Well Worth It

Happiness delivery: The Million Wells campaign is striving to rejuvenate Bengaluru's groundwater table while providing a livelihood to the Mannu Vaddar welldigging community

-  AJAY SUKUMARAN

Fourteen years ago, S. Vishwanath was getting on his motorcycle somewhere in south Bengaluru when a man tapped him on the shoulder, asking if he wanted a well. That's right, a water well. A rainwater harvesting enthusiast, Vishwanath was nonetheless flabbergasted by the random question. In the conversation that ensued, he started to learn of the numerous open wells in Bengaluru up until the mid-1980s when borewells began to take over. And how the Mannu Vaddar community that made a living from digging these open wells was gradually finding itself out of work. The idea of a campaign to dig a million wells for Bengaluru was thus born.