New Delhi: This year on May 1 which is 'Maharashtra Day', there is a unique opportunity for city folk to come out in large numbers and work shoulder-to-shoulder with villagers for a few hours. Speaking at a college event in Pune, Founder of Paani Foundation, Aamir Khan appealed to students and all urban citizens to become ‘Jalmitras’ and join this effort against drought.
By signing up on the link jalmitra.paanifoundation.in, people from cities can register to work in villages with villagers on May 1. The last date for registration for May 1 'Mahashramdaan' is midnight on April 25. Around one lakh people have already signed up to be Jalmitras in the past three weeks.
In 2016 Paani Foundation, a non profit company started by Aamir Khan and Kiran Rao, organised the Satyamev Jayate Water Cup which is a competition held each year between villages to see which village does the best work in watershed management. This is a people’s movement for a water-abundant, prosperous Maharashtra.
Paani Foundation trains people in the science of watershed management, and villagers then plan and execute various watershed management works in their village with help from the government and NGOs. In the first two years, around 1,500 villages participated in the Water Cup creating potential storage capacity of nearly 10,000 crore litres of water. In this, the third year of the competition, over 4,000 villages in 75 talukas and 24 districts of Maharashtra are participating.
The top three prizes at the state level given to competing villages are Rs 75 lakhs, Rs 50 lakhs and Rs 40 lakhs respectively. The top village in each taluka gets a prize of Rs 10 lakhs. The movement has steadily grown, and over the past two years, thousands of people in cities expressed the desire to contribute to this effort. To make it possible to volunteer and participate in different ways, Paani Foundation created the ‘Jalmitra’ - or ‘Friend of Water’ initiative, which it launched on World Water Day - March 22.
On May 1, there will be a ‘Mahashramdaan’ across Maharashtra in all 75 talukas of the Satyamev Jayate Water Cup, where tens of thousands of citizens, both urban and rural will meet and work together for water abundance.
Aamir said he believed that this partnership between rural and urban will not only help the villagers but the city folk as well, to come closer to understanding our farmer friends, and knowing where our food, water and labour comes from. 'It will help to bridge the chasm between cities and villages, and go a long way towards creating a more equitable and humane relationship between the two,' Aamir said.He urged the students to join the fight against water scarcity, and help work towards a prosperous and happy Maharashtra.(UNI)