Saturday, August 30, 2008

Chengara- a sepia story




Excerpts from Sudeep's Blog (Backdrop)

[The news from Chengara (ചെങ്ങറ) is depressing. Women are being abducted and raped, men kidnapped, in addition to over two weeks of cutting off food and other lifeline supplies to people who have been protesting peacefully for more than an year now.]


Armed with a lot of gumption and confident that i would be able to fare better than others at my tryst with tyranny, i set on my mission- to Capture Chengara and the lives of thousands who are stranded in the settlement with the no supplies and no government help.

32 day old samaraja was born amidst calamity, her mother looks after her with the supplies that manage to reach her, Sarun her elder brother is malnourished and has health problems.







[Over 5000 families of landless Dalits, Adivasis and other marginalised people started this protest on 4th August 2007 claiming 6000 acres of land (you read that right -- six thousand acres) that is illegally kept by Harrison Malayalam Private Ltd in Pathanamthitta district, Kerala. Around 24,000 people from different parts of the region have moved to this area, with tents with poles and plastic sheets. ]










A year long protest has left Ambika (60) and Sarojini tired.


George (58) has a bad heart which is failing his body..he wants to live a better life but first needs some medicines.








Panchami (60) was begging for a bit of rice when my lens fell upon her.





Chicken pox has left her scarred Nimmi (11), it could have killed her, thanks to the traditional Neem therapy.









Mani (55) is an asthama patient, with agrrevated breathing problems, his life is a misery these days. When he is caught unawares by a bout of asthamatic attack, he frantically looks for his friend who has an inhaler from which he is allowed a small share.
Almost 20 women who had camped at 4th counter of the protest grounds. The women have various diseases like fever, chickenpox etc... Availability of food is their main concern.









An artist has left these words on the walls of Chengara...May victory be theirs and Humanity.

31 comments:

Vidya Bhushan Rawat said...

Thanks a lot friend for sending such heartening stories from Chengara. Each day has to be documented in Chengara so generations remember such gruesome tales to learn lesssons from the people claiming championing their cause. Chengara is not an isolated incident. Attack on people livelihood and natural resources would continue. This continuous struggle for the dignity and life of people would go on. A few of us who are mad, angry will go and come back. Those in power have everything with them, muscle power, the media and the propaganda machinary, we have poor, confusion and diversion, yet a united people can teach them a lesson. hence documents like these remain important.

My solidarity with the people of Chengara in their struggle for dignity and human rights. land is human right to live with dignity and honor.

sree said...

aji, that was a good job. May victory be theirs and Humanity.

Unknown said...

ajilal,

giving all support for the humanity.and support for chengara protest.

vinu.v.v

Smrti said...

It was very touching to see these pictures. Thanks a lot Ajilal for publishing this. Can I send this link to my freinds who are involved in the struggle?

Babitha Marina Justin said...

Saw this link through Smrti's link, its horrible. and its horrifying to also sense the apathy with which the media is so silent about the whole issue. Werent they silent for almost a year and of course the headlines are stolen by 7th std text books and Mar pavathil and Pinarayi mudslinging each other.
Have mallus lost their sense to react, are we becoming like the rhinos of Ionesco??

old fable teller, me... said...

chengara comes alive through these pictures. thanks.

Vidya Bhushan Rawat said...

Hello friends,

Thanks a lot for updating us about Chengara daily. Tommorrow is an important day for the people as we suspect the goons and thugs of the organised trade unions of the left will try to turn Chengara into another Nandigram. I have forwarded your updates on my network for solidarity.

Keep updating us and our solidarity with the masses. Chengara is a living example of people's struggle when all other avenues are closed.

In solidarity,

Vidya Bhushan Rawat

g sunil said...

the historic struggle needs help from everywhere of all sorts, ajilal
has done a great job.
a slid show of the same photographs is available in youtube.

prabha said...

great job...
i hope the message will reach the destination...

Sekhar said...

Heartening stories indeed. Saw this episode on Asianet News. But these pictures tell the story in a touching way.
Keep up the good work Aji.
Thanks for this informative post.

SVK said...

Oh My GOD...
I really am clueless...Thanks for the post and thanks Smrti for the link..

പൈങ്ങോടന്‍ said...

It was a touching series

JPK said...

Being there at the right time, the right moment to capture the right expression without the slightest touch of artificiality is what you have achieved, these near perfect pictures have a lot to say. The Chengara saga continues but through your photographs, you have exposed it to a whole new world. These pictures will be a turning point in the history of Chengara.

കാലചക്രം said...

great photos aji,
u did a very good job
samsaarikkunna photos
there is no need for an explanation

അരുണ്‍ ടി വിജയന്‍ said...

the real owners of the land is "DAlITS".
then why chengara?
The Chengara Land Movement is not written by the golden pen of communist party,
so they want to struggle...
Here a question arise for what and whom a govt like this in this world of Discriminated and landless people

g sunil said...

click this link to
see a slide show of these, one.http://in.youtube.com/watch?v=IHS9AbohE4s

Vidhu Raj said...

