From villages’ lifeline to poisoned curse

For decades now, industrial effluents and pollutants have swamped villages along this river, destroying agricultural land and making the water poisonous. Villagers are pinning their hope on Supreme Court, which is set to hear their petition today Man Singh’s tractor has been parked in the courtyard of his house in Doli village, about 35km from Jodhpur, for years. It once tilled 600 bighas of farmland that he and his three brothers owned. But for over a decade now, the entire land has been submerged under sewage and industrial effluents, rendering it uncultivable. This is not an isolated instance of devastation. On a drive from Jodhpur towards Barmer, only a little distance before Dhawa and all the way to Kalyanpur, both sides of the highway present a gloomy picture: stretches of blac