Freemasons Wheel Watershed Moment | Nagpur News

Chandrapur: The dusty landscape in Bramhapuri in Chandrapur is unbearable as it thirsts for water in this heat. For decades, this harsh environment dictated locals’ lifestyles, in particular the exhaustive pursuit for water. Long before dawn, village women and young children were already on the move, balancing heavy clay pots and plastic containers on their heads. The grueling ritual drained spirits, and caused permanent spinal injuries.Up until five years ago, this was the norm. The turning point came when the Freemasons of Nagpur’s Lodge Trimurty No. 294 discovered a unique tool called the WaterWheel. Instead of forcing women to carry 20kg water on their heads, this heavy-duty, food-grade plastic drum allowed them to roll up to 50 litres of water along the dirt paths with a durable steel handle.As per data collected by Freemason brothers, across Maharashtra, an estimated 5 lakh villages face severe water transportation challenges. These remote areas often don’t get piped water. “We realized that the women and children were spending hours each day transporting water on their heads,” said Tarun Srivastava, a member of the lodge. Tarun recalled, “The villagers were deeply skeptical at first”. Once that bridge was built, the project finally took off, resulting in 52 WaterWheels distributed in the first year.To ensure the aid reaches those who need it most, the lodge relies on ground-level surveys coordinated by Jayant Srivastava, Tarun’s cousin. “I identify families with the absolute least access to water,” Jayant said adding, “We also look for families who own a lot of livestock, because their daily water requirement is twice as high.”Jayant, who coordinates with the gram panchayat to enrol villagers, has witnessed the enormity of the region’s water scarcity. “In one village, people were forced to wash their clothes in dirty canal water. In another, the govt had built all the infrastructure, the pipes, and tanks, but there was absolutely no water.”The impact of the Freemason’s project was immediate and life-altering. In the village of Betala, Ajay Misar and his family received four wheels four years ago, a donation that transformed their daily life.“Before we got the wheels, my younger brother and I had to travel two kilometers back and forth, four to six times daily to fetch water. Carrying those heavy pots used to hurt our heads, but not anymore. We only have to make three trips a day. The wheels are so practical that we even bring them along to local events near our house,” Misar said.A similar transformation took place in Padmapur, where Lankesh Maske’s family received a waterwheel three years ago. Seeing the immediate relief the drums brought to those initial families, the Srivastava brothers distributed 100 wheels the following year.The initiative secured long-term funding through annual financial contributions from the Regional Grand Lodge of Western India and the Grand Lodge of India, involving a group of 60 to 65 brothers every year. To ensure the hardware could survive the rocky, unpaved terrain of rural areas, the lodge partnered with a private firm to supply durable, terrain-ready units.