“My husband works as a daily wage laborer at the dam construction site and earns $340 per month, but this money hardly is sufficient. Slowly we are losing this battle of survival,” Bano says, standing on a parapet overlooking a small kitchen garden. “We have to buy everything from the market now, like vegetables, milk.”

Farhana Latief is a development researcher at Jawaharlal Nehru University, New Delhi. She explains that governments typically promise to build state-of-the-art facilities and develop a region when they are proposing large-scale projects. “But in reality it is a façade,” she says. “Generally they require skilled people to design, build and operate such projects. Hence, the brunt of development is always faced by the local population as they get displaced and lose the avenues of sustainable survival. This process will ultimately push these communities into debt and poverty, because they are paid low compensation for their fertile lands and sustainable way of living.”

Dams also threaten local flora and fauna, as tracts of forest are destroyed. At the same time, fertile agricultural land is submerged, as these dams are “run-of-the river” dams, which means they generate electricity from flowing water. There are long-term risks associated with this, says Bashir Ahmad, a geology lecturer in Srinagar, Kashmir’s largest city.

“Extensive human activities related to hydropower construction, clearing of forests, and excavation of roads along the river course have intensified erosion and triggered slope failures on the highly unstable rock slopes,” says Ahmad. He points out that this is not a new occurrence. In 2008, construction of Kishtwar’s Baglihar Dam was completed, displacing approximately 1,400 people. Flooding associated with the dam later submerged the town of Pul Doda.

Meanwhile, Bano has seen her health deteriorate. She says she has been exposed to pollution that has given her a regular cough, noting that her family must now put aside what little money they can spare to pay for travel to see doctors and buy medicine. “I hardly go out now and remain confined inside this house,” she says.

For her part, Begum has been diagnosed with high blood pressure and hyperthyroidism — a condition whose symptoms can include rapid or irregular heartbeat, sweating and weight loss — and must take medication regularly.

“I used to walk all day as our houses were on small hilltops,” says Begum. “Now it feels like we have been caged in these houses and our bodies are paralyzed because there is no work to do and nowhere to go.”

“Currently, the construction work is going on and my husband gets to work, but in the next 2-3 years the construction of the dam will be complete, then what will happen to us?” she asks. “I am just worried how will we feed our young daughters, because throughout our life we reared cattle and cultivated the land, and that’s all we know to do.”