Kalmane Kaamegowda is an 84 year old man who has single-handedly dug 16 ponds in the last 40 years for birds and animals. He calls himself Vanapalaka (guardian of the forests) and is popularly known as ‘The Pond Man’ by others. He wants to make water easily available for the birds and animals that inhabit the hills near his village as well as the visiting ones.
He has also planted numerous trees around these ponds and these have been declared as parks by the forest department. Kaamegowda has used his own money to fund his projects without financial support from anyone else.
40 years ago, his village, Daasanadoddi, was suffering from acute water shortage. The absence of lakes and ponds made life hard for the villagers as they had no access to water. Even the little rainfall they received either mostly evaporated or percolated to the ground. Kaamegowda noticed that even worse than the villagers was the condition of the birds and animals. There was no watering hole for them and they suffered under the scorching heat of the sun. Seeing this, Kaamegowda began digging a pond for them.
Kaamegowda used to leave early in the morning and return late at night after a long day’s work. He had to work odd daily wage jobs, empty his savings and even postpone building his own house just to be able to sustain the costs of the project. The result was 16 interlinked ponds surrounded by many trees making water more accessible for the voiceless birds and animals.
Kalmane Kaamegowda saw a problem in his villages and he decided to solve it himself. It would be very easy for him to call it the government’s responsibility and do nothing but he instead chose to solve the problem himself and took action. We should all learn from him to take actions ourselves instead of shifting our work onto someone else’s shoulders.
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