The scheme for migrant workers’ welfare, however, leaves inter-district migrants completely out of its purview, focusing only on 116 districts across six states which see high inter-state migration.

ATIKH RASHID

On Saturday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the Garib Kalyan Rozgar Abhiyan (GKRA), a scheme to boost livelihood and employment opportunities for migrant workers who have returned to villages from metro cities due to the Covid-19 pandemic and the ensuing lockdown. The scheme for migrant workers’ welfare, however, leaves inter-district migrants completely out of its purview, focusing only on 116 districts across six states which see high inter-state migration.

GKRA is a programme to provide livelihood opportunities to returning migrant workers by employing them under 25 government schemes. The works include laying of gas pipelines, water supply, internet set up, building housing for the rural poor, waste management infrastructure, rural roads and work on Anganwadis, among others, under 12 different Union ministries.

According to the Prime Minister’s Office, the districts chosen for the scheme are those where more than 25,000 migrant workers have returned in the last few months. These districts are estimated to cover about 66 per cent of such migrant workers.

The lack of a plan to provide employment to returning inter-district migrants – especially skilled workers – is most apparent in Maharashtra’s Marathwada region where more than a million migrants have returned from Pune, Mumbai and other major cities in the state after the lockdown. In most of the eight districts, the administration is counting on the returning migrants to go back to the cities after the pandemic subsides. “Some are already returning,” said an administration official, with a whiff of relief.

Each of the eight districts of Marathwada – a region known for low socio-economic development and migration of rural population – has seen a much higher number of returning migrants than the 25,000 eligibility mark for GKRA since March 2020, when the pandemic started affecting life and livelihoods in Mumbai, Pune and other big cities in comparatively wealthier western Maharashtra.

Numbers obtained by The Indian Express from district authorities show that about 10.8 lakh migrants have returned to the eight districts in the region with each seeing anywhere between 60,000 to 2.5 lakh returnees from cities in the last three months. The highest count of 2.5 lakh is in Beed district, which sees very high seasonal migration of sugarcane harvest labourers to various sugar factories in western Maharashtra, in addition to other skilled and semi-skilled migrants who move to cities such as Mumbai and Pune in search of better wages.

Other districts in the region — Aurangabad (about 2 lakh), Latur (1.43 lakh), Nanded (1.5 lakh), Osmanabad (1.1 lakh) Parbhani (1 lakh), Hingoli (65,000) and Jalna (60,000) — have also received migrants in numbers that are many times higher than the 25,000 threshold fixed by the central government for inclusion in GKRA scheme for inter-state migrants in six states.

Most districts counting on return of migrants, work under MGNREGA

While those looking for manual work back home can, possibly, be accommodated via MGNERGA works, for skilled workers there is very little to do in these districts. In most districts, the only possible solution is going back to the big cities, again, to look for work.

“In the last few months, we have issued thousands of fresh job cards under MGNERGA, of which about 2,000 would be returned migrants. For skilled workers who were working in industrial units in the city, we have very little capacity to accommodate them as there are almost no industries here. We are in talks with a few units, which had earlier employed north Indian workers who have now left, to employ the locals who have returned,” said Hingoli Collector Ruchesh Jaywanshi.

When asked about the district administration’s plan for the migrants, Collector of neighbouring Parbhani, Deepak Mugalikar, said the migrants have returned to their native places, but only temporarily. “They will be going back. In fact, some have already started,” said Muglikar.

“The first priority for us in connection with the returning migrants is to ensure that they do not spread coronavirus. We are keeping them in 14-day institutional quarantine followed by another 14 days of home quarantine. If they seek jobs under MGNREGA, we have ample work…,” he said.

But the Rs 202 per day wage under MGNREGA is nowhere enough for a skilled worker like Pramod Harkal (24), who used to earn over Rs 600 a day as a helper in an automobile assembly unit in Alandi, Pune.

Harkal, who hails from Gunj Khurd village in Parbhani district, said he returned to his village two months ago and has been unemployed since. “I can’t get any suitable work in the village. I tried to find some in Pathri (the tehsil headquarters) but to no avail. I am now looking to go back to Pune once transport opens,” said Harkal.

Pankaj Gajmal, a 30-year-old from Pathri town in the same district, had returned in April from Mumbai, where he worked as a support staff in a data centre of a nationalised bank via a third-party contract. “Although my office was open, I couldn’t go as the local train service had sopped in Mumbai. I returned home in April. I tried to find some work online but there isn’t any,” said Gajmal, who plans to return to his earlier job in Mumbai, or get a new one in the city, as soon as the local train service resumes.

Experts believe that schemes like GKRA may help migrants survive the pandemic period by providing them minimum income. But GKRA, like MGNREGA, can’t keep the population of migrant workers back home, who leave their homes looking for better wages.

