The PHE engineers revised the cost of the scheme to Rs 69 lakh. But what they had forgotten was they hadn’t got the administrative approval for the first scheme. And so, no funding was made and the scheme could not be commissioned.

Apart from the PHE project, the Rural Development Department had also dug up nearly half a dozen wells in the village under the centrally sponsored Integrated Watershed Development Programme. But most of these wells dried up much before the onset of summer.

The PHE dug one such well near the Government Girls Primary School but it did not have enough water, said Nek Alam, an ex-serviceman in the village. Instead, after the new well was built, the water level in an old, existing well fell, he said. “Last summer, we had to bring a water tanker from PHE Akhnoor and unload it into the old well”.