The poem ‘Water’ attempts to depict the struggle, the anguish, the suffering and humiliation suffered by the Dalits to get their rightful share of water, which is an elixir of life, and a natural resource. The poem incidentally throws light on the multiple facets of water. The poem highlights instances when ‘water’ is used as the instrument of discrimination, as a life-giver, a life taker and a multinational market commodity also.

Water can be a source of retributive justice. It can not only give life but can also devour life. The water that could not serve to quench the thirst of parched throats became the killer tsunami wave which swallowed the whole village after village. Water is so powerful that it treats the ‘poor’ as its playthings. Sometimes, many villages suffer from drought and become dry deserts killing poor people. It may also come in the form of floods and drown them.

Water is the elixir of life and without water, no life can exist on this earth. Naturally, water is a life-giver. When a panchama goes to a village tank and is made to wait all day for a pot of water, one can imagine the misery and the hardships the Dalits have to suffer when they are denied their rightful share of water. 

Like the panchama, the Wada girl is also made to face humiliation by being forced to collect the water dropped from above and getting drenched in the process.

Water functions like a life-giver. The poem presents one incident where water would have been a life-giver. In Malapalle, several thatched huts would have been saved if only there was one pot of water to douse the fire. On the whole, one can infer that water is no mean matter but an omniscient phenomenon, because it is now being sold as mineral water in bisleri bottles all over the globe.