Mahindra Group chairman Anand Mahindra on Friday, 10 July 2026, paid tribute to Caron Rawnsley, an 80-year-old Irish volunteer who has spent decades cleaning and restoring Jodhpur's historic bawris and jhalaras, and used the occasion to spotlight a wider national movement to revive India's ancient stepwells as living symbols of both heritage and water security.

Context

Rawnsley, nicknamed 'Paagal Saab' (loosely, 'the mad foreign gentleman') by locals in Jodhpur, Rajasthan, has devoted himself to clearing encroachment and debris from the city's traditional water structures — a commitment that earned him both affection and the gentle jest embedded in the moniker. Mahindra noted that Rawnsley's passion is no longer an outlier: 'Today, you don't need to be either paagal or phirang to devote yourself to reviving India's stepwells,' he wrote, signalling how mainstream the conservation movement has become.

Mahindra also referenced an earlier post of his own about Chand Baori, one of India's largest and most architecturally significant stepwells, located in Abhaneri, Rajasthan, citing it as an example of a well-maintained heritage site. He named water activist Rajendra Singh, conservationist Kalpana Ramesh, and organisations Tarun Bharat Sangh and Project Bawri alongside 'countless local volunteers and village communities' as the backbone of this restoration effort.

Policy Backdrop

Tarun Bharat Sangh, founded in 1979 and led for decades by Rajendra Singh, began community-driven johad and river restoration in Alwar district in 1985, eventually expanding to multiple states and earning international recognition. The organisation's model — mobilising villages to revive traditional water bodies rather than relying solely on state infrastructure — has since been cited as a template for national programmes.

The Government of India launched the Jal Shakti Abhiyan in 2019, explicitly encouraging the revival of traditional water-harvesting structures including stepwells. The Archaeological Survey of India and state heritage departments have periodically notified and funded conservation of select stepwells under the Ancient Monuments Act since the 2000s. Stepwell restoration is increasingly framed not merely as cultural preservation but as a low-cost, community-anchored strategy for groundwater recharge in arid zones.

Stakeholders and Impact

Jodhpur has a high concentration of historic bawris and jhalaras, many of which had fallen into neglect due to encroachment and disuse as piped water became available. Volunteer-led efforts like Rawnsley's have helped reverse that trajectory for several structures, drawing attention to the functional value of stepwells as passive groundwater recharge systems in Rajasthan's water-stressed landscape.

Project Bawri focuses on documenting, conserving, and reviving stepwells across India, treating them simultaneously as heritage assets and practical water infrastructure. Kalpana Ramesh has similarly championed urban stepwell restoration, particularly in Hyderabad. Mahindra's post, reaching his large social-media following, is likely to amplify visibility for these organisations and the broader movement among urban audiences and potential donors.

What's Next

Observers tracking water policy will watch whether state governments move to formally notify more stepwells as protected monuments, and whether bawri restoration budgets find explicit mention in the next annual action plans of the Jal Jeevan Mission or the Atal Bhujal Yojana. Mahindra closed his post with a direct appeal: 'May his work never cease,' underscoring that sustained, individual commitment — not just institutional funding — remains central to the movement's momentum.

As India's climate adaptation agenda intensifies, the convergence of heritage conservation and water security represented by stepwell restoration is increasingly attracting both civil-society energy and policy interest, suggesting the movement Rawnsley helped popularise in Jodhpur may find greater institutional support in the years ahead.