Mangaluru: "What a life, what an achievement". This is what Union Jal Shakti Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat had to say about Amai Mahalinga Naik after the Centre announced the Padma Shri award for him. Who is he? Meet the 'tunnel man' of Karnataka.
An illiterate but skilled laborer, Naik worked hard for over four decades to convert a piece of barren hilltop land with no water into a lush green farm in Kepu village. He has been selected for the fourth-highest civilian award in India, the Padma Shri, for his contribution to agriculture. Naik had dreamt to raise an areca nut farm atop rocky hills with poor vegetation, near Adyanadka, about 50 km from Mangaluru, Karnataka.
The 77-year-old man single-handedly worked to irrigate his two-acre land and succeeded in raising a small plantation in a story spanning over four decades. He did this all by himself as hiring workers for digging would have been highly expensive. Next, he set his eyes on the kind of tunnels he wanted to dig: Tunnels that go deep into hard laterite rocks, to reach groundwater, through which water flows permanently in a small stream, without the use of a pump.
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After digging up to a depth of 30 metres, he gave up and began digging at another location guided by his instinct. But water still remained elusive at a depth of 35 metres in the second tunnel. When he had to abandon digging the third and the fourth tunnel at 35 metres again, the hard work of four years seemed to have gone in vain and he started feeling disheartened.
He began digging the fifth tunnel located at an elevated place. And finally, at 50 feet, he discovered moisture on the ceiling. A sixth attempt, at 315 ft long, he found water. Then Naik went on to dig the seventh tunnel behind his house to provide water for drinking and domestic use. He has grown areca nut trees, coconut trees, banana trees, pepper vines and cocoa on his land.
