‘One Million Wells for Bengaluru’ — that is the pithy vision statement of Biome Environmental Trust and Friends of Lakes (FoL) which together seek to revive open wells in The City of Gardens as well as engage with the community to find water solutions. One million wells may be a tall order, but the fact that the bar has been set so high shows the spirit behind the campaign.
“There are at least 10,000 open wells in the city that are providing water to residents,” says S. Vishwanath, who run the Trust. And, there are many more out there that need to be located. By localising the campaign, the group wants to set an example that reviving such wells will make the land water-sufficient. A few recent examples of the work done by the team include reviving seven open wells at Cubbon Park. These were revived with the financial support offered by an NGO, and it now serves the water needs of the sprawling park.
In another case, a huge open well at a park in Indira Nagar was restored.
All that is expected of the community is look for old wells that are hidden behind open plots or dumped with garbage. All old localities are likely to have wells, most probably abandoned now, and one just needs to go looking for them.
“If you find some water, it is possible to recharge the wells further with the help of well diggers who have the skill to dig, deepen and desilt them,” he says.
Chennai, he says, has many wells. “But, people seem to have forgotten them. They need to come together to revive those memories,” he says.
He says every old well can be used as a recharge well by allowing water from the roof top to run into these structures.
“If you have enough water at the community level then everyone is going to benefit out of it,” he says.
Urban Waters Bengaluru, a platform that brings the knowledge, experience and practice of many communities, citizen activists and researchers, can be a resource for those looking for information on how individuals and societies in the city are harvesting water for the future. It also has contact numbers of well diggers who are ready to come to other cities to take up the work.
