Water and how to use it wisely
Dying Wisdom — Rise, Fall and Potential of India’s Water Harvesting Systems — A Citizens’ Report edited by Anil Agarwal and Sunita Narain. Centre for Science and Environment, New Delhi. Pp. 404. Price not stated.
THERE is a school of thought which credits British colonialism with introducing modernisation in India. Many historians and social scientists have argued that the British administration laid the modern infrastructure like railways, post and telegraph, etc. and promoted a sense of equity, rule of law and modern forms of governance in the country. The argument, if stretched to its logical conclusion, would stress that but for the advent of the British, India would have stayed primitive or at least pre-modern, and its inhabitants condemned to lead a semi-barbaric life for all times to come.
Admirers (read apologists) of British colonialism overlook two basic facts in their zeal to defend the Raj. First, whatever was done by the colonial administration was, directly or indirectly, aimed at facilitating the task of plundering India. Second, Indian society, extremely rich in its traditional wisdom, was deprived of its great potential to grow in various fields. As a consequence, it suffered unimaginably at the hands of British colonialism.
To take the example of agriculture, the introduction of the land revenue system in India by the British through permanent settlement, led to the destruction of time-tested traditional water harvesting systems in India which made famine a recurring phenomenon in the countryside. During the nearly 200 years of British rule, two lakhs of people perished every year on an average on account of famine. About 4.5 million perished in the famine of 1896-97, followed by another 2.5 million in 1899-1900. The Bengal famine of 1943 alone claimed about four million lives.
The report under review is a masterly document dealing with traditional water harvesting systems in India which went a long way in empowering local communities, increasing wealth in villages and in promoting integrated village ecosystem management. Water has been harvested in India since times immemorial through tanks, wells, embankments and canals. Kautilya’s Arthashastra written in the fourth century B.C. tells that the people knew about rainfall regimes, soil types and appropriate irrigation techniques in specific micro-ecological contexts.
The report is divided into four parts. The first part deals with the traditional water harvesting systems in India. The second part has 15 sections dealing with 15 ecological regions, delineating in fascinating detail the methods employed in harvesting water resources. The third part is a masterly exposition of the blow dealt by the British colonial rulers to the traditional water harvesting systems of India, which resulted in widespread penury and misery in the countryside and the destruction of traditional arts, craft, cottage industry, rich cultural heritage and wisdom. The final part is a passionate plea to learn the appropriate lessons from the ancient wisdom and mould it to suit the present context.
Space does not permit an elaborate treatment of the water harvesting systems in every nook and corner of the country described in graphic detail in the report. A newspaper review would permit only a few illustrations. In certain areas of Himalayan region, an ingenuous system of bamboo pipelines has been devised to deliver water to plantations in rocky terrain where no channels can be built. It resembles the modern drip system which delivers small quantities of water straight to the roots of the plants. Glaciers, the only source of water in Ladakh, melt slowly through the day and water is available mainly in the evening, too late for irrigation. Water is stored in a tank and used the following day for irrigating plantations.
In southern India tanks played an important role in water harvesting. Temples played a highly valuable role in promoting tank irrigation. A part of wealth generated through money endowments for the famous Tirupati Temple, established in the ninth century, was used for promoting small-scale irrigation in the Vijayanagar empire.
Thar desert of Rajasthan provides a unique example of water harvesting system. Water is the most precious commodity there. Celebration of rain is an important part of Rajashtan’s folklore. A rooftop water harvesting system is widely prevalent in Thar desert. Rain water that falls on the roof is taken through a pipe to an underground tank known as “kundi”: A “kachha” structure known as “kui” is dug next to the tank to collect the seepage. Since water is scarce, every drop must be preserved and used judiciously. At places people bathe on a stone block, from which water drains into an animal water tank. Since washing of glasses used for drinking purposes needs water, a round shaped tumbler known as “lota” is lifted by one hand and water from it is poured straight into the mouth.
