Water Insecurity in Urban India

Abstract

This research is an attempt to examine the everyday experiences of water insecurity among poor women in urban India. Their everyday living around a limited amount of water was captured visually to exhibit local idioms of struggling. There is empirical evidence that the narratives of becoming a global city often exacerbate the presence of social polarization and inequality in cities of the Global South. This includes unequal access to water, especially among subordinate groups. Drawing from fieldwork conducted in Hyderabad and Bangalore on water insecurity, the findings show that the impacts of water insecurity are highly gendered and contentious. It is in the landscape of gender division of labour that women have to negotiate their everyday lives around water. Deploying photography as the primary method, this article demonstrates the social dimension of water insecurity and the impact on women’s lives who bear the majority of domestic water issues. It is concluded that lack of efforts by the state and its agencies to improve understanding of the lived experience of water insecurity would aggravate the water issues in urban India and leave poorer urban women to be highly water insecure.