Ceritalah | In drought-stricken Chennai, water is now more expensive than petrol
- Government think tank estimates 21 of the country’s cities will run out of groundwater by 2020
- The monsoon arrived later and weaker than usual this year, raising concerns these cities will be squeezed dry
Nearly four years ago, the south Indian city of Chennai, the capital of Tamil Nadu, was under water. The worst floods in living history – the result of cyclones from the Bay of Bengal – brought this manufacturing and services powerhouse of 11 million to a standstill as brackish water lapped at the wheels of the planes parked at the Anna International Airport. More than 500 people died and a further 1.8 million were displaced.
Today, the city is wracked by an unprecedented drought, enduring more than 200 days without rain. Chennai’s four main reservoirs are bone-dry and the Chembarambakkam lake is rapidly disappearing.
However, for Anbu, a 28-year-old truck driver, the drought has been a source of work. During the 2015 floods, he was forced to leave his village, Pavandhur, some 250km to Chennai’s south because it had – of all things – run out of water. Despite earning a diploma in ceramics, he had hoped to become a sugar cane farmer like his father.
“When there is water, it is a crop that really gives back,” he says.
At a highway truck repair station in Poonamallee on the outskirts of Chennai, Anbu proudly pats his brightly painted water truck. His job as a driver is a 24-hour commitment so the vehicle often doubles as his home. Every day, Anbu drives past the Chembarambakkam lake, which was once ringed by prosperous fishing villages. Now, he and his fellow drivers might be the only people who can prevent thousands of Chennai’s inhabitants dying of thirst.