Skip to main content

Forced displacement, starvation deaths, industrial pollution "rampant" in Jharkhand

After successfully completing two-phases, traversing through 11 states, top civil rights network National Alliance of People’s Movements (NAPM)-sponsored Samvidhan Samman Yatra began its third phase this week from Jharkhand. Travelling through Odisha, West Bengal, Assam, Meghalaya, Nagaland, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh, Delhi, Haryana, Punjab, Jammu & Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, and Uttarakhand, it will culminate in Delhi on December 10, International Human Rights Day.
At several villages, including Malhar Toli, Ramgarh, Badakagaon, Ranchi, Nagri, Ulihatu, Khunti, Angrabari, Lachragarh and Simdega, participants listened to people’s, especially tribals’, plight -- forced displacement, starvation deaths, industrial pollution, imposition of aadhaar-based direct benefit transfer, atrocities in adivasi areas, and other human rights violations.
At Malhar Tola, Basant Kumar Hetamsaria, NAPM convener, Jharkhand, told activists how villager Chitaman Malhar had died due to lack of food security and a complete failure of social welfare schemes in the village. The village represented the true face of the state government, he said, pointing out that very few people have been covered under any social welfare schemes.
Majority of families do not have ration cards, National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme (NREGS) cards, pensions etc. Fact-finding organised by NAPM suggested that the death of Malhar was not due to his inability of availing social security schemes but complete failure of administration and neglect towards people by the state, he added.
Prem, Chitaman’s son, told activists that the death of his father was due to hunger. The state government tried all means to subvert the reasons. Soon after his death, officials rushed to the village and distributed ration cards to a few families. “We are facing starvation since long but no government official ever paid any attention to our village”, he added.
At Ramgarh, Santoshi, a village woman, said that they have to walk more than two kilometres to fetch water. “We don’t have basic amenities, we are deprived of food, water, and shelter. How can we even imagine about cooking gas or electricity? We don’t have resources to make toilets and the government never paid any attention to this. They may be claiming that Ramgarh is a model in Swacch Bharat but you all can see the realities we are facing.”
At Badkagaon in Hazaribagh district, which is the epicentre of intense land struggle in the coal-rich state, activists visited the families whose members were gunned down two years back. Mithilesh Dangi from Karanpura Bachao Sangharsh Samiti said their struggle is to save land and livelihood of 295 villages, which are endangered by coal mining by the National Thermal Power Corporation (NTPC) and other corporations.
Book on starvation deaths released at Ranchi
Devdas, a local activist, complained, “RSS and other Sangh organisations distribute weapons to create conflicts, but we distribute thoughts, and seek peaceful ways of struggle for our constitutional rights.”
Aloka Kujur said, since 2017, the authorities have become hyper actively, creating an atmosphere of terror. The state came down heavily on the Pathalgarhi movement, whose activists write down their constitutional rights on stone and place them at important places in villages for awareness and assertion of rights. Fr Stan Swamy added, the authorities were calling Pathalgarhi movement a criminal conspiracy. More than 3,000 adivasi youth are behind bars when they stood for their rights and development in their area.
At Khudda village of Khunti district, where the Adivasi Moolnivasi Astitva Raksha Manch and the Netarhat Firing Range Sangharsh Morcha organised public meeting, local activist Dayamani Barla said, “We have a tradition of resisting any kind of oppression and fight for our rights and dignity. Our leader Birsa Munda and others fought against the Britishers and East India Company’s repression. Taking inspiration from our leaders, we also successfully fought against Arcelor Mittal steel company.”
At Lachragarh village, where an 11-year old girl, Santoshi died of starvation because her family was denied ration after making aadhaar mandatory, Taramani, a Right to Food Campaign activist, said that she had been raising the issue of starvation deaths in the area since long time with the district administration but the government did not respond in time. Santoshi would have been alive if they would have listened to her.
At a public meeting at Satya Bharti, Ranchi, NAPM released a book edited by Hetamsaria on hunger deaths in Jharkhand in the presence of well-known activists like Fr Stan Swamy, Jean Dreze, Dayamani Barla, Aloka Kujur, Gabriele Dietrich, Suniti SR, Rajendra Ravi, BS Rawat, Meera Sanghamitra and others. Briefing the gathering, Hetamsaria said that there have been more than 61 deaths due to hunger since 2015. Among those 18 has taken place only in Jharkhand.
“Hunger deaths are an issue across the nation and not just in Jharkhand. It is a failure of the government. Almost half of the deaths happened as their ration cards were not linked to aadhaar and other technical issues. It is also a failure of society, where we see in one case that a dalit person died due to hunger”, said Prof Jean Dreze, well-known economist and social activist.

