In Edamadaka village in Andhra Pradesh’s Cuddapah district, a centuries-old stepwell had become a dumping ground. For nearly nine decades, garbage had accumulated in its depths. Then, in 2023, 22-year-old Sane Lakshmikanth arrived with a group of volunteers and a plan to clean it up in a week. The engineering graduate, from Bellum village in Nandyala district, found more than rubbish beneath the silt. The stepwell was a piece of history which had survived centuries of change, only to be forgotten. As he travelled through Kadapa and Nandyala districts, he repeatedly encountered historic structures buried under garbage. So, in 2024, he founded the Poorva Sampada Rakshata Sena, a volunteer organisation dedicated to restore neglected stepwells, temple tanks, and old temples across Andhra Pradesh.
Since then, he and his team have restored 15 stepwells and two temples. The process is long and often complicated. The first step is always to clear the rubbish and silt. Only then can the real work begin: assessing whether a structure is stable enough to restore, identifying the repairs it needs, and determining whether the village will use it once the work is complete. “Day one is always garbage: clearing it, hauling it, finding out what’s actually underneath,” Lakshmikanth says. A restored stepwell that is abandoned again within months, he believes, defeats the purpose.
His work has revealed a peculiar contradiction. In some villages, residents often don’t allow household drainage to be connected anywhere near a stepwell or temple tank. “These water bodies are tied to local deities, and there’s a logic that keeps them separate, sacred, untouched,” Lakshmikanth explains. “It’s a kind of protection, except it also means the wells get isolated, and reverence curdles into abandonment.”
He has pulled animal carcasses from water bodies and removed rubbish from sites that villagers consider holy. The irony is not lost on him: a place can be considered sacred enough to be protected from daily use, yet is neglected enough to be unusable. One of his most challenging projects involved a stepwell dating to the reign of Sri Krishnadevaraya of the Vijayanagara Empire—roughly five to six centuries old. Since the structure was very old, the wild trees had claimed it. With help from local volunteers and politicians, his team completed its restoration in 15 days.
Lakshmikanth mobilises volunteers through social media and identifies villagers to monitor restored monuments. Even though he is not backed by any official recognition, he says most villagers are helpful. His teams try to fence the sites to prevent further neglect. Villagers provide food and accommodation, panchayats contribute cleaning equipment and materials, and crowdfunding helps cover larger expenses. Restoration costs between `3 lakh and `5 lakh, depending on the condition of the monument. His campaign received a boost when Prime Minister Narendra Modi featured him on Mann Ki Baat. Villages that had previously shown little interest began to approach his team, and more volunteers came forward to help.
Lakshmikanth’s next plan is to restore four temples dedicated to Shiva, Ganesha, Parvati, and Veerabhadra. All four have been defunct for decades and are believed to be around 1,600 years old. Looking ahead, the restorer hopes to build a wider network both online and on the ground through which villagers can report neglected heritage sites. He wants to strengthen partnerships with local governments to secure funding for restoration projects, too.
His mission is simple: find forgotten monuments, bring them back to life and ensure they are not abandoned to time again.