Bajura‚ Dipayal facing water crisis

HIMALAYAN NEWS SERVICE

BAJURA/ DIPAYAL: With monsoon yet to arrive, Bajura and Doti locals are reeling under acute water crisis.

More than two dozen villages in Bajura, including Jugada, Sappata, Jagannath, Kolti, Toli, Jayabageshwori, are facing severe water shortage. Water sources have dried up, and villagers have been forced to either drink water from local streams and other unsafe sources or make a long journey to collect water. “Wells have dried up and I have been making a three-hour trip every day for one pitcher of water,” said Dil Bahadur Dhami of Sappata-3, Rudi. The situation is no better in the district headquarters Martadi where locals earlier were enjoying 24-hour water supply. These days supply has been reduced to four hours a day.

In Doti too, people in dozens of villages, including Barbata, Mudbhara, Girichauka, Chhapali, are facing a hard time due to water crisis. The district headquarters Dipayal also is reeling under water shortage. “Students walk all the way to the Seti River for water,” said Kaushila Nath, a teacher at Rajpur-based Shahid Smriti School in Dipayal.

A Dipayal-based hotelier Mohan Patali said it has been difficult for him to operate the hotel. He said he was managing water from the Seti River. “We have to pay Rs 10 for a litre of water to transport it from the Seti River,” he said.

Farmers, on the other hand, have yet another problem; they have been forced to twiddle thumbs with no sign of monsoon even in the second week of June. Had the monsoon been on time, farmers by this time would have been busy planting maize and paddy.

“Temperatures have crossed 44 degrees Celsius in Dipayal this year,” informed chief of Dipayal-based Meteorology Office Hikmat Singh Chopda.