We have forgotten our history and broken our compact to live within our ecological means
Bengaluru's water crisis is not merely a consequence of climate change but the culmination of a century-long forgetting — a city that once engineered a thriving relationship with water across lakes, wetlands, and wells, and then chose to dismantle it in pursuit of modernity. Where medieval residents celebrated overflowing tanks as sacred abundance, their successors filled those same lakes with concrete and commerce. The reckoning now arriving is less a natural disaster than a civilizational one, and the path forward asks not for nostalgia but for the recovery of an ecological intelligence that was never truly obsolete.
- An early, brutal summer and prolonged drought have pushed Bengaluru to the edge, with tanker operators charging steep prices and residents resorting to disposable plates to conserve what little water remains.
- The crisis is not accidental — since 1892, the city systematically destroyed 1,490 lakes and wells, replacing them with stadiums and malls, severing the intricate network that had sustained the plateau for centuries.
- Medieval engineers had built an integrated system of tanks, wetlands, and connected channels so precise that overflow was cause for festival; today, even restored lakes lack the surrounding wetlands that once made them functional.
- As the population surges toward 20 million and distant water sources grow unreliable, the city faces a compounding vulnerability it largely engineered for itself.
- Organizations like Biome Trust are already working to restore wells, and calls are growing for rainwater harvesting, wetland protection, and a fundamental shift in how the city imagines its relationship with its own ecology.
Bengaluru is running out of water. An unusually early summer has collided with prolonged drought, and when the monsoon arrives it is expected to be weak. But this is not simply a climate story — it is a crisis of forgetting, built across a century and a half of choices that dismantled the very systems that once made the city livable.
Centuries ago, the Bengaluru plateau was semi-arid and sparse. Successive generations transformed it through patient engineering — building keres, or irrigation tanks, connecting them through channels called kaluves so that overflow from higher lakes fed lower ones, surrounding them with wetlands that filtered water and recharged aquifers, and dotting the landscape with open wells. A stone inscription from 1307 CE describes residents clearing jungle, levelling ground, and constructing a tank. The Cholas called their great tanks samudra — vast bodies of water. The names Thippasandra, Mallasandra, and Junnasandra still mark the map; the lakes they once named are gone.
The unraveling began in 1892, when the last traditionally built tank — Sankey — was completed and the city began importing water from the Arkavathy basin instead. Once pipes arrived, the old systems were recast as obsolete, even dangerous. Lakes were declared cesspools of malaria and filled in. Sampangi lake became Kanteerava Stadium. Shoolay Tank became a mall. Thousands of open wells dwindled to fewer than fifty, most broken. The integrated ecology that had sustained the city for centuries was replaced with concrete and commerce.
Today the consequences are everywhere — in the price of tanker water, in social media alarm, in apartment notices asking residents to use wet wipes. The city cannot undo what has been destroyed. But it can protect the lakes and wetlands that remain on its periphery, revive rainwater harvesting with modern techniques, and restore wells across its neighborhoods. More than any single intervention, it must shift its urban imagination — away from a century of growth through ecological destruction, toward growth through ecological restoration. The goddess Duggalamma, once celebrated when tanks overflowed, was never merely mythology. She was the name the city gave to a relationship with water it has since abandoned, and must now find its way back to.
Bengaluru is running out of water, and the crisis unfolding this year offers a stark preview of what climate change will demand of the city in the decades ahead. An unusually early, brutal summer has collided with prolonged drought. When monsoon rains finally arrive, they will likely be weak and scattered. But the water shortage is not simply a climate problem—it is a crisis of forgetting, of choices made and unmade over the past century and a half.
The city has systematically dismantled the water systems that sustained it for centuries. Lakes have been filled in to make room for shopping malls and bus terminals. Wetlands that once filtered and recharged groundwater have vanished. Open wells that once numbered in the thousands have been abandoned or destroyed. The city stopped maintaining the intricate network of tanks, channels, and wells that earlier residents had engineered with meticulous care, and instead decided to pipe water in from distant sources. Now, as those sources grow unreliable and the city's population swells from 12 million toward 20 million, Bengaluru faces a reckoning with its own carelessness.
The history is written in stone and in the landscape itself. Several centuries ago, the Bengaluru plateau was semi-arid, with sparse rainfall and little to sustain settlement. But successive waves of residents—beginning centuries before the modern city—transformed this barren region through patient engineering. They built keres, irrigation tanks that became the city's lakes. A stone inscription from 1307 CE, discovered near the old airport, describes how residents "having cleared the jungle… levelled the ground, built a village, constructed a tank by removing the sand." The Cholas, who ruled the region, were especially prolific builders of these tanks, calling them samudra or sandra—words meaning vast bodies of water. Drive past Thippasandra, Mallasandra, Singhasandra, or Junnasandra today, and the names are all that remain; the lakes themselves are gone.
