MUSIKOT, Rukum, Oct 18 – Many villagers of this remote district spend half of their precious time just for fetching water from the streams that lie far below their settlements. “Sorry! we don’t have water to drink, quench your thirst with curd and milk,” is a common reply of those living at water-scarce village Bhaljula of Chhibang Village Development Committee-3 to the strangers.
Water is more expensive here than milk-products. There are so many villages like Totake, Danda Chhibang, Pwang, Kurul and Simchaur. People of all ages make a long strenuous journey simply to fetch water.
People of this VDC, which is located three-hours walking distance from here, wake up at cock’s-crow and walk down for an hour to a stream to fetch water for the day’s supply, a sisyphean job to all of them.
So invaluable the water is for them that they collect rain-water into a small pond that saves most of their time of fetching water during monsoon.
Deurupa Oli, 17, from Bhalajula says most of the villagers want to migrate to other places if they manage to sell off their property simply because of shortage of water in the locality.
“We have to wash our clothes and take baths whenever we go to the nearby stream for grinding our grain,” Oli says. As the village is situated on top of a mountain there is no source of water which could supply the villagers.
Majority of the people living at the village are the Magars and their main occupation is to rear livestock who are also fed yogurt instead of water, the locals say.