In a winter morning, I travelled from Nagpur to the south western tip of Madhya Pradesh, the heartland of India. Balaghat district is close to 3 other states at least, Chattisgarh, Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra. Even Orissa is not far away. State borders have their own problems everywhere. Naxalism or violent guerrilla wars in small pockets for changing social order (termed as biggest internal security threat in India by the present PM) is prevalent in the region. Whether it works towards changing the social order or not, this gives the reluctant authorities another reason to keep away from the area. Baigas are a Primitive Tribe Group (PTGs) and has a history of being pushed or rather shoved around. Baigas like to live in small communities in far flung areas and mostly deep inside the forests and on the hill tops. Their hamlets in this area are in and around the famous Kanha National Park. Baigas are reducing in number every year even in the absence of any government sponsored schemes that promote and advertise contraceptive methods. The government machinery with its basic health amenities has not reached them and hence the high mortality. But the government has found an unique method of arresting their dwindling number. It has banned contraception among the Baigas!! They lose their children every year due to frequent child births and very low level of nutrition and scary as it may seem, they are now used to this loss. They do not mourn much. Are children capable of mourning for the dead for long? They are the ones who lose these babies among Baigas. Girls as old as 12 have children and do I need to emphasize that they are at loss as far as child rearing is concerned? As I sit in Chukatola, in the Baihar Block, a girl of hardly 13 (her young body could not fake her age) was sitting with about a year old child. Looking at a mother-child duo one really does not know, which child should one pray for? Who needs your blessings and prayers and well-wishes more? The child-mother or the child-daughter?
Chukatola was the first village to visit which came after a journey of 7 hours by road. The name of the village tells a tale of neglect and pain. The original name of the village was different. It has been re-christened as Chukatola, which literally translates to “Forgotten Hamlet” after the villagers realized the administration keep them out of every welfare scheme. Neither the road reaches there nor the tube-well for water. They do not have electricity and certainly not the primary health center. We reached there in the last lights of the day and sat around fire with Baiga men-women. To my amazement (and the accompanying activists’ relief) most of them were not drunk! I forgot to mention Kailash. He is the one who showed the driver ways that resembled “no-ways” to the village! We discussed how the villagers do not get Antyodaya ration that is due to them. It is the same story everywhere. I have heard it so many times. It seems I know what is coming even before they start . And thank god, they talked about ration, land registration, oppression by the system, all that my heart as well as head can handle. And I thankfully they did not talk about losing their children, I would not have known where to look! Will I ever master up enough courage to hear about mothers losing their children with a straight face? I do not know. I doubt it very much. But I knew I could talk about local elections, oppression by administration, failure and corruption in the Public Distribution System and how they are filling the pockets of the Government officials, being as poor and hapless as they are and so I did. I looked into their entitlement cards and helped them figure out although this tribe never uses sugar; their cards pronounced that they had taken as much as 5 kg of sugar in a month!! Where this sugar actually goes is a lay man’s guess!
Towards the end of the meeting I was offered a birhi (a country-made cigarette) in jest and I took it.They made the birhi with much love in front of me and loved it when I could keep it alight for a minute or so. These are difficult to keep alight! One has to smoke really rapidly. I told them I liked it and could almost light it with the fire of my heart in the real filmy style! Film numbers are a hit even in this remote corner of India. They instantly guessed the song I was referring to. It was appreciated with a full throated laughter that echoed in the forests that engulfed their huts. It is this laughter of people who toil everyday for each small need, fills my heart and keeps me going. It never lets me forget what I set out to do in the first place!
Nayana, I was taken aback at how close I am geographically to these people, and yet, like most of us, completely ignorant of their existence, leave alone their peculiar(or am I wrong there) predicament.
ReplyDeleteI was also take aback at their reproductive practises. Do u think it is an outcome of abject government neglect over the years? Or is it their normal way of life? I think minus what we term 'civilization' we would all have been riding in the same boat.
And I absolutely agree or share yur dilemma- whom does one really help or pray for- the mother or the daughter as both are nothing but children . And even if u can decide whom to help, the more pressing dilemma would be'how' to do that.
Keep walking the path, u know not what u r doing....
Well, government's efforts to preserve this Primitive Tribe Group is completely misdirected even if we take it for granted that the intention is good. Child marriage is an evil. But look at what the asministration is doing. No health facility, no education on reproductive and child health and then no contraception!!!! What a predicament! And if you do a bit of search on PTGs in India, you will see that each PTG has funds allocated to them. These funds come to the states and go back unutilised whereas they live in abject poverty.
ReplyDelete