These were not simple holes filled with water. They were part of an integrated system. Wetlands upstream of each lake cleaned the incoming water and allowed it to percolate into the ground, recharging aquifers. Large open wells surrounded the lakes, providing water even during dry months. Lakes were connected across the topography so that excess water flowed downhill through channels called kaluves from higher tanks to lower ones. When a lake overflowed, the village celebrated with a festival honoring Duggalamma, the goddess of the lake. The system worked because it was designed to work within the region's natural limits.
This pattern continued for centuries. Kempegowda and his descendants expanded the city by creating new tanks. The Mysore kings did the same. Even the British, when they arrived, continued the tradition. The last tank built in this manner was Sankey tank in 1892. Then something shifted. The city, intoxicated by technological capability, decided it no longer needed to depend on local water. It began importing water from the Arkavathy basin. Once water arrived through pipes, the old systems seemed obsolete. Lakes were rebranded as cesspools of malaria and filth. They were filled in. Sampangi lake was replaced by Kanteerava Stadium. Shoolay Tank became Garuda Mall. The 1,490 open wells that once dotted central Bengaluru dwindled to fewer than 50, most of them broken and unusable. Even lakes that have been restored in recent years have lost the surrounding wetlands and wells that once made them functional parts of a larger system.
Today, the crisis is visible everywhere. Tanker operators charge exorbitant prices for water. Apartment buildings counsel residents to use disposable plates and wet wipes to conserve. Social media fills with alarm. But alarm without action is a cycle that leads nowhere. The city cannot resurrect Sampangi or Shoolay Tank. It cannot undo decades of concrete. But it can choose a different path forward.
The answer lies not in some romantic return to the past, but in recovering the ecological wisdom that the past embodied. The city needs to protect the lakes and wetlands that still exist on its periphery. It needs to revive the practice of rainwater harvesting, updated with modern techniques. It needs to restore wells across the city—work that organizations like Biome Trust are already beginning. Most fundamentally, it needs to shift its urban imagination. For a century, Bengaluru has grown by destroying its ecology. It must learn to grow by improving it. That means residents, apartment associations, malls, and offices all committing to reuse water and invest in harvesting rain. It means recognizing that the goddess Duggalamma, once celebrated when lakes overflowed, represents something more than mythology—she represents a relationship with water that the city abandoned and must now reclaim.
Citas Notables
Having cleared the jungle, levelled the ground, built a village, constructed a tank by removing the sand— Stone inscription from 1307 CE describing lake construction near Bengaluru's old airport
We need to return to our traditional history of ecological wisdom by protecting lakes and wetlands, bringing back old traditions of prudent water usage and rainwater harvesting—with a modern twist— Harini Nagendra, director of Centre for Climate Change and Sustainability at Azim Premji University
La Conversación del Hearth Otra perspectiva de la historia
Why does Bengaluru's water crisis feel so sudden if the city has been growing for decades?
It's not sudden—it's the moment when the borrowed time runs out. The city spent a century importing water from distant sources, which masked the destruction of local systems. Now those sources are stressed, and there's nothing left to fall back on.
You mention that lakes were celebrated with festivals when they overflowed. That seems almost quaint now.
It's not quaint—it's the opposite of how we think about water today. Overflow meant abundance, meant the system was working, meant survival through the dry months. We've inverted that logic. Now we see water as a problem to be piped away.
If the city can't bring back the lakes that were destroyed, what's actually recoverable?
The peripheral lakes and wetlands that still exist. The knowledge embedded in old inscriptions and oral histories about how water moved through the landscape. The wells that haven't been completely destroyed. And the possibility of redesigning how new development happens—making rainwater harvesting mandatory, restoring groundwater recharge.
You mention a "million wells movement." That sounds ambitious for a city of 12 million people.
It is. But it's not about drilling a million new wells. It's about restoring the practice of maintaining wells as part of how the city functions, the way residents once did. It's about shifting from thinking of water as something that comes from a pipe to thinking of it as something the city can capture and hold.
What would it actually take for residents to care enough to change?
Probably thirst. But it doesn't have to be that way. A manifesto—a commitment from residents, businesses, and institutions to demand water reuse and rainwater harvesting in their homes and workplaces—could create momentum before the crisis becomes acute. It's about making the connection between personal choice and collective survival visible.
Is there any sign that's starting to happen?
There's alarm, certainly. But alarm without a clear path forward just leads to despair or denial. What's needed is for people to understand that the solution isn't technological rescue from somewhere else—it's recovering practices and relationships with water that worked for centuries.