KOTA (RAJASTHAN): Gopal and his wife Ann Bai, a tribal couple were in for a rude shock after they returned home on a hot June day spend collecting firewood in the forests. Around nightfall, his eldest son, eight-year-old Sanjay, complained of fatigue and his eyes went red. His condition worsened and by early morning he was dead. Panic-struck, Gopal took his two other children to the nearby Primary Health Center. But by then it was too late. His four-year-old son, Dhruvshankar, was declared “brought dead”; his three-year-old daughter Barka, died the same afternoon.

In 24 hours Gopal had lost all his children. The cause: malnutrition. In the last two months, at least 35 children and one adult, almost all of them belonging to the Bhil tribe have died due to malnutrition. The victims belonged to Mawasa Dhani and Mawasa villages, located about 23 km from the industrial town of Kota “I do not know what happened. I could not do anything in the night and by day time it was too late,” said Gopal of Mawasa Dhani village. The deaths, many of them caused by measles or heatstroke to which the victims had become susceptible because of malnutrition, have mainly occurred in the Bhil tribe. In Mawasa Dhani, there are 81 Bhil families, apart from Gujjars and Rewaris Mawasa, where five non Bhils have died, is a Muslim-dominated village with a sprinkling of Gujjars. Malis and Bhils.

The sole source of livelihood for the Bhils of these two villages is to gather firewood in the nearby forests which they sell in the market every second day. Each couple earns between Rs 60 and Rs 80 which affords their daily one meal a day. “The children do not even get milk. All day long the naked children roam the forests with their parents,” said Dr.Hemraj Verma, in-charge of the Primary Health Center at Khaitoon. 6 km away.

By contrast, the Gujjars and the Rewaris are a prosperous lot. Together, these two communities own more than 5,000 cows and buffaloes in Mawasa Dhani. But they are un- willing to help the Bhils. As a result, the affluence of the Gujjars and Rewaris stands out in stark comparison to the impoverishment of the Bhils. The Bhils believe in rearing big families. One can see children everywhere. Most of the families have four to nine children. Gopal’s friends have told him that if he had more than three children, then at least one or two of them would have been alive today.

 

Article extracted from this publication >> June 24, 1994