Wednesday, October 18, in Bandipora, north Kashmir, women from Saderkoot Bala village protested because they haven’t had clean water for months.
Most of the protesters were women, and they said they were going several kilometres to Sumbal’s administration centre to get higher officials’ attention on their situation because they had been pleading with local authorities over and over again but had not been heard.
“It’s been over two or three months since we’ve had any water come out of our taps,” said Maimoon Begum, an older woman on the protesting women’s group.
“No matter how cold or wet it is, we have to work hard to get water.” Most of the time, we get water from neighbours with wells, but they don’t like having us around all the time, she said.
She said that they were old and that getting water was a lot of work. I worry that we might hurt ourselves if we fall. “The government needs to listen and give us water.”
People in the town said there was a problem with the water because there weren’t enough pipes. Also, they said that a public bore well in the town wasn’t enough to meet the needs and wasn’t useful without a rotary pump.
People in the villages said that the department was sending water trucks on and off to make up for the lack of water, but that “a single water tanker” wasn’t enough because it didn’t reach most or half of the people.
Another old woman broke down in tears and said, “God sees how much we are suffering.” “We Can’t See Any Drinking Water Running Through Our Taps.”
The women said that not having sufficient drinking water was a bother and that they had experienced problems with it before.
The people in the villages asked the deputy commissioner of Bandipora and the executive engineer of the Jal Shakti department to help them get water by giving them water pipes and a water pump.
