H2O

Today as the world celebrates Water Day; let’s revisit the stirring story of Ralegaon Siddhi in Maharashtra, India. The drought-prone villagers were in debt. Rampant alcoholism brought along feuds and crime, especially against women. The village temple around the samadhi of ‘Yadavbaba’ had broken down. The wood from it had been used as firewood. It was to this village that Anna Hazare returned 25 years ago.

Today the temple is the hub of activity and houses a ‘grain bank’. Water is systematically harvested and three crops are grown. The village where a fifth of the families ate only one meal a day, now markets vegetables, grain, and milk. While neighboring villages wait for Government tankers to bring drinking water, Ralegaon has enough for the villagers as well as the hundreds who walk in to see Anna’s vision.

The very way of life and relationships within the village has been transformed. Everything is built by community effort. People get married in community marriages. All this has been achieved by decades of dedication by Anna who came from a poor family in debt, took an early retirement from the army as a truck driver, inspired by Swami Vivekananda's dictum, ‘The purpose of life is to serve others.’

A once destitute village is now, a brand for appropriate development. It isn’t enough to identify what is wrong, we must initiate action and back it with committed perseverance. Anna has shown the way of involving community to change the situation. Ralegaon Siddhi is stimulation to be better at managing the real elixir of life – water!

To BE BETTER at overcoming the H2O situation,

We must walk Anna’s path of collective action!

- Pravin K. Sabnis