“A scheme like GKRA will temporarily discontinue the inter-district migration during the ongoing pandemic. Most of the migrants – especially in districts such as Beed – migrate to western Maharashtra looking for better wages and advance amounts from muqadams (contractor) to undertake major expenditure, such as on marriages or tackling an emergency. The government schemes have limitations to provide these benefits and… these schemes may not help them stay back in the native districts,” said Nishikant Warbhuvan, assistant professor at the School of Management Sciences, Swami Ramandand Teerth Marathwada University (SRTMU), sub-centre, Latur.

(This story was published in The Indian Express on June 23 2020)

As villagers can’t afford to flush litres of water down the toilet, Narendra Modi government’s Swachha Bharat Abhiyan (SBA) is badly hit in drought-affected areas of Maharashtra.

ATIKH RASHID

Ekurke was a success story that inspired many. In 2013, this village in Osmbanabad district’s Kalamb tehsil built 350 toilets in a short span of one-and-a-half months to end the shame of having to defecate in the open. The concerted efforts by the villagers led to the transformation of their village once “infamously dirty” into one where each household has its own toilet.

Three years later, with Osmanabad reeling under one of the worst droughts in the region’s history, almost the entire village is back to doing the morning ritual out in the fields notwithstanding the fact that each family has a toilet in the backyard. Reason: There’s no water to “waste” to flush the toilets.

The sight is common in hundreds of villages in the rural Maharashtra, including those which have officially been declared Open Defecation Free (ODF). Men, women, children and elderly are forced to visit the fields not only in villages of Marathwada and Vidarbha, but even in comparatively better western Maharashtra. The officials monitoring the Swachh Bharat Abhiyan (SBA) concede that unavoidable circumstances of drought have temporarily hit the campaign.

Rajebhau Bhise, a resident of Ekurke who was at the forefront of the campaign to build toilets in the village in 2013 under the Nirmal Gram Yojana espoused by the United Progressive Alliance government, says, “What choice do we have? We are dependent for water supply on two private borewells and one well in the village which is presently providing us just enough water to sustain. At the moment, we provide 200 litres of water to every family every day, which is much higher than what is being given in nearby villages. But can it be used to flush the toilets? If so, the entire quota will be exhausted in flushing toilets. Barring elderly, every one is going to the fields in the morning.”

Osmanabad district has 44 Gram Pranchayats which have been declared ODF by the committee comprising senior officials of Union and State government agencies. While villagers and officials concerned unofficially say that most of these villages have taken to open defecation again due to water scarcity, there’s no method or mechanism to monitor the ground scenario.

“The government is not interested in knowing if the villagers are actually using the toilets. All they want to know is whether toilets have been built or not. If we show them that every household has its own toilet, the village is declared ODF. I don’t think there’s any village in the Osmanabad district that can afford 100 per cent toilet use in such a bad drought,” said a class II revenue department official from Kalamb tehsil.

In Parner tehsil of Ahmednagar district, barely 80 kms from Pune, villagers wonder how they can afford to use water for flushing toilets when they are assigned 20 litres of water per person per day.

“I have seven members in my family. Let’s consider that every member needs 5 litres of water for toilet use. I would be able to sustain a pair of buffalos on 35 litres of water rather than letting it go down the drain,” said Tatyasaheb Shinde, a resident of the village in Parner tehsil.

Another resident says, “A population of 1,630 gets 30,600 litres of tanker supply every day. Those who can afford to buy private tanker water, at Rs 250 for 1000 litres of water, can use the toilets. At the moment, 80 per cent men are going out to the fields while women use recycled water to flush.”

Since the Swachh Bharat Mission was launched on October 2, 2014, the state has built 13.35 lakh toilets with 6,756 villages earning the ODF tag. The officials coordinating the campaign rue that water scarcity has also hit the toilet building exercise. The effect is most visible in Marathwada region which is the worst hit among the five administrative regions in the state.

Suryakant Hazare, Deputy Divisional Commissioner, Aurangabad Division, who is responsible for monitoring SBM in eight districts of Marathwada, says, “I won’t be able to tell you how many of them are using the toilets and how many of them aren’t, but it’s certainly true that the construction of new toilets has slowed down due to lack of water. If a village is facing a severe shortage and even struggling to meet the drinking water needs, we can’t press them to build toilet blocks. We will have to wait until it rains.”

Of the 10,639 Gram Panchayats in the Marathwada region, 644 have been declared ODF by the authorities. In 2015-16, the region got 2.35 lakh new toilets against a target of 2.49 lakh set for the year. The campaign is not likely to start before June, officials say.

Government officials working at the village level say the present situation may have far-reaching effects on the village sanitation and campaign against open defecation.

“Convincing villagers to get rid of the habit of open defecation is not an easy job. Many months of efforts in awareness campaigns, flying squads which click the picture of violators, door-to-door visits, getting government subsidies to build toilets for economically weaker families and many other things go into the campaign. The drought relief attempts have ignored this aspect completely. It’s not clear how the government has decided ‘20 litres/person per day norm’. If a person decides to use toilet, he may spend half of his due quota on flushing alone,” said a Deputy Chief Executive Officer working with Aurangabad Zilla Parishad.

(This story was published in The Indian Express on May 22 2016.)

