Stampedes over water kill girls here

Vijaysinh Parmar TNN
Tharad: If thirst does not kill you in the parched villages of Tharad and Vav talukas in north Gujarat, a stampede will. Villagers here are so desperate that they fight for every drop of water they can salvage each time a water tanker arrives or water starts flowing, however briefly, from public taps. The aggressive jostling can often lead to fights breaking out and even deadly stampedes. Ironically, large amount of water passes by these villages through the Narmada canal, supplying water to adjoining Rajasthan. Just last week, Chief Minister Narendra Modi released the waters into Rajasthan with much fanfare at a function in Tharad. Stampedes have killed at least four young girls and injuring many others in different villages of Tharad and Vav. In 2004, a six-year-old girl was killed in a stampede at Meghpura village in Vav. Last year, Rahabhai Rabari of Daiyap village lost his 18-yearold daughter, Jebar, in a stampede. His younger daughter Agar was badly wounded on her left leg. Jebar was crushed between the tanker and the wall of people trying to reach the water. Jebar’s marriage was being fixed on the day she died. Her future father-in-law was at her home to fix the date of the wedding. “After Jebar’s death, I decided never to take water from tankers,” says Rahabhai. “I will spend the rest of my life drinking brackish water from the village well.” “Stampedes kill at least a teenage girl in this area every year,” says Agar Rabari of Kundaliya village in Vav, who lost her 18-year-old daughter in a stampede last year. “We started getting some water through pipes this year,” she says, “but had it come last year, my daughter would have been alive today.” “We have to travel at least four kilometres just to get water. Our village has a pipeline but the supply is erratic, it is practically useless,” says Baldev Rajput of Ashara village.