Live
- ‘Get Set, Grow Summit 2024’ Focuses on Digital Detox for Families
- Stokes motivates his team to put in extra effort, says England pacer Potts
- From overcoming setbacks to leading India in U19 Women’s Asia Cup, Niki Prasad's amazing journey
- Driving Enterprise Security: Inside Venkata Reddy Thummala’s Leadership Journey
- Constitution debate: PM Modi hails 'Nari Shakti'; makes strong pitch for 'United Bharat’
- Abhijeet Bhardwaj: Revolutionizing Enterprise Analytics with Innovation and Expertise
- Bihar: Inquiry initiated against principal who went to buy veggies during school hours
- Press Sri Lankan Prez for release of Indian fishermen: TN Cong MP to EAM Jaishankar
- TN: DMK postpones executive meet due to heavy rains & Parliament session
- Porous silicon oxide electrodes can fix durability issues in batteries: Researchers
Mazhapolima- Art of harvesting rainwater!
God’s Own Country, as it is affectionately called, does not always have all the blessings. The bottle green stretch of fertile land is sandwiched between the winding mountains ranges of Western Ghats and briny waters of Arabian Sea. It boasts of 44 rivers and copious rainfall (exceeds 3 metres a year!) most time of the year. But, come summer, wells are dried up and people run hotfoot to fetch a pa
God’s Own Country, as it is affectionately called, does not always have all the blessings. The bottle green stretch of fertile land is sandwiched between the winding mountains ranges of Western Ghats and briny waters of Arabian Sea. It boasts of 44 rivers and copious rainfall (exceeds 3 metres a year!) most time of the year. But, come summer, wells are dried up and people run hotfoot to fetch a pail of water.
Though there are rules for water harvesting, people turn a blind eye and never bother to follow. They press in water tankers and depend on tube wells during summer. However, one official, pained over the plight of people, thought out of the box. Way back in 2008, Dr V Kurian Baby, the then collector of Thrissur, a central Kerala district, came out with a solution to the problem.
He formulated a unique plan to pull together bountiful of rainwater into wells and thus recharge them and lo and behold, it worked out well. The idea was simple. First gather rainwater from the rooftops, run it through a sand filter and then into the well on the homestead.
The local self-help groups, called Kudumbasrees, were pressed into service. PVC pipes were fixed to the rafters protruding from the edges of roofs. These were connected to a common descending pipe that led into a sandpit. From there another pipe took the water into the well. And thus, Mazhapolima was born! According to Kurian, the cost was Rs 5000 per household for the pipes and other materials.
People of each house did the work themselves while some hired workers. It took less than a week to set up a system for a typical Kerala house. The catchment was ready-made with tiled roofs on most homes. The district played pioneer in water harvesting and slowly other district followed suit.
According to Kurian, total investment for implementing the technique in the entire State would probably exceed Rs 1,800 crore, all private. However, the state government, this year, set aside more than Rs 90 crore for Mazhapolima . The government issued an order in February, specifying the institutional structure for running the project.
A state-level monitoring committee headed by the Principal Secretary for Local Self-Government, district committees headed by the district collector for planning and panchayat committees were formed for implementation of the programme.
