400 Noida Families Don't Have Water. Children Scrape Leaked Pipe For Drops

Around 400 families in Noida's Valmiki Basti have been left without drinking water after the authorities sealed a leaking pipeline that residents had been relying on for nearly a month. The source was dangerous. But for 400 families, it was all they had.

Residents of Valmiki Basti in Sector 78 have been facing a water shortage for close to a month. With no supply, people were forced to collect water from a leak in a Gangajal pipeline running beneath a nearby drain.

Girls as young as six and seven years old were seen wading into the drain, filling buckets and lifting them above their heads to pass them up. Some tied cloth to the buckets and lowered them in. One slip could send a child into the black water below.

A government tubewell belonging to the Noida Authority stands nearby. Its main pipeline runs under the drain. The pipeline has been leaking, and residents were collecting water from that leak for drinking, cooking and washing.

One of the girls fetching water, Sonam, spoke to NDTV after climbing out of the drain with a filled bucket. "Brother, what can we do? We come here every day to fill water like this. We drink this water and use it to do all the household chores, including washing clothes and utensils. We come here with buckets every morning and evening. We've been filling water like this for the last three months. Before that, we used to fill water from another pipe in the drain ahead," she said.

When asked whether she was afraid of falling, Sonam said simply, "No."

"What should I do, brother... should I go to school or fetch drinking water?" six-year-old Raja asked.

Another girl, Muskan, said, "The situation has been like this for months. We come here every day, and we even cook our food with this water."

An NDTV report published on Thursday highlighted the risks associated with collecting water this way. Following the report, a Noida Authority team arrived at the site and sealed the leaking pipeline. The team has also begun using bulldozers to shut down other water sources along the banks of the drain, citing safety concerns over residents entering the drain to collect water.

The pipeline was hazardous, and the authority's concerns about safety were not unfounded. But with the leak now plugged and no alternative arrangement announced, the community is facing a deeper water crisis than before.

(With inputs from Harsh Pandey)