Uma Shankar Pandey

Uma Shankar Pandey is a social worker and water conservationist from Jakhni village in Banda district, in Uttar Pradesh’s Bundelkhand region. He led the community effort that made Jakhni known as India’s first jalgram, or water village. He was named for the Padma Shri in 2023 in the field of social work, from Uttar Pradesh ^[1].

A village emptying out

Pandey was born on 5 February 1971 in Jakhni, which then had no school, electricity or road ^[2]. Water was so short that farming failed and young people left for the cities in search of work ^[2]. Seeing this, he resolved to turn Jakhni into a water village, and on 1 June 1995 he began the work with the community ^[2].

Field bunds and trees

With no government money, he brought together the village’s farmers, young people and the unemployed, men and women, who worked without pay to build ridges around their fields to hold rainwater and to send the village’s waste water to the fields ^[2]. His approach is summed up in the slogan khet par med, med par ped, “bunds on the fields, trees on the bunds” ^[2]. Today the village has 33 wells, 25 handpumps, six ponds and two drains that hold water all year ^[2].

The Prime Minister praised the method on Mann Ki Baat and urged people to adopt field bunding ^[2]. Under the Jal Kranti Abhiyan in 2015 and 2016, the Union government developed 1,050 water villages on the Jakhni model, and the water table in Banda district rose by more than a metre ^[2]. NITI Aayog has cited Jakhni as a successful example of community water conservation without government support ^[2].

He received the Water Warrior award in the second National Water Awards of the Ministry of Jal Shakti ^[2].