Session 10. 10. B.

The Chambal badlands (comprising of gullies and ravines) are an extensive and striking topography, characterised by a rugged yet spectacular landscape, but with poor soil, lack of vegetation and dreaded dacoits that hid in the gullies and ravines, and where human survival is at stake.

Over the past three decades hundreds of dacoits gave up their life of crime and took to farming. This farming gave them a life of dignity, and they can now meet their needs and aspirations. Change is the villages is evident with each cropping season.

Many dacoits took to crime because farming was impossible due to water scarcity. With no other livelihood opportunities available, and no food on the table, they took to violence to feed their families.

The change from a violent to a non-violent way of life was possible due to their community-led rainwater conservation efforts, which recharged the groundwater, improved soil moisture, vegetation health, and healed the earth. Over the years, water conservation efforts led to a revival of small rivers, indicating a balance between groundwater and surface water. Villagers are now climate resilient. This dramatic change has been possible due to the sustained community facilitation efforts of a civil society organisation.

This work, spread across two districts and several small river basins demonstrates the impact of small, low-cost water conservations structures, constructed at appropriate sites, keeping in mind the local topography and the requirements of the villagers.

This paper will describe the environmental, social and economic benefits that accrued and the role of local knowledge and wisdom in finding equitable solutions for water security, which led to villagers living in dignity, peace and security. It will also describe the importance of sharing knowledge for building conviction and the importance of water security in improving GDP through green growth.

The field of Urban political ecology has often focused on the fragmented waterscapes in cities of the global South, underscoring how unequal water access affects diverse population groups. While previous studies have extensively explored the 'other' urban waters, such as ponds, lakes, and tanker-sourced water, along with their associated power dynamics, this paper introduces urban springs—or baolis—into the discourse. These springs are a vital yet underexplored element of the Himalayan urban waterscape, particularly in mountain cities like Shimla, India, where they provide critical water support during water crises. Despite inadequate maintenance, urban springs remain a primary water source for many residents in the city. This also highlights the resilience of these traditional water systems even as they fall outside the formal governance and infrastructure frameworks.
In this context, this study explores Shimla's springs-scape with an urban political ecology lens to understand how these springs function as both a resource and social space, shaped by complex governance structures and everyday power relations. Focusing on two spring-dependent neighbourhoods, this research employs in-depth interviews, transect walks, oral histories, and spatial mapping to reveal the dynamics surrounding urban springs and the ways in which they contribute to a unique, pluralistic urban political ecology within the context of a mountain city.

Keywords: urban political ecology, mountain springs, governance, power.

There is insufficient support for archival systems sufficient to help historical understanding of environmental quality and relationship with human society, as well as local governance mechanisms to make this work socially for future choices. To improve such a situation as much as possible, how can we reflect our knowledge of our past relationship with water and its use as a resource? This presentation targets the case of the Okinawa Islands, where wells and springs are still treated as sacred even today when they are no longer used.

In this presentation, I focus on both the ways in which watering places continue to exist in the community and the ways in which they are shared based on the knowledge of past experiences related to watering places. First, I clarify the process of citizens' activities to visit and record watering places and the motivation behind the archive concept. Second, the process of materializing the archive concept will be clarified, and how the purpose and content of the activities can be reflected in the development of information tools, which supports the collaborative use of archival knowledge about watering places while visualizing the linkage of knowledge using a knowledge graph, will be shown.

The increasing frequency of both natural and manmade disasters globally has amplified their impact on vulnerable populations, especially marginalized communities and further on women. These disasters—ranging from floods and droughts to wars and communal violence—disproportionately affect women, exacerbating the physical, psychological, social, and political marginalization. The study investigates the critical and often unrecognized ‘water anxiety’ defined as, the mental stress stemming from uncertainty regarding access to water and sanitation during and after disasters. The disasters causing physical displacements intensify the physical, psychological, social, and gender challenges, placing a heavier burden on women. The study aimed to examine the relationships between disasters led displacement with provisioning of water security, and further between the women's anxiety and their resilience in managing water uncertainty and scarcity. The study is part of a project that plans to facilitate water security by bridging the affected communities and the donor organizations. The objective of the paper is to highlight the pattern of water anxiety from the findings and learning from case studies namely, recurring hurricane in Acapulco, Mexico; recurring GLOF (glacier lake outburst flood) affected Kalimpong, India; recurring earthquake in Lamjung District, Nepal; 2023 communal violence in Kakching, India; and 2024 landslides in Wayanad District, India. The approach to study includes ethnographic surveys, qualitative and quantitative tools. Collaborating with local partners—particularly women—and partnering with local NGOs and government entities play a pivotal role in implementing initiatives to understand water anxiety to incorporate them in the water security. The key takeaway from the study is that water anxiety needs factoring in the water security policies and funding to be able to address the water apathy of the disaster affected communities. Besides, the community resilience building among the vulnerable women is worth documenting and dissemination learning.