Before the advent of the British rule, India was a rich and highly urbanised country with highly developed arts, crafts and literature. Villages, which functioned as small republics, generated enough surplus not only to support themselves but also the cities and towns. There were 3,200 big cities, towns and urban hamlets in Akbar’s kingdom. People had devised highly efficient methods of water harvesting through their native talent and resources. Sir William Willcocks, a British irrigation expert, was invited by the British authorities in the 1920s to study the Indian irrigation system. He opined that the British would do best to learn from the natives themselves in this respect. John Voelcker, another British expert, observed, “I make bold to say that it is a much easier task to propose improvements in English agriculture than to make really valuable suggestions for that of India.”
The findings of Irfan Habib, an authority on medieval Indian history, reveal that on account of two annual harvests, cereal yields were higher in India than in Europe until the 19th century. The per capita output of ghee was higher during Mughal rule than during the British period or later.
The report under review correctly points out that in order to increase their revenue, the British colonialists destroyed the financial resource base of Indian villages and their internal capacity to manage their natural resources. The village-based water management systems were destroyed by taxing the people too much. As a consequence, there were not enough internal resources to manage the irrigation structures and India became a nation chronically afflicted with famines and destitution. British colonial rulers brought about fundamental changes in the land relations in the country. The state became the “universal landlord” with land revenue as its primary objective. The introduction of private property in land led to the emergence of a strong speculative market in land, ruining many farmers. In the process, the water management systems devised through communitarian efforts of the villagers were destroyed. In the absence of the patronage of the state and the rural gentry, traditional Indian arts, crafts and industry and the rich heritage of traditional wisdom were ruined.
With the plunder of Indian resources the British rulers ushered in the process of industrial revolution and modernisation in their native land. In order to facilitate the task of pillaging the colonies, the colonialists had to provide the minimum infrastructure. This has been interpreted by many in terms of giving credit to the colonisers for bringing modernity to the colonies. The argument underscores a preposterous assumption that the natives were incapable of self-development.
There is an attempt to overlook the fact emphasised by Fanon that not only were “the well-being and the progress of Europe were built up with the sweat and the dead bodies of Negroes, Arabs, Indians, and the yellow races, but Europe is literally the creation of the Third World”. Echoing Fanon, Sartre observes that “the European has only been able to become a man through creating slaves and monsters.”
The report in its final part makes out a cogent case for learning appropriate lessons from traditional wisdom of India in the matter of water harvesting systems as they have passed the test of time and are suited to the specific environments in which they got evolved. The report rightly warns that a mere replication of the past may prove to be counterproductive. The traditional wisdom has to be moulded to suit the exigencies of the modern time. There has to be a creative fusion of tradition and modernity.
— D.R. Chaudhry

A country forever at war with itself
Afghanistan and Asian Stability edited by V.D. Chopra. Gyan Publishing House, New Delhi. Pp. 238. Rs 360.
One will never know if the people of Afghanistan will ever see peace during their lifetime. Geo-strategically located across the Amu Darya and the Hindukush mountains, this land-locked Muslim state has seen every type of cultural and military invasion that historians would care to remember. Even its buffer status during the days of Czarist Russia and British colonial India could not save it from civil war, insurgency and all-out conflict.
This is a sad tale of a poor land, where three distinctly separate forces tried to do constructive good as they perceived it, only to end up making a bigger mess of things. Those who must share in the sorrows of Afghanstan today are the ambition-ridden leaders of these simple and hardy people, the country's immediate neighbours and, of course, the super-powers, which felt that their intervention, covert or overt, was beyond any debate or questioning.
V.D. Chopra's compilation, besides his own contribution, has traced the "currents and cross-currents within this landlocked country, the role of the major world powers and the fall-out of the prolonged civil war in Afghanistan on Asian stability," and highlights the fact that only a political solution acceptable to all sections of Afghan society, be they be the Taliban, or the erstwhile Mujahideen now in opposition, can usher in some semblance of durable peace.
