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December 2001
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Community GIS on Water is a project that has been conceptualised as an academic collaboration between Media Lab Asia and Centre for Spatial Database Management and Solutions. The project envisages the development of a participatory model with the help of the community, especially through young minds, to demonstrate the role of Geographic Information Systems, Global Positioning Systems and Remote Sensing in addressing the water related issues of a cluster of villages. A village Tikavali in Faridabad is chosen for the pilot phase. The project which ultimately may result in development of village maps, in the pilot phase will basically focus on water related issues. The project which is being executed under the aegis of Media Lab Asia (MLA) intends to meet the broader objectives of MLA that is to bridge the digital divide.
‘There is no scarcity of water, it’s the electricity that is really my concern’ said one of the villager when we asked him about his village environment. The village, Tikavali set close to the urban centre of Delhi, in Faridabad seems to have seen many enthusiasts, like us, eager to give ready solutions to their problems, whatever they might be. Quite naturally, they all had a long list of problems, but water did not feature in it.
On further examination of the problem we realised that the villager was right. It was not the water itself but the taste, odour and quality of water were mainly the problems in this village. However, this villager has been living with it for such a long time that he hardly seems to recognise it. The ‘water problem’ is visible to us, in the way they live and use their water resources but for them, it’s a way of life.
An urban village?
Tikavali is one of the many villages which neighbour a large metro like Delhi and so its problems are neither specific to those of a village or to a city. The village seems to be in a transitory phase – aware of urban facilities and infrastructure but ignorant of its limitations – the limitation of giving back to Nature. The rural sensibilities of the people encourage them to find solutions within all they have around them and use it optimally but their urban aspirations despairingly force them to ask for more and waste more in the process. Hence, the ‘trustworthy’ water pump and the bore well are ‘ultimate solutions to their water problem’ had it not been for the ‘electricity failures’.
Making the problem visible
The water related problems may not be apparent enough to the villagers today but these could lead to serious dimensions in a few years of time. What they use today may not be available tomorrow for their children. This sensibility that has somewhere got lost in the illusion of an urban setting has to be brought back into the villagers. However, problems have an uncanny way of multiplying and interconnecting to become bigger. Probably a methodology has to be evolved that enables the community to look at their problems holistically and find long-term solutions rather short term gains.
‘Tools’ not ‘schemes’?
At the same time, providing ready-made schemes prepared outside of the community may not lead to any solution at all. Many such initiatives have failed despite regular efforts by the government as well as many concerned individuals and NGOs. The community need ‘tools’ and not ‘schemes’ to manage and plan their own environment as they see fit. A tool that is specific to their context, a tool that takes data and transposes it onto interactive maps making complex problems visually revealing and at the same time interactive enough for them to assert their own solutions.
Interactive community maps could be a modest beginning. In India, village maps do not exist. GIS, if it can act as a decision support system for a policy maker then why it can’t be used by village panchayats. The 73rd amendment of the Constitution of India that empowers village panchayats to take decisions for village development offers an opportunity for such initiatives.
Children participating at painting competition and at Tikavali village
Catching them young
Children can act as a bridge between the ‘tool’ and the community to ignite the initiation flash. Being young, innovative and inquisitive enables them to absorb new ideas and explore the newer possibilities. That also ensures a life to such initiatives and ideas. On the very first visit to the village, when children were asked to draw the notional maps of the village, they did it well. Through children, the concepts of visual communication tools, maps, meaningful narratives, and evolved choices may find their ways to get them translated in certain solution oriented decisions by the local community. These better-informed decisions may be a result of a proper blending of advance technology and indigenous knowledge. This could be the first step in inculcating the attitude of systematised planning and spatial thinking. This can be further complemented with the introduction GIS and related technologies.
A national village map prepared by a village youth
GIS to grassroots
Taking GIS to grassroots apparently seems to be a good idea. However a conscious effort has to be made to reorient the community as well as the technology to demonstrate the linkages of GIS and its potential in solving the community problems. Simultaneously, a unique and affordable user-technology interface will have to be developed to ensure sustainability of the concept.
A painting by a village child
Measuring Success
The success of the project will not be measured in terms of development of participatory interactive maps or creation of an OpenGIS but will be measured in terms of evolved consciousness of villagers towards proper utilisation of the physical space and natural resources. This will ensure the utilisation of the tools developed in the project which may inspire neighboring villages to replicate the model.
This publication is an output from a research project, which is a collaborative effort of MLA and Centre for Spatial Database Management and Solutions, and funded by Media Lab Asia. Media Lab Asia is funded in part by the Ministry of Information Technology, Government of India. The research was carried out in collaboration between Centre for Spatial Database Management and Solutions and Media Lab Asia in support of the Media Lab Asia programme.
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