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Prisoners riot for water in eastern Indian state |
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May 2, 2000 BHUBANESHWAR, MAY 1 (AP) - Thirsty prisoners rioted when they were denied water for two days in a drought-hit eastern town, where thousands of residents, carrying buckets and plastic pails, mobbed a water train when it pulled into the station.
A searing heat wave that brought temperatures of 48 C (118 F) last week has dried up streams, ponds and wells in Orissa state, which was covered with water last October after a cyclone killed about 10,000 people.
The worst affected area is the western district of Bolangir, where half of the 8,000 wells - the main source of drinking water - have dried up in the past week, officials said Monday.
A ticket collector dropped dead from heat stroke at the Titlagarh train station on Friday, officials said, reporting the first confirmed drought death in India this year, where a heat wave and water crisis is affecting 11 of the 31 states.
The Bolangir district government ordered schools and colleges closed from Monday and set government office hours from 7 a.m. to 1 p.m. instead of 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., to conserve energy and keep people from working or standing in line for service during the heat of the day.
In the trading center of Titlagarh, all but one of the town's 58 wells have gone dry, said district information officer Subhas Nial.
When a train carrying 150,000 liters of drinking water from Calcutta pulled into the station on Saturday, thousands of men, women and children mobbed it to carry away water in plastic pails and pitchers.
The Bolangir district administrator, Chandra Sekhar Kumar, said the 200,000 residents of Titlagarh were getting by with less than 1 million liters of water a day, when their normal requirement is 3.75 million liters.
The 55 inmates at the town jail, left without water for two days in cells without fans, tried to scale the walls Friday to break free.
They tossed their cooking pots, pans and plates over the jail wall into the street and shouted, "Give us water or kill us," said jail superintendent Tarini Charan Behera.
The inmates need 6,000 liters of water a day for drinking.
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