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The Rediff Special/ Sheela Bhatt

'This drought is not the worst ever'

"It's not an easy job. Ask the MBAs of IIMs to manage the drought-affected areas and see. They will run away!"

That was Sanat Mehta, a former mayor of Jamnagar district, one of the worst-hit areas in Gujarat.

He is absolutely right: no one will argue that arranging relief to a parched populace spread over hundreds of villages is a cakewalk.

If you still need confirmation, you can speak to Girish Murmu, the collector of Jamnagar. Murmu reaches office at around 0930 hours every day. His working hours are as long as they are hectic.

"In the last 15 years Jamnagar has experienced nine years of water scarcity. Just last year, in the same month, on the same date we were supplying water by tankers to the same numbers of villages. Nobody reported that. Nor was it labelled the worst drought of the century," he says.

"We saw the worst droughts in three successive years, between 1985 and 87. Today I am supplying water only to 448 villages; in 1988, 497 villages didn't have a drop of water. Our operation was at a much larger scale. But no one wrote about it!"

Murmu is in charge of 1.1 million parched souls. His 14-hour working day goes in planning, executing and monitoring relief for them. Before the first showers arrive he will spend approximately Rs 680 million.

"My priority is to distribute two buckets of drinking water to each villager in 448 villages," he says.

His tanker supply chain needs strict supervision. The contractors are all politically connected, making his task all the more difficult. In some cases, the local politicians own the company that supplies the tankers. By June, Murmu will pay Rs 100 million to the contractors.

The collector gets a lot of complaints about the timing of the water supply. Tanker-timings are highly erratic. So much so that some places get their water in the middle of the night! A solution to this problem is difficult: the supply depends on the distance between the source and the village.

Water for the villagers is also highly dependent on the supply of electricity. Erratic electric supply affects the schedule of the tankers, as electric pumps are used to fill them.

Then, tankers break down. A common complaint that Murmu hears is, "Saab, gadi bagdi gai che" [Sir, the vehicle is not working.]

All drivers carry logbooks. The talati [a minor government official], signs it when the tankers reach his village. With the connivance of tanker owners, many of these officials are now minting money while the sun shines.

A population of 5,000 requires 10 tankers a day. The corrupt contractors register more trips on paper. It's very difficult to monitor the actual number of trips made to each village if the talati has been bought over. At many places the contractors distribute water on alternative days and then charge the government for daily supply.

To end this, Murmu proposes to be in touch with all the 448 villages over telephone. He would pay the contractors only after checking their claims.

"Fudging of figures are more in the case of the bigger villages where they make more than 25-30 trips, supplying some 300,000 litres of water everyday. They swindle the money of 5-6 trips. I have sent notices to the talati of Sikka village," he says.

A major part of Murmu's day goes in managing the supply of fodder. Jamnagar has 30 depots for this. Daily, Murmu supervises the distribution of 200,000 kilos of grass. Every week three trains arrive in Jamnagar. Each brings 70 wagons of grass. Some 50-60 trucks are hired everyday to transport this to the depots.

"The grass which costs the government Rs 4 per kilo is supplied to the villagers at Rs 1 per kilo. This year the south Gujarat and Maharashtra based farmers had assessed the situation well in advance and hoarded grass. Some 15 million kilos will be supplied at the subsidised rate this summer," he reveals.

Managing the relief work camps is another of Murmu's tasks. There are 235 of such, where some 60,000 villagers earn between Rs 20 and Rs 40.

"During the drought the people below the poverty line gets a chance to earn more then they normally do. Relief work is a kind of secure job for them," Murmu tells you. "But even here they try to cheat the government. I have suspended some 25 clerks for inflating the figures."

The government has paid out Rs 250 million to workers in such camps since January 1, the collector says. In addition to the Rs 2 million paid daily to the labourers, Murmu doles out Rs 15 per aged and handicapped, and Rs 5 to every child.

"The relief work timings are from 6 am to 2 pm, but the villagers never report to work before 7 am. And they leave the camp around 12 noon for lunch.. Since every year we are facing drought or drought-like situations many villagers now know how to exploit the situation," he complains.

Contrary to the official claim, a large numbers of children do work in relief camps.

According to Murmu , in his district 200,000 villagers are below the poverty line. He has to distribute around four million kilos of additional grains as per the government's latest announcement.

"Our biggest worry is to find new sources of water. In the last three months we dug up 198 places. In 118 places we found some water, but that has already been exhausted. In my area there is no water even 500 feet below the ground. I have spent Rs 5 million to install 22 bore wells, but with little success."

For a bureaucrat like Murmu, the end of a day is another step closer to the monsoon. And like the politicians and the people he too will forget this waterless summer once rain arrives, as it happened the last time and the time before and the one before.

"This drought is not the worst ever," Murmu tells you again. "People are just complaining more, that's all."

The Rediff Specials

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