'But the water table fell below the point from which I could raise water with my pump.

'I'm already in debt this year. I could not borrow more to dig a deeper bore. The water just vanished. It must be due to the water these huge pumps are taking away for the new houses here.'

Sohna village is now almost on the border of new realty developments that have spread from Gurgaon, the town adjacent to the Indian capital. In the absence of water supply from the municipal authorities, real estate developers have been forced to sink deep tubewells and powerful pumps for residents. The result is an overall fall in the area's water table.

Mohan's neighbours who do have deeper borewells and pumps attached to them said it did not help. 'There was no electricity most of the time, so we could not run the pumps,' said Narain Singh.

'The (real estate) developers have huge generators, so they can run their pumps all the time. We'll not be able to repay our loans this year. There's nothing we can do. God knows how we'll feed our families.'

(Joydeep Gupta can be contacted at joydeep.g@ians.in)