minerals and it is very nutritious for them. The community use the water for washing themselves, sometimes take the water home for various uses. Dobhas are usually found near the houses. They also have a history because traditionally people are managing them and there are certain embankments that are being done, sometimes it is done through natural materials like stones, wood, etc. and in some places they have started using cement so that they can store more water because of the water crisis. The people conserve the water by digging the Dobha more. A lot of organizations are working to revive these traditional systems and across India where these traditional systems are being found now and they are being used to collect the water, to revive the ground water and to also acknowledge the traditional systems because those were the actual systems which governed these resources so that they could not be exploited.

Similarly, there is the “Dodhi” of Chhattisgarh – it is mostly seen near a certain water body and at the edge of a certain mountain. The colour of water there is also very bluish, locals say that it is because the water seeps through the roots of the trees and other biological elements in the soil and they have been drinking this water since generations. In a village if there are a dodhi, a lake and a pond, then the dodhi would be used for consumption purposes and the lake would be used for other purposes like washing, construction, etc. this is how they divide the usage, they understand that the dodhi is a very sensitive piece of system of water and it should not be exploited, otherwise once it goes away (dries) then it never comes back. There are wooden construction done around dodhi to collect water. There are specific knowledge systems in place which tell about what wood should be used in banking the little water hole, these have been time tested. Some places use cement structures to conserve water, the water is the same bluish colour. What it does is that if there is a dodhi near a village, it actually recharges all the wells all the other resources. So, having a dodhi is a good identifier of the ground water in that area. Varun visited a place where the dodhi was owned by two communities: the Gond and Pando communities, they worked collectively, they knew that there will be shortage of water, so they made cement structures so that they can have more water atleast to drink/consume, for other purposes they can source water from somewhere else. But, Varun feels that it is very necessary to have a movement to identify and to also understand that indigenous systems are there and they are time tested.

The team is still exploring many more water systems across India and Varun states that “water crisis is not just water crisis, it is the driving force for many other forms of crisis. To break this chain it becomes extremely essential to acknowledge the traditional systems of managing resources.” The indigenous knowledge systems are centuries old. These are time tested methods, which are still save communities in the harshest areas. The world needs to acknowledge the indigenous systems and adapt them.