On a blazing afternoon, Rehan Qureshi, 11, sprints to the Mukundwadi railway station with two empty pots. He must board the 3.15 p.m. train to Aurangabad, 7 km away. He has never missed the train all summer.
The wells and ponds at Mukundwadi in Maharashtra, where Rehan lives, have been dry since April. Rehan’s mother is a domestic help and his father a daily-wage labourer.
It is Rehan’s duty to fetch water home from the Aurangabad railway station. Tankers visit the drought-hit Mukundwadi every five days, but they charge up to ₹100 for a drum of water, which is not even potable.
Rehan has dropped out of school; he can afford to do this daily journey. On some days his younger brother and several friends also join him. The train ticket costs ₹20 up and down, expensive for Rehan’s family, but still cheaper than buying water.
The train stops for about 40 minutes at Aurangabad; Rehan and his companions rush to fill their pots. The difficult part is carrying their full pots off the train at Mukundwadi — the Hyderabad-bound train stops only for a minute here. “Often, policemen shout at us and sometimes they empty our cans, but we have to take that risk,” Rehan says.
Prakash Nagre, Rehan’s friend, nods in agreement. “Sometimes we fall and get hurt... Sometimes we carry back cans for other families in our neighbourhood.”
“We have no other option,” says Rehan’s mother, Parveen Qureshi. A month ago, their fears came true when Rehan’s cousins Ayaan, 3, and Shoaib, 8, went missing. The train started moving even as their mother was helping them unload the water cans. The children are still missing.
(Images and text by Emmanual Yogini)
At the Mukundwadi station, Rehan waiting for the passenger train to Aurangabad, 7 km away.
The days begins around 3 p.m. for Rehan Qureshi of Mukundwadi, a drought-hit Marathwada village, as he leaves home with empty pots to the nearby train station.
At the Aurangabad station, Rehan and his friend Prakash Nagre start filling water in the vessels they have brought.
Many people of Mukundwadi collect water at the station, evading the eyes of Railway Protection Force men.
On the move Rehan sits on a drum filled with water on his way back to the village inside a coach reserved for the disabled persons.
Rehan’s younger brother Irfan, 9, joins the water trip on some days.
Mission accomplished Rehan waiting for people to come and take their water cans after offloading them from the train.
Rehan, Irfan and friends carry a full bucket to his home.