NextBillion - An Initiative of the William Davidson Institute at the University of Michigan

Friday, May 30, 2014

In a five-year span, Chandrasekaran Jayaraman (Chandra) visited approximately 1,000 villages in India to restore dilapidated temples and heritage structures. He first discovered the problem when visiting some villages in Chennai, noticing that most buildings had heavy vegetation but were still standing strong.

“Basically they were made up of limestone, granite, and some natural ingredients added to the structures which binds the materials together and keeps it strong. It really interested me and I started restoring the temples and structures,” said Chandra, who says it is an “astonishing and sad story” that there are approximately 125,000 dilapidated historic structures in southern India.

During these five years, whenever he searched for drinking water, he would be directed to the store to buy bottled water. Whenever he searched for a toilet, he would be brought to a location that had a clean toilet. As a guest he was offered these options, but he realized that the locals do not have access to water service or toilets.

“This problem struck my heart,” said Chandra. “Almost 75 percent of the Indian population don’t have access to good drinking water. People get waterborne diseases very easily because of unfiltered water.”