Here, villagers dig pits in river beds for water

Ballari: With the temperature already soaring to 42 degree Celsius  and  the rivers Tungabhadra and Vedavati drying up, people  of  Siruguppa and Bellary taluks are  doing what their forefathers always did in such conditions.  They are digging  two feet deep pits  in the dry riverbeds to tap water, following the ancient practice of  "varthi."

Once the water begins to surface in the pits, women queue up and using  small bowls to collect it,  fill as many vessels as they can to take home.  Local bodies too often follow this system to draw water for supply to villages.

The practice begins from March onwards and continues  till the onset of monsoon, with people thirsting for drinking water in these parts. While water usually bubbles up in the pits dotting the river beds if they are dug two feet deep in early summer, the villagers need to dig deeper, to around seven feet, to find water in later weeks of  April and May. Despite the time and effort that it takes to collect water this way, the people of several villages have  no other option to get their drinking water supply. So they stoically get down to the job with their spades and hovels as a hot sun beats down on their backs. “Seeing how bad the heat is already , we shudder at the thought of what awaits us when summer reaches its peak  later this month and in May,” said a woman, Yaremma, of Kudadarhal village in Siruguppa taluk.