In the remote village of Bastar, Chhattisgarh, a woman named Savitri carries her pregnant daughter-in-law on a wooden cot across a muddy path. The road to the nearest health centre is 12 kilometers long—and doesn’t exist on the ground, only on paper.

It’s not a scene from a disaster film. It’s daily life for thousands in rural India, where roads vanish in the rain, electricity is a luxury, and mobile signal depends on which tree you stand under.

For Savitri and others in her village, infrastructure isn’t just a development issue—it’s a matter of life and death.

Development by Distance

In urban India, we talk about 5G, metro rails, and smart cities. In villages like Savitri’s, people still wait for pukka roads, steady electricity, and clean drinking water.

The lack of connectivity means:

• Ambulances can’t reach during emergencies
• Children drop out because schools are too far
• Farmers can’t transport crops on time
• Government schemes exist but can’t be accessed

Without infrastructure, opportunity cannot travel—and so, villages remain stuck in time.

Children Climbing Trees for Signal

In a tribal village near Odisha’s Malkangiri district, school children climb a banyan tree daily to attend their online classes. The school has no internet. Their village has no tower. Their future, quite literally, depends on their ability to catch a signal.

Some days it rains. Some days the network fails. But they climb anyway.

Education, when denied by distance, becomes a daily act of courage.

The Infrastructure Illusion

On paper, thousands of rural roads, toilets, and electrification projects are “completed.” In reality, many of these projects are either unfinished, unusable, or never started.

Savitri’s village has been listed as “electrified” in government records for three years. But all she has is one broken solar bulb—and a promise that “work is in progress.”

Local Resistance and Resourcefulness

Despite neglect, villages don’t just wait—they resist and innovate. Some communities dig their own roads. Others pool money to install shared solar panels. In Kerala, a collective of women turned their village into a digital hub after the government delayed installation of internet infrastructure.

These efforts are heroic—but they shouldn’t have to be. Basic infrastructure is a right, not a reward.

What These Roads Reveal

The absence of roads is more than a geographical problem—it’s a symbol of institutional abandonment. Without roads, there’s no healthcare. Without signal, there’s no education. Without water, there’s no dignity.

When we talk about “bridging the rural-urban divide,” this is what it truly means: ensuring villages are not just remembered during elections—but connected, supported, and respected all year round.

Ink of Impact’s Take

At Ink of Impact, we document the places India forgets—where progress is promised but never arrives. The road to justice, equality, and opportunity must first be a physical one.

Until then, we’ll keep writing about those who walk it anyway.