Comments

TRENDING

60 crore in Mahakumbh? It's all hype with an eye on UP polls, asserts keen BJP supporter in Amit Shah's constituency

As the Mahakumbh drew to a close, during my daily walk, I met a veteran BJP supporter—a neighbor with whom we would often share dinner in a group. An amicable person, the first thing he asked me, as he was about to take the lift to his flat, was, "How many people do you think must have participated in the holy dip?" He then stopped by to talk—which we did for a full half-hour, cutting into my walk time.

Morari Bapu echoes misleading figures to support the BJP's anti-conversion agenda

A senior Gujarat activist phoned me today to inform me that the well-known storyteller on Lord Ram, Morari Bapu, has made an "unsubstantiated" and "preposterous" statement in Songadh town, located in the tribal-dominated Tapi district. He claimed that while the Gujarat government wants the Bhagavad Gita to be taught in schools, the "problem is" that 75% of government teachers "are Christians who do not let this happen" and are “involved in religious conversions.”

Breaking news? Top Hindu builder ties up with Muslim investor for a huge minority housing society in Ahmedabad

There is a flutter in Ahmedabad's Vejalpur area, derogatorily referred to as the "border" because, on its eastern side, there is a sprawling minority area called Juhapura, where around five lakh Muslims live. The segregation is so stark that virtually no Muslim lives in Vejalpur, populated by around four lakh Hindus, and no Hindu lives in Juhapura.

An untold story? Still elusive: Gujarati language studies on social history of Gujarat's caste and class evolution

This is a follow-up to my earlier blog , where I mentioned that veteran scholar Prof. Ghanshyam Shah has just completed a book for publication on a topic no academic seems to have dealt with—caste and class relations in Gujarat’s social history. He forwarded me a chapter of the book, published as an "Economic & Political Weekly" article last year, which deals with the 2015 Patidar agitation in the context of how this now-powerful caste originated in the Middle Ages and how it has evolved in the post-independence era.

Justifying social divisions? 'Dogs too have caste system like we humans, it's natural'

I have never had any pets, nor am I very comfortable with them. Frankly, I don't know how to play with a pet dog. I just sit quietly whenever I visit someone and see their pet dog trying to lick my feet. While I am told not to worry, I still choose to be a little careful, avoiding touching the pet.

Caste, class, and Patidar agitation: Veteran academic 'unearths' Gujarat’s social history

Recently, I was talking with a veteran Gujarat-based academic who is the author of several books, including "Social Movements in India: A Review of Literature", "Untouchability in Rural India", "Public Health and Urban Development: The Study of Surat Plague", and "Dalit Identity and Politics", apart from many erudite articles and papers in research and popular journals.

Socialist utopia challenging feudal and Brahminical systems: Kanwal Bharti on Sant Raidas’ vision of Begumpura

In a controversial claim, well-known Dalit writer and columnist Kanwal Bharti has asserted that a clever Brahminical move appears to be behind the Guru Granth Sahib changing the name of the 15th-16th century mystic poet-saint of the Bhakti movement, Sant Raidas, to Sant Ravidas.

New York-based digital company traces Modi's meteoric rise to global Hindutva ecosystem over several decades

A recent document, released by the Polis Project Inc.—a New York-based digital magazine and hybrid research and journalism organization—even as seeking to highlight the alleged rise of authoritarianism in India, has sought to trace Prime Minister Narendra Modi's meteoric rise since 2014 to the ever-expanding global Hindutva ecosystem over the last several decades.

A conman, a demolition man: How 'prominent' scribes are defending Pritish Nandy

How to defend Pritish Nandy? That’s the big question some of his so-called fans seem to ponder, especially amidst sharp criticism of his alleged insensitivity during his journalistic career. One such incident involved the theft and publication of the birth certificate of Masaba Gupta, daughter of actor Neena Gupta, in the Illustrated Weekly of India, which Nandy was editing at the time. He reportedly did this to uncover the identity of Masaba’s father.