The Company Wants To Snatch Our Fields Forcibly

(Translation of article “Hamare Khet Companywale Jabardasti Cheenana Chahte Hai” by Dayamani Barla, published in Prabhat Khabar, Dated October 2, 2005)

(Translation by Vidya Jonnalagadda)

Ghansi Raam Tudoo, Simon Murmoo and other young men say that the administration by the aadivaasi (aboriginal) community has been true to the spirit of their ancestors for centuries, but the (people from the) Explosives Company have driven them away. The displaced women, who have been resettled in residential colonies in Turamdeeh, keep returning to their deserted villages and fields, to stare at their broken homes and tell their tale. (They tell that) “On 3rd August, the Police bulldozed our houses. They threw out our possessions from our houses onto trucks as per their whim. Women Police personnel were also present”. The women ask “how can we live in Quarters (allotted housing) with our large families? We are aadivaasis, we have poultry, cattle and pigs. How can we keep them in the Quarters? There is no place there at all”. The women tell “the Government has said it will provide employment to one brother (in a family) and not to the other; so now they (the brothers) fight with each other.” Muntoo Swansee indicates the fields and tells “the field where soil is being spread is our field. When we had stopped the people from the Company, they had beaten us up and put us in jail.”

The women tell us “We have asked (the Company) for employment for two members (from each family), but they are not willing. We had our fields here. We used to get a very good harvest though there was little water (irrigation) as the water from the mountains used to flow down. Each year we would get two harvests – one inAashaadh month (spring) and one in the summer – both without applying any fertilizer.” They added that the resettlement accommodations have been provided only for humans; the cows, bulls, and goats are now roaming all over the place. Shanti told that they had five big goats (khassi): after their home was bulldozed, they were all roaming outside and now they have been eaten up by hyenas and foxes (lakkadbaagha). She says “ureej-marom soben hale-daale tana ko” (cattle and goats all became scattered). Suneel Paandeya’s house is where all the houses got bulldozed. Suneel’s family tells (us) that they were asking for jobs for two members, but they did not get it. “We are not getting any money (reimbursement) either, that is why we are not going to move from here”. The displaced families that live in theAavaasiya colony say that they don’t like living there, but have been compelled to due to the circumstances. One person told that when the company took their land in 1982, they gave laborer jobs to some people in return. Of these people, they suspended (fired) the laborers who did not allow them (the Company) to break their houses.

The displaced people ask how they can educate their children now. Before (the displacement), children from Banduhura village used to attend school in Gade, which is two kilometers away. But now the children are not able to go there, as the school is four kilometers away from the (resettlement) colony, and the Company has closed the road. The people told that they were not being allowed to go to their fields where they had sown their crops. It is known thatJawans (guards) from the CSF (Central Security Force) have been posted all over the region where mining activity is taking place. Seeing the plight of the displaced people of Banduhuraang village, the people of Taalsa village, which also falls in the Banduhurang mining belt, are worried. The people of Taalsa say “the Government has glibly promised us land and jobs, but we have seen the condition of the people of Banduhurang”. The villagers pledge that they will give up their lives but will not give us their land. They say that they will not relocate to the Government Quarters settlement in the hills. They say that they are not cattle that can be stuffed into any accommodation. They say that they will unite and oppose the Government. The Government has Police and guns. When asked what they will do in face of pressure from the Government, the villagers say “We have our chests, we will take the bullets”.