The tribal households of Khandwa, Barwani and Jhabua districts in Madhya Pradesh can now access safe drinking water at their disposal. It is a huge achievement that will serve the 143,500 population who previously relied on unimproved water sources for their drinking water needs. 

Caritas India’s Water and Climate India (WCI) programme launched in August 2021, is taking the solution to the people. It reduces the risk of waterborne diseases caused by microbiologically contaminated water and increases access to safe water at the household level by raising awareness for good WASH practices. 

WADI is a solar-powered UV-measurement device, which indicates the process of solar water disinfection in a simple manner. It has been tested by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and approved as an effective method of household water treatment. 

The WCI programme is providing this solution to households and people started using the method of Solar Water Disinfection (SODIS) with a WADI device for disinfecting water. The programme is supported by HELIOZ Global Services Private Limited and implemented with the help of Khandwa Diocesan Social Services and Pragati Society. 

One of the programme beneficiaries Nansingh Baraiya’s family from village Barod in Jhabua district, M. P. used to drink water from the nearby hand pump and open well sources after boiling on Doctor’s recommendations. It was found that either someone or another gets sick with diseases like dysentery, diarrhoea, cholera, jaundice, typhoid etc. For the treatment and cure, the family had to spend Rs. 1000-1500 per month. Children used to suffer the most as they had to skip school leading to a loss of education. 

In a tribal community, there were many myths including never storing water for more than a day for drinking, so they used to get water from the open wells and handpump sources on daily basis. After the intervention, the belief system slowly changed and they started collecting the water in the evening from all the 10-13 bottles (20-26 litres of water) and filling it in the pot and drinking it the next day. Every morning they keep the water collected from the open wells and handpump in the bottles in sunlight for the WADI and SODIS disinfection and purification.  

For the past 6 months, many families started using WADI technology to disinfect water. They realised that their medical expenses have gone down and they use less fuel to boil water thereby reducing Carbon emissions. They have saved more than Rs. 5,000 on doctor fees and medicines for the whole family. All are happy and thankful to Helioz and Caritas India for bringing changes in their lives which are very low-cost and Sustainable for households.