Village: Saradhapur, GP: Sunapur, Block: Boden, District: Nuapada
A tribal denizen-dominated village named Saradhapur is situated in the Sunapur gram panchayat of Boden block of Nuapada District. The village has 172 households with 767 population. The village has 03 ponds, 13 farm ponds, 05 dug wells, 11 Tube wells, and 01 streams for the use of the community people, but still, people experience water scarcity in the summer for their domestic, drinking, and agricultural use. About 90% of the people in this village earn their living by growing vegetables, paddy, and pulses such as green gram beans, red lentils, chickpeas, split black gram, pigeon peas, etc., and almost 10% of the people used to migrate for their survival. Along with farming, people raise goats, chickens, sheep, ducks, and cows to earn. They also collect Mahua flowers, seeds, Chahar (a deciduous tree of the cashew family), tendu leaves, and other non-timber forest products from the nearby forest, farm, and fallow lands and sell them in the market or designated depots.
Mrs. Laxmi Mahauti, the field facilitator of Chale Chalo, has been working in this village on water conservation and management. She regularly visits the fields to conduct meetings with the Didi groups, water volunteers, village water management committees, communities, SHGs, PRIs’ members, youths, adolescents, service providers, and other stakeholders on water, water cycle, rainwater conservation, watershed management, soil, and forest conservation, understanding and protection of ecology.
The Didi and PRIs’ members and water volunteers have undergone exposure visits to Jharkhand and West Bengal with the Chale Chalo team and attended the training/workshops held in the community, cluster, Panchayat, block, and project levels. During the initials of this project i.e. during 2019, under Khariar Division, a check dam was constructed in Pila Jor Nala by the Minor Irrigation Project (MIP). The villagers and the neighbourhoods’ were using the check-dam water for their domestic use. Animals too used to drink the water from it.
Unfortunately, in 2021, the check dam crumbled due to poor construction, resulting in no water storage.
On dated 23.11.2021, the concerned project team members and Didi group conducted the five-year micro water security planning with the Sarpanch, ward members, and other community people where they planned to renovate the check dam in 2022-2023. The team members regularly discussed the issue, mobilized the villagers, and conducted meetings with Didi, PRIs, water management committee members, and other stakeholders.
Finally, the renovation work was approved and executed during April-May 2023. The work was completed on 10.05.2023 by the Minor Irrigation Project under the supervision and cooperation of the gram panchayat, Didi groups, and villagers. The villagers worked as wage laborers and renovated the check dam with 06 pillars, and now it has the storage of 6fts of water in it. Apart from using the water for bathing, washing, and drinking for domestic animals, the farmers with the help of a motor pipe connection, use the water for growing maize, peanuts, cotton, paddy, pulses, and vegetables in the nearby lands. This has also ensured the recharging of groundwater and works as a protective irrigation source for the Kharif paddy crop. The villagers, especially the women (Didi leaders and members) are fully convinced that water and livelihood security in villages is possible through implementing micro water security plans.
During the recent visit of the evaluator and the Chale Chalo team, we found that the gram panchayat has sanctioned 7lakhs rupees for the repairing of the check dam. In order to enhance the effectiveness of the check dam, the panchayat has engaged 60 women to clean bushes and excavate mud covering 1.5kms in the catchment area, reservoir, and canal. The work is in progress. The check dam has helped in recharging the water table in the nearby areas. The farmers have been using both the surface and groundwater for growing vegetables, pulses, and cereals in their lands.