Demise of Parvati Jadhav, an adivasi, variously attributed to heat stroke and cardiac arrest
Many myths surround the death of 41-year-old Parvati Jadhav, an adivasi woman in Dolhara. Officials attribute it to a heat stroke, and some say it was a cardiac arrest, but people in the village have no doubts about the reason. “Parvati was a sacrifice to the severe shortage of water here,” says Yashoda Wargade.
“Why don't they just poison us instead of killing us without water,” she laments. “Parvati was breathless when she was brought back from the well and couldn't even drink water,” she adds. At home, Parvati's husband Ramu, son Hiraman and four young daughters, the eldest Savita is 14 and youngest Sandhya, eight, try to reconcile with her death. A garlanded photograph of Parvati is brought out to show visitors. Her daughter-in-law Madhuri has given birth to a second daughter only a month ago.
Shocking incident
Filling water occupies most of the women's lives and the incident has come as a severe shock. They wait for six to eight hours sometimes for their turn at the well and even the men chip in at night since it is dangerous to be out alone. “Parvati made several trips in the heat and she died because of that,” says Shakuntala Jadhav.
Parvati like other women used to spend most of the mornings waiting for the elusive tanker which empties about 4,000 litres into the well, about one kilometre from her house. That Sunday morning on April 22, she rushed as usual to the well and made two trips in the baking heat carrying several steel pots each time. She was in the middle of preparing lunch for her family.
The heat and stress became a fatal combination for her. There is never enough water and it was during her third trip that she fell in a faint. Women bringing her back to the house recall that her pulse was fading and her eyes had rolled upwards. Her nephew Pundalik Jadhav says filling water repeatedly sapped her life.
She had no known ailments, confirms Kailash Jadhav, Additional Collector, Thane, who submitted a report to the Maharashtra government saying Parvati died of a heat stroke and her death was not due to water scarcity or a stampede.
Mokhada taluka in which Dolhara is situated has faced acute scarcity conditions since March this year and tanker supply has been erratic. There is chronic water shortage here. Yet, Thane is not on the government list of 15 scarcity-affected districts. People spend all day and night collecting water which forms a trickle at the bottom of bone dry wells.
The village had asked for a well closer to the village and a dam. The police patil Shankar Patil had even donated some land for a dam near the village. It was approved 10 years ago at a cost of Rs. 1.5 core but no one came forward to construct it, he rues. Villagers in disgust had boycotted elections but it was of no use. “How many more must die for water?” asks Yashoda.
The women have to amass bundles of unwashed clothes every week and wait for a State transport bus to ferry them 10 km away to a rivulet for washing. “The conductor does not let us enter with these smelly clothes even though we pay Rs. 7 per head,” says Ms. Jadhav.
The men also fetch large blue drums of water by bullock cart from another well about five km away from the village. The women scoffed at the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena (MNS) which distributed sealed plastic glasses of water to the village after Parvati died. Crushed cups are strewn in the village but in Shakuntala's house, the children have kept them untouched. “Look at these cups of water. Of what use can they be. We refuse to drink this water,” laughs Yashoda. In the village, a large hexagonal water tank stands as a testimony to the futility of government schemes. It was built many years ago for storing water but it used to leak and there is no earthly use for it now, people say amid demands of tearing it down.
‘Unfortunate event'
Immediately after her death which Mr. Jadhav termed “an unfortunate event,” a bore well was dug in the village which yielded water. And in addition, a long-pending demand for a small dam on a nearby rivulet has been sanctioned with alacrity. “Work will begin in September and it will be completed next year and then Dolhara will be out of scarcity,” declares Mr. Jadhav.
The two wells in the village are dry and two tankers supply water once in a while. Now the government sends up to three tankers for a population of 1200-1500 in the village. The two hand-pumps don't work and a new one was installed now and one last year.
No post-mortem
Sanjay Dahale says his aunt was taken to Khodala for treatment but they couldn't do much and she was taken to a private hospital in Nashik. The police are investigating her death. The doctors charged Rs. 45,000 for a day's treatment. There was no post-mortem conducted after she died.
Mr. Jadhav clarified that Parvati's condition was critical and the doctors at the Nashik hospital said they would not be able to revive her and advised the relatives to take her home. She died on the way back. While going to fill water, she fell about 200 metres away from the well and did not sustain any injuries. There was no blood supply to her brain, he said, adding that she may have been unwell or not had anything for breakfast. He said women used the well all year round and there had been no such incidents so far.
Parvati's death is a warning to an apathetic administration. The question is will it wake up.
Keywords: water shortage, Dolhara village, Maharashtra drought
its an irony where when asked for water cuts in posh areas of mumbai
people get panicked and write letters to get 24hr water supply and
here even when the essential quantity is for 8 glasses of water per
person minimum people dont have a drop to taste water and what does
political parties do waste the peoples money to buy plastic cups of
water instead of sending in tankers to these parched places and why is
it so rain water harvesting is important in cities where as villages
dont get to know how the process of restoring ground water works its high time we start to manage our water other wise a day will come when a bottle of water will cost as much as a bottle of stored french wine.
Meena Menon's powerful photojournalism depicting the crusade for
fetching water is spine-chilling one.This is happening very nearer to
Mumbai suburban district Thane!...Whenever we drink water in Mumbai or
at Elephanta caves, Parvati Jadhav will come to our minds!It is a pity
that rural womenfolk are 'made' for filling water from far-away
lands."Swaraj" film on real story on Madurai Leelavati is reminded here.
This is a tragic incident which is highly melting.
In this highly mobile world, the government's failure in consistent transport of water to such spots is really heartbreaking.
Can't they just spend half of the money they spent in brunches and dinners at part meets?
Not only government but we "the people" also need to take this up seriously.
We the commoners of so called working society use water "unconcernedly". We always have a thought of saving water, but applying it strictly in daily life has become a part of negligence.
Through this article I compelled to think , wasting water is one of the habit of humans against the survival of human race.
Please save water !
The photo shows it all !!!...
It is painful to see our women walk for miles, wait for hours just for a
mere survival - a pot of water. Be it water, toilet or firewood women
and girl children are the ultimate ones who toil to meet their basic
needs irrespective of their unattended health status. Where is women
empowerment? Where are we heading?
Its a shame that it takes a life for the govt. to take steps to solve the issue.Unfortunately this is what the people of our country has been experiencing all time.Just a well near by the village would have avoided this incident.Its high time that govt. analyses the situation of the state and does the needful.
It is very shameful incident that a person dies without water. I don't think that state government has any moral right to stay in power.People are dying without water without food, where in gowdan grains are decaying and many thousand crores are spending in the name of providing drinking water to peoples of India. Where does all these resource are going(in Swiss bank) is there any answer for these question from our so called respected representatives who are sitting in parliaments both in states and in Delhi.
No post-mortem had done, what should be the probable reason of death
leaving all those facts aside the main question is how long it will be
continued. We are claiming ourselves as a developed asain country still
there are a lots of villages where people are fighting with odds to get
their basic needs. If your people don't get water, shelter or other
basic needs then we are not really developing in real aspect life as
development should't only be measured by the means of how much HIGHTECH cities we have.
India's war on its poorest people, the Adivasis continues unabated. And these blood sucking corporations continue to steal the resources of the world at will. In the recent meeting of WTO and other economic forums, the process of privatizing the world's water has gained much momentum. So very soon we will have a world where there will be those who can afford water and those who cannot. Its only those people who have to walk 5 km to fetch a bucket of water know the value of water,not those who waste loads of it at the turn of a tap.
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