THIS IS THE REAL JOURNALISM,IN MY THOUGHT.REALLY TOUCHING
GO AHEAD

manoj kannan said...

thanks a lot aji. u did a great job!
manoj

Vishnu said...

Hello Ajilal
Can you please contact me in this id...
vishnuharih@gmail.com

it is very urgent

Vishnu said...

these were the names of the photos. it is better that you hand pick the best one's. it is you who could know the intensity behind each one.

DSC_0459B&W.jpg
DSC_0106test1.jpg
DSC_0080B&W.jpg
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DSC_0441B&W.jpg

saif said...

kandu.............
vallathe nombarappeduthunnu..........
manasil kuttabodham niraykunnu...............
othiri nanni, oro padathinum.............. aa valiya manasinum.
saif chakkuvally
9447012362

palappoovu said...

have seen some of these pictures in the latest issue of "pachakkuthira"..

a community who lived for greenery... "Adivasis" of kerala... who cares about them today.. ?

appreciating work of camera on their miseries...

pavamsajin said...

hi ajilal,
i am sajin, doing research in school of letters, m.g. university.
saw your shots from chengara. really......
now its not possible for me to say beautifull.
because how can we describe it as beautifull when thousands of people are struggling for their life!!
but you camera did an excellent work.
wish you all success in the future
why not we be freinds?
my e-mail:pavamsajin@gmail.com

R.Sajan said...

Chengara Conspiracy

Kerala is a place where you cannot get agriculture labourers because everyone is literate and thinks manual labour is unbecoming. The minimum wages that you have to pay to any manual labourer is Rs. 250/- a day - for 6 hours of what they deem to be ‘work’. The carpenter gets Rs. 300/- to Rs. 500/- a day. A live-in maid comes at not less than Rs. 4500/- plus food and clothes, a month. If you use her for other things, you pay extra. All labourers come to work in motorcycles or scooters.

Kerala is ‘Gulf’ to manual labourers from other states. There is practically no unemployment here after 2000, if you are ready to work. The greediest of young men work in ‘quotation gangs’ that recover money for banks like ICICI, HSBC, HDFC etc, or beat up people for politicians or similar others. They quote in 10000s to lakhs.

Malayali workers including head loaders, and employees including college teachers are, within Kerala, a disgrace to world labour. To them, work is worship of selfish indolence, and exercising of the tongue. Chaathans, created by the great VKN is the best possible presentation of our poor farm labourer.

The Communist parties profess the raising of the living standards of the working class and their leaders. They have thus managed to raise the lifestyles of even coolies or head-loaders to Star levels. Clerks and peons of government departments like Revenue, Registration, and Transport etc earn much more than MNC CEOs, thanks to their unions’ protecting bribe-taking. College lecturers earn at UGC levels without possessing the stipulated qualifications, only because of their Left unions. Secure monthly salary earners are deemed the genuine working class because they pay more and regular Union levies.

Kerala has a population of about 4 % of the country. Projected population for 1st March 2008 is 3, 42, 32,000. We have land of 1.18% of India. The quantum of land 38863 sq. kms or 9 603 00000 cents cannot change.

Of this geographical area, 48% is mountainous or hilly. 12% is the coastal lowlands. The remaining 40% of midlands alone is suitable for human dwelling. That is to say, for 4% percent of the country’s population, only about 0. 45% of its land is available for living and surviving.

In land-starved Kerala, the largest landowners are the government, the Christian plantation owners and the Church. Every time that the CPM has been in power, grabbing of government land by the party workers is usual. The party, however, is now no longer of the poor; it is now a party of contractors, brokers and businesspersons. The CPM thus having moved away from the downtrodden, new forces like the Muslim Solidarity, Catholic Infam and foreign-funded environment organizations moved in to rescue the poor. The Sadhu Jana Vimochana Samyukta Vedi (SJVSV) that has started the Chengara land-grab is one such saviour-outfit of dubious origins.

The pressure on land is our greatest weakness. Our earlier planners did not give this matter honest consideration. We should have planned for development without disturbing or destroying the highlands and lowlands. You meddle with mother Earth and you suffer – our planners ignored this old rule.

Institutional support by the Church to encroachments is responsible for the destruction of our hills. Muthanga was the zenith of their achievement under a Catholic ruler. Sex tourism is responsible for the vandalisation of our coasts.

Land belongs to all of us equally. We also have responsibility to it. Calculating on 960300000 cents and 34232000 humans, individual share comes to 28 cents each. Permissible human usage-share is 40% of that total. Thus, each of us has a birthright to only 11 cents of the land area in Kerala. If you allow a further deduction of 30% to man-made infrastructure like roads, public grounds and buildings, other public utilities etc, a Keralite can claim or own to himself only 7 cents or so.

