All for Water for All (AFWFA)

Man is the most insane species.

He worships an invisible God

and destroys a visible Nature.

Unaware that this Nature

he’s destroying

is this God he’s worshipping.

The All for Water for All (AFWFA) festival concluded recently on 22 March at Bharat Nivas, after seven weeks of knowledge sharing and learning. This took place in seven bioregion villages in districts of Pondicherry-Auroville-Villianur-Cuddalore. Upholding the United Nations Water’s overarching goal of “Securing sustainable water for all”, the AFWFA festival was an attempt to focus attention on the water crisis and pollution faced by the villages of this region and build a “culture of collaboration” to save the precious resource.

Celebrating the beauty of Water

The idea behind AFWFA was initially conceptualized in the Auroville Town Development Council by Tom and his team, with some support from Thamarai, while discussing the need for fostering good relations and aiding development in the bioregion. After intense brainstorming that started late last year, partners like PondyCan and the French Institute of Pondicherry were brought in. The primary aim was to create a platform for the people to step up and participate in decision-making in development activities around water – be it resource extraction or disposal. “What we see now is that a city grows at the expense of the organic resources around it, mainly from the villages. But the wastage created from this is then irresponsibly dumped outside the city itself, with no proper channel to send them even to treatment plants,” says Tom, who is one of the organizers of the festival and the water advisor to the TDC. “The UNESCO representative pointed out that in the coming years, 25% or more of the population will move to the cities, and then what happens to the areas outside? They will be like vast deserts”, he adds.

The biggest challenge in water conservation efforts stem from improper waste management practices around the country, despite repeated efforts from NGOs or government programmes. Massive pollution is also caused by big players like industries that release excess amounts of untreated toxic wastes into rivers or lakes for disposal. “While visiting the villages in this region, you can see that the water is turning blacker due to the heavily loaded toxics present in the water,” says Tom.

The solution? “For a start, as responsible citizens, we all need to segregate our waste, something we practise in Auroville and which happens in many other cities now. Compost organic matter at source, and ensure that it does not contain chemicals or plastics. Organic matter is a useful resource and cities can send such compost to the villages nearby to replenish the surrounding soils.”

Tom recounts how in the past, farmers from Kuilapalayam purchased compost from landfills in Pondicherry which contained harmful medical waste like syringes. The result? A typhoid outbreak in Auroville! Later, Aurovilians like Dr. Lucas initiated small projects to discourage the farmers from importing urban waste. Dr. Lucas later shifted his focus to EM technology for sanitation. These were among the various issues that the AFWFA festival tried to educate everyone about.

The festival was a meeting place for not just experts, but also saw the emergence of grassroot level leaders; school students from villages as far as 50 kilometres away came to share their conservation efforts for restoring their water resources. Mr. Krishnamurthy, a farmer from Bahour, displayed in his stall almost 20 traditional varieties of rice and other grains that he managed to revive in his ten years of farming work.

Lessons for Auroville?

Despite the ambitious intent and pool of partners to support the festival, Tom found the response from the community disappointing. “We Aurovilians sometimes get so busy with our many meetings and working groups that we forget that Mother’s intent in creating Auroville was for it to serve as a beacon for humanity. Auroville has a primary duty to make this light available to the rest of the world, especially in the fields like ecology or sustainability where we have our niche expertise. These discoveries need to be shared.”

Tom acknowledges that the limited attendance was also due to the poor visibility and communication about the Festival within Auroville. “We could have used a lot more support from skilled volunteers and the Auroville youth. Facebook and word-of-mouth isn’t enough!” he admits.

The Festival

The AFWFA festival was launched by the Chief Minister of Puducherry on 2 February, which is also World Wetlands’ Day, at a gathering which hosted prominent persons, including other Ministers of State, representation from the Consul General of France and noted NGO members. The highlight of the event was when Rajendra Singh, also known as ‘The Waterman of India’ and recently the recipient of the Stockholm Water Prize, shared his personal journey in the field of water conservation in trying to revive the rivers of Rajasthan which met with a lot of resistance from the ‘forces at play’.

Over seven weeks, the festival organized multiple events in villages in the bioregion, reaching out to more than 15,000 children and their families, In each village, there was one week of cultural and educational programmes, including puppet shows and tank cleaning. There also was an eco-fair in Pondicherry and a film festival; at the Alliance Française.

The final event was an exhibition in Auroville with stalls displaying various water-related services. In the valedictory session, attended by the Consul-General of France and representatives from UNESCO, the organizers presented their experience from the past weeks. Students from schools of the bioregion then took a pledge to save water with a Neer Kudam ceremony. The musical performance by SVARAM on water and a Fire Dance later in the evening added a sense of grandeur to the occasion.

It doesn’t stop here. The Festival organizers intend to keep up activities every year until 2025.

“All For WATER For All” Collective, a network of citizens and organizations involved in the protection and conservation of water resources in the Pondicherry-Auroville-Villupuram-Cuddalore bioregion. It includes farmers, Tank Users Associations, NGOs, students, Industries, Business Institutions (academic, scientific and religious), UNESCO, Governments of Pondicherry and Tamil Nadu, Auroville, Centre for Science and Environment (CSE), French Consulate in Pondicherry & Media. For more information, visit their website http://allforwaterforall.org/