‘Water’, by Challapalli Swaroopa Rani, is a reflective-narrative poem. The speaker, in the persona of a ‘Dalit’, reminisces and chronicles a few typical but poignant situations which express the anguish and helplessness of a Dalit when he or she goes to a public pond or tank to collect water for their daily needs.

In the first five stanzas, the speaker cites ‘water’ as the witness to the practice of untouchability. The poet states in a casual, matter-of-fact tone that ‘water’, which knows where the ground is inclined along which it has to flow, knows that ‘untouchability’ never disappears, because the quarrel or conflict over allowing the Dalits to collect water from a village tank or pond, between the upper caste people and the Dalits, has been smouldering for several generations.

The idea is reiterated citing another instance of untouchability. The poet cites a Biblical incident in which Jesus, the Jew, goes to a Samaria woman (in a town called Sychar) and asks the woman for water. The Samaria woman belongs to an inferior race and Jesus, the Jew belongs to a superior race. Here the speaker seems to say that ‘water’ is essential to all, be it a Samaria woman or Jesus the Jew; similarly, water is essential for both the upper caste people and the untouchables. The same idea is reiterated in the next two lines. Even among the untouchables, there were sub-castes. ‘Leather’ refers to cobblers and the ‘spool’ refers to weavers. The speaker means to say that whether one is a cobbler or a weaver both of them need water. This fact is known to ‘water’, but why are people so cruel to give access to water to one and deny access to the other. Here, the ‘other’ refers to the untouchables.

A Panchama does not have the right to draw water from a public well because he is untouchable. It is cruel and unfortunate that he is made to wait near the well until a Shudra arrives. Here again, it is ironical that the ‘Panchama’, who does not belong to varna, has to wait for a Shudra who is supposed to belong to the fourth rank in the social hierarchy. A Shudra, according to the ‘varna’ scheme, is an unskilled labourer and he does all the physical tasks as directed by the other upper caste people. Naturally, only when a Shudra comes to a pond to fetch water for an upper caste person can he give some water to the Panchama. It also means that the other upper caste people who normally do not fetch water from a well will not be able to give water to a Panchama. The speaker is once again referring to the cruelty of the varna system’ and the practices associated with untouchability.

The speaker cites another cruel instance of untouchability. Normally, whenever a person belonging to one of the four varnas happens to give some water to an ‘untouchable’ (here it is a girl], he/she takes care to see that the giver and the receiver stand apart from each other and pours water from a distance and from a higher level. On such occasions, some water is bound to fall on the receiver. Here, the receiver being a girl, waterfalls all over her. The speaker wants the reader to imagine the humiliation of the girl when someone throws water at her or on her. Here, the speaker is highlighting the cruel practice of untouchability.

The speaker recalls a heinous incident that happened in a place called Karamchedu. It is reported that, when two Kamma youths were washing dirty buckets (that had been used to feed their buffaloes) in the drinking water tank in Madigapalle, a Dalit boy objected to it, which angered the youth. Consequently, when the youths were about to beat up the boy, Munnangi Suvartamma, a Dalit woman, tried to protect the boy from the attackers. She lifted the vessel that she was carrying, to drive away from the attackers. This act of lifting the vessel in self-defence later resulted in a ghastly attack by the upper caste people on the Dalits.