Nile Nathiyora Nangaiyar Ulagam

About the book

This is a book by a diplomat who served in the Nile region offers an insider's perspective on the water crisis gripping communities along Africa's lifeline river and its devastating impact on women and children. Drawing from firsthand experience, the author documents how water scarcity—caused by climate change, dam construction, and geopolitical conflicts—forces women and girls to walk miles daily for water, sacrificing education and safety. The narrative reveals how this burden perpetuates poverty and gender inequality while exposing health risks and violence women face. Yet it also illuminates women's remarkable resilience—forming water committees, implementing rainwater harvesting, advocating in regional negotiations, and challenging exclusion from decision-making. Through the gender lens, the book examines how international water politics affect ordinary lives while centering women's voices and agency, serving as both crisis documentation and tribute to women who refuse victimhood, becoming leaders in the fight for water justice and survival. This book has bagged the first prize in 'Pennezhuthu Potti' Competition 2025, under the Best Essay Collection category.

About the author

Padma Arvind holds a doctoral degree in Medicine and a management degree in Administration. She works as a policy change consultant for the Human Resources and Health Department of the U.S. federal government. She regularly writes about American politics in the weekly magazine Madras Paper. Her book 'Kanavugal Minnum Thesam' (A Nation Where Dreams Sparkle) has been published by Her Stories.