It is against this ground reality that Chengara orphans demand five acres of land suitable for agriculture and Rs.50,000 in cash for each landless family among them [The Hindu 04.06.2008]. The demands are typically Malayali – similar to demanding that you shut your thattu-kada, stop plying your autorikshaw or not take your ill child to the hospital, for ‘their’ Bandh. It is mere bullying. And we would not dare to do it outside Kerala borders.
Meeting the demand would need only about 40000 acres of land.

I heard Laha Gopalan say many times on TV that the Chengara camp has people of all castes, and that it is only an agitation of people who do not have as much land as their birthright [they having only 4 to 10 cents] and the landless. This might mean that it is not an agitation of landless Dalits; or at least, not any longer. Laha Gopalan himself has by his own admission, only one hectare or 247 cents valued at Rs. 24, 70,000/-

In 3 years, 30% of the active population in Kerala would be non-Malayali or immigrant labour. The Chengara model would serve them well. TRESPASS, SQUAT, GRAB! We need not stop with land alone in the Chengara culture.

There are reports that the organisers of the land-grab collect admission fees ranging from Rs.6000/- upwards from the squatters. As per the Vedi’s claims, as many as 24,000 people belonging to 7,282 families are occupying about 14,000 acres of land at the Kumbazha Estate. The number of makeshift huts pitched at the estate will be around 7,800. The money collected might thus come to crores of Rupees, exclusive of financial assistance received from various Agencies.

Medha Patkar, Arundhati Roy and similar mega-stars’ going to Chengara to proclaim support was only like Henry Kissinger’s having come to New Delhi in November 2007 on behalf of the NSG corporates, to sort out the Left’s misgivings about the reciprocal arrangements for their agreeing to the Nuclear Deal. Such initiatives need spending.

Harrisons Plantations is a company of the RP Goenka group. It is not a foreign company, as depicted by the activists and the media. From 2005, they have been selling off pieces of the Estates in Kerala to real estate companies. The land was not theirs; and their lease with the owners, the Kerala government, had run out years ago; in 1996, according to Laha Gopalan. However, neither Left nor Right, or activist raised any voice against the fraud. http://www.moneycontrol.com/mccode/news/article/news_article.php?autono=169951

The Harrison’s Kodumon Estate land grab by Laha Gopalan and his group in 2006 and the Chengara land-grab of 2007 might thus have been some trick by some real estate group to force a cheap sale of the land. The huge funds spent in mobilising media and activist support could have come from that group. Alternately, it might have been a trick by RPG themselves to escape from Kerala without paying the rent to the government [they have reportedly not paid it for 20 years] and the employee benefits to the labour. After the lease ran out, RPG had availed a loan of Rs. 100 crores from the ICICI Bank on the security of the Estate, on which they had no rights at that point of time. The land grab might also have been to avert RPG’s having to repay the Bank.

AK Balan, Kerala’s Minister for SC/STs, has already called Chengara a ‘state-sponsored agitation’. It is like Kerala’s Private Bus operators’ agitating and frequently stopping services to make the public agree in agony to fare-hikes by an eager ministry. In the name of settlement of Chengara orphans, government land elsewhere would soon be allotted. The Estate might also be divided and allotted to different employees’ co-operatives, to benefit all the political parties. On 17.9.2008, Laha Gopalan categorically said on Doordarshan that they would not accept land at Chengara, even if no other land were given.

The rehabilitation initiative would be used more as a ploy to allot land to LDF cadres. Each party would have quotas, as had been with the Plus 2 allotment. Anyone that would pay the leaders would get choice real estate ‘free’. By 2010, the plots thus allotted would be consolidated to build resorts, amusement parks or professional colleges. Either the Party leaders themselves or Comrades like Farris Aboobacker would be the entrepreneurs on the land. Chengara would thus be revealed as a Total4 U, in a few more months.
http://archive.gulfnews.com/world/India/10242380.html

On 20th September 2008, AK Balan, Kerala’s Minister for SC/STs, announced that beginning October 5th, the government would begin a massive Scheme for allotting land to the landless all over the State. The government has identified a total ‘micha bhoomi’ or excess land of 15000 acres which could thus be disposed off. Houses would also be built for the beneficiaries. Chengara squatters would be the first to benefit under the Scheme, he said.

What is to happen to the landless among the middle classes of Kerala, who are unable to have houses of their own because of the inhuman cost of land in Kerala? Would they also have to squat and threaten suicide to have 7 cents for a house each?

Average minimum cost of land in Kerala is Rs.10 lakhs per acre in the rural parts. In places like Kochi, it is around half to one crore a cent. How much of public wealth would be lost when 15000 acres is freely given away to squatters and encroachers?

The intellectual activists ought to answer. Is might alone right?

saju john said...

One of the basic concept about the blog which shows in your blog with its touching photos.

പിള്ളാച്ചന്‍ said...

Sajan, you deserve a pat on your back!!! excellent work man.... got a lot of information.... Thanks a lot...

Anonymous said...

nirangalil kanneer.

Unknown said...

itha okkae ullathae thannae .......heeeeeee nice pics..

greenleaves said...

The heinous snaps you catch from "CHEGARA" has a valuable stand.

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