Last year, drought was declared in over 29,000 villages in Maharashtra. Early last month, Maharashtra’s Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis declared that the state will be drought-free by 2020 - making it evident that the drought in Maharashtra is still very much a pressing issue. While almost every village of state has been longing for the monsoon which has only recently arrived, the Kadwanchi village, in the Jalna district, remains indifferent.

For a decade now, this village has been left unaffected by the drought that has enveloped Maharashtra, even though it received only 60% of its average annual rainfall in the last two years. On the contrary, the residents of this village have flourished - their income has risen by 700% in the last two decades, its output rising from INR 27 crore to INR 42 crore in 2015-16. The reason for something seemingly so impossible? A brilliantly executed watershed project initiated by the Krishi Vigyan Kendra (KVK) of Jalna, established by NGO Marathwada Sheti Sahaya Mandal. This project focussed on preventing soil erosion by methods that included the building of groundwater recharge pits and earthen embankments, with an end result of almost 25 kilometres of rainwater streams enlarged and de-silted, increasing the soil’s ability of retaining moisture. Additionally, KVK’s project has excavated 600 wells and created 300 farm ponds.

This project has enabled the farmers of Kadwanchi to begin planting horticultural crops like grapes and ginger – “You think vast vineyards are possible only in Nashik? We have grapes on nearly 1,200 acres of the 3,700 acres of cultivable land in Kadwanchi, because there’s water in our wells and farm ponds nine months of the year,” said the village sarpanch, Chandrakant Kshirsagar. Today, the village holds over 1,000 acres of grape orchards, belonging to 350 families. If a small village in Jalna could achieve a feat so impressive, we can only hope that the rest of Maharashtra follows suit – and soon.

Feature image via Down To Earth