Water crisis forces Damoh villagers to migrate

BHOPAL: A large population of a distant village in Damoh district has migrated following acute water crisis. More than 600 people from the village with a population of about 800 have shifted to either Jabalpur or the district headquarter of Damoh.
The village wears a deserted look as a large number of huts are locked. However, battling against odds, a few families of Panajhir village of Tendukheda development block stayed back.Now, every day they have to fetch water from a jungle in the neighbourhood, about 8 km from their settlement. Those living in the village end up spending half of their time in search of water.
Vandana Ahirwar, a woman left behind in the small hamlet located on a hilly terrain, said, “Eight km is too long a distance to fetch water. Besides, some of the water spills over from the earthen pot while returning to the village.” Another villager, Kallo Bai, said, “People migrated because they neither had employment nor water. Why would they stay here?” She wondered as to when they would eke out their livelihood after spending six hours to fetch a pot of water.
Located on a hillock near Patan tehsil of Jabalpur, Panajhir is a small hamlet where a mixed population of scheduled cast and backward communities lives for long. All the tube-wells have gone dry in the village, which is part of Sahajpura panchayat. In all there are 13 handpumps in the panchayat, three of which are located in the village facing acute water crisis. None of them are functional.
Sarpanch Priti Khangar said the administration was informed many times about the water crisis and defunct tube-wells, but in vain. Her husband Ganesh Khangar said the villagers migrated due to water scarcity. District panchayat CEO Manish Bagri admitted that the people have migrated, but said it was not because of water. He hastened to add, “These villagers live in Jabalpur and spend only a few days in Panjhir. No doubt there is acute water crisis in the village, but their migration cannot be correlated with it. Even if you dig 200 feet in this hilly terrain you would only get stones,” he said.