A collection of essays and reports compiled from the deliberations of two seminars, one of these held in London by the London School of Economics, form the basis of this book. A wide range of subjects from the geo-political importance of Afghanistan, religious fundamentalism and ethnic conflicts facing the country, the geo-economic and the oil factor in the post-cold war phase, the take-over of Kabul by the Taliban, the spread of weapons and narcotics within the country, the Russian and the Central Asian response to the new power centres, the impact of the Afghan situation on South and South-West Asia and, finally, India's stand on Afghanistan during the past two decades or so.
A very broad spectrum of views emerges from these writers. Professor Fred Halliday of the LSE indicates that the broad Soviet view of relations with the West, in a way, determined its policy on Afghanistan. He says, "In 1987-88 Gorbachev traded Afghanistan for an agreement on arms control. Even the US decision to continue sending arms did not halt the Soviet pullout."
Kalim Bahadur writes about the spread of the Taliban doctrine and ideology in neighbouring Muslim countries. He says, "Pakistan has paid a heavy price for the Afghanistan policy of Gen Zia-ul-Haq which the Pakistan establishment has continued since then. The spread of drugs, Kalashnikov culture and sectarian strife have been tearing the country apart. Though the Taliban political culture is yet to have its full impact on Pakistan, political circles in Pakistan are already giving warning signals about the danger of Taliban ideology spreading into Pakistan." How true! It has often happened before that forces released in one direction often have boomeranged onto their own masters.
An interesting perception of the Soviet view of the Afghan crisis needs mentioning here. O.N. Mehrotra writes: "Russia seems to be disinclined to interfere in the Afghan internal affairs or become a competitor in the game plan. But at the same time, it would be vehemently opposed to any foreign interference in Afghanistan that would be inimical to the Russian economic, political and strategic interests". Afghanistan lying in the soft underbelly of Russia and now the C.I.S. is of legitimate concern if not alarm to these countries.
Some of the writers have painted interesting possibilities in the region in the years to come. Two separate Afghanistans, one in the north and one in the south, a Pakhtoonistan carved out of the North-West Frontier Province and areas adjoining the Durand Line, both in Pakistan and Afghanistan. Obviously no cause of joy for Pakistan, but very much in the minds of the old trusted leaders of the Pakhtoon movement.
One of the concluding chapters on India's stand on the Afghanistan crisis by editor Chopra, comes as somewhat a disappointment. The author says little by way of views or analysis. "The Afghan conflict became a major threat to India's security," says Chopra. "This assumed a new dimension within a period of two years if one recalls the developments” in Punjab." There was little connection between Afghanistan and the "developments' in Punjab, where Indira Gandhi was playing her own game. If anything, the Afghan-Pak border and the Soviet presence in Afghanistan, compelled Pakistan to focus heavily on their own western borders, rather than on Punjab.
Again Chopra says, commenting on the US pumping arms into Pakistan, in the wake of the Soviet military intervention, that "this shows that Indira Gandhi and later Rajiv Gandhi were clear in their minds about the external ramifications of the Afghanistan crisis". One only wishes that they really were, because there is precious little to show for both of them, for whatever efforts they put in to reduce the fallout in the neighbourhood arising out of the Afghan issue.
Finally Chopra states, "Now that the Taliban seem to have an edge in Afghanistan of the Afghan problem." First, it is pretty much debatable who has an edge in Afghanistan: Kabul or the forces at Mazar-e-Sharief? And second, peace efforts are always (or at least should be) an ongoing process in the diplomatic corridors of any worthwhile Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and it would be a sad day if that were not the case in that of our very own
Afghanistan, a monarchy turned communist turned Islamic turned no one knows what, will not die in spite of an invasion or a feudal strife between its people. It is not an Asian problem but an international one, and defence analysts, diplomats and world leaders can only ignore events here at their own peril. India more specifically though not an immediate neighbour, and as a successor to British Indian policy in the region, would do well to invest heavily in all the major chess players in that country today, so as not to be left as the odd man out in any emerging peace process.
All in all, V.D. Chopra's collection provides an insight into the affairs within Afghanistan, and adds up substantially to what little has been written so far on this luckless country which has from times immemorial never accepted any external interference or intervention.
— Himmat Singh Gill