Villages on Karnataka-Andhra Pradesh border facing acute water crisis

TUMAKURU: In an attempt to draw the attention of Congress vice president Rahul Gandhi during his journey to Ananthpur district on Friday, Bagepalli legislator S. N. Subba Reddy plans to meet the leader en route and appeal to him to recommend a lasting solution to long pending water problem of the semi-arid and drought-prone region.

Villages bordering Andhra Pradesh, particularly those in drought-hit Bagepalli taluk of Chikkaballapur district, are facing an acute drinking water crisis with women forced to trek for about two to four km to fetch a pot of drinking water. Successive governments have failed to solve the drinking water problem faced by people in this region.

“After sending my two children to school in the morning, I will walk down to one of the private bore-well agriculture fields to wash clothes and to fetch a pot of potable water for drinking and return home only around noon,” complains Gayatri Babureddy, a resident of Deva Reddipalli, about 7 km from Bagepalli town. About 150 families in Deva Reddipalli buy water from water tankers and pay Rs 2 per pot of water, she added.

Mr Subba Reddy took up an initiative to sink about 500 borewells within a short span of two years, but most of them failed to yield water event at depths of 1200 to 1500 feet.

He said that he was ready to spend 25 per cent of the amount from own pocket to install RO plants in all villages under Bagepalli taluk, a region which has been listed among 39 most backward taluks in Karnataka by the committee headed by the late economist Dr D M Nanjundappa.