Kantabai gave her family safe water and a bright future
Kantabai is thankful her grandsons will not know the water crisis like her sons once did.
The village Kantabai calls home is on the Southeastern side of the Indian state of Maharashtra. As one of the 8,000 people living here, Kantabai knows it can be challenging to get enough water for your household.
She recalls the numbering system that indicated when she and her two little boys could walk to wait in a line for several hours until it was their turn to fill buckets with water from the subsidized community water source. Families were only allowed so much and according to Kantabai, it was never enough.
“There was a shortage of water.”
In the countries where we work, like India, women and children often bear the primary responsibility for water collection.
To supplement what they were unable to get from the community source, Kantabai explained she and her sons would walk long distances to collect water.
“We had to travel far every day to collect water and we used to face a lot of problems while getting water outdoors.”
Women and girls spend 200 million hours every day collecting water. This is time not spent working, caring for family members, or attending school.
As she looks back on the struggles they endured as a result of their water crisis Kantabai shared, “It has been thirty years...the children grew up...but now it is going well.” Now it is going well because now Kantabai is able to give her adult children, their spouses, and her grandchildren safe water at home.
Kantabai is proud of the safe water solution she was able to give her family.
Through Water.org’s local partner in Maharashtra, Kantabai took out a small loan for the construction of a borewell and water connection on her property. With this solution in place, Kantabai and her whole family can cook, clean, bathe and drink safe water as they need it. And now Kantabai is thankful her grandsons will never know the water crisis like their dads once did.
Now Kantabai has access to safe water when she needs it, at home.
Empowering women is critical to solving the water crisis. When women have access to safe water at home, they can turn poverty into possibility for their families. Your donations help make this possible.
Donate here to help empower more women like Kantabai with lasting access to safe water at home where their children, grandchildren, and generations to come can experience the health, hope, and bright futures safe water brings.