Without enough water to irrigate a summer crop, a village in Maharashtra takes a three-month holiday.

ATIKH RASHID

Hivre Bazar,a village with a population of 1,300,is on a three-month holiday. Residents of this village in Parner taluka of Ahmednagar district in Maharashtra, most of them farmers who otherwise spend this time of the year nurturing summer crops of groundnut or tomato, are organising fairs, arranging cultural programmes, taking sight-seeing tours or just enjoying leisure at home.

The decision to take a three-month break from farming, from March to May, was taken by the villagers in a gram sabha (village meet) unanimously. According to villagers, due to a sparse rainfall last monsoon, there wasn’t enough water to sustain a summer crop and a crop failure was likely. That would have been a wastage of effort,money and water. So instead of planting a summer crop, we unanimously decided that we will rest and also allow our fields to do the same, says Sakharam Tukaram Pawar, a villager.

According to Popatrao Pawar, the deputy sarpanch who played a pivotal role in converting this drought-prone village into a model village, the villagers had gone on a similar break in 2003, again due to less rainfall.

Ahmednagar is among the 12 drought-hit districts in Maharashtra. The drought has resulted in severe shortage of drinking water and has forced many farmers to pull out standing crops as they had no water to irrigate them.

Pawar says, “We have a water audit system in the village which is run by village students. Our experience of the past 20 years shows that if the village receives 400 mm of rainfall in the monsoon season,we get enough water to meet our drinking and crop needs in all the three seasons kharif, rabi and summer. This year,we have had only 190 mm of rainfall,which means just enough water for drinking and kharif and rabi crops. Had we planted a summer crop, we would have exhausted our drinking water.”

Once a drought-prone village,Hivre Bazar now has two percolation tanks with a collective storage capacity of 10,000 million cubic feet. A weak monsoon failed to fully recharge these last year. Apart from percolation tanks, there are 294 wells,16 earthen dams and seven cement storage tanks. The village has won accolades for watershed development work and rural welfare schemes.

Once the water audit done in February showed that the water stored in the dams would just be able to meet drinking needs of villagers and the livestock,the situation was explained to every villager in a gram sabha which unanimously decided against planting the summer crop. “We told them that only 25 per cent families in the village could plant a summer crop with the water from their wells. But they will have to risk a crop failure. In that case,the remaining 75 per cent will have to depend on tanker water for drinking. So these 25 per cent families sacrificed the summer crop for the water needs of fellow villagers”, says Pawar.

Currently, every household in the village gets 500 litres of water through the village water distribution scheme which is run entirely by women. Pawar says the decision to hand over control of water to women was taken because as homemakers,they are the ones who have to deal with the scarcity of water.

Sakharam Patil,another villager,argues that sacrificing his summer crop doesn’t actually mean that he has to forgo the income from his field. There were strong chances that my summer crop would fail or generate very little yield, resulting in losses on the investment. Avoiding these losses is also a kind of profit. Besides, it’s tiring to toil in the field year after year. Now we have holidays and have also allowed our fields to take some rest. A rejuvenated soil will also give us a better yield next season, he says.

Villagers are making the most of their free time by organising fairs and cultural programmes. We are busy holding jagran-gondhal and bhajan-kirtan. Women are using this opportunity to make pickles and poppadums. Some families have gone out. Once it rains,we will resume work in the farms with renewed vigour, says Raosaheb Pawar, a villager.

Pointing to low production this year,Balasaheb Darade says don’t call us hoarders without taking into account ground realities.

ATIKH RASHID

EVERY time onion prices spiral up,traders in Lasalgaon—often called Asia’s largest onion market—are dubbed villains in an insidious plot to put the otherwise humble commodity out of reach of the common man. That’s about the only time Lasalgaon,a village of around 15,000 people,located about 60 km from Nashik,makes news.

Among the 40-odd traders operating in the Shri Chhatrapati Shivaji Agriculture Produce Market Committee (APMC) of Lasalgaon,which exclusively deals in onion trade,Balasaheb Darade is bewildered at how the fate of even distant governments comes to rest on his bulbous produce. According to him,that’s because of the entirely baseless media portrayal of them as hoarders, without taking into account either trade mechanisms or the marketing chain.

Claiming that production has been low this year due to drought,the 30-year-old says: It is a business like any other. We buy the produce from growers and sell it to traders across the country keeping a certain profit. Depending on the market behaviour we sometimes make profit and there are also days when we lose money. While certain amount of produce is stored like in any other trade—the allegation of hoarding of huge quantities is baseless. If production is lower,the prices are bound to increase.

As per state government estimates,there has been a 40 per cent drop in market arrivals between April and July at Lasalgaon. While in 2012,the four months saw arrival of 12,58,995 quintals,in 2013,the same period saw just 7,51,833 quintals.

Unlike other agriculture markets which open very early in the morning—almost at the break of dawn—Lasalgaon traders such as Darade start their day late. The market here opens at 9 am.

“In the onion trade you have to be very careful about the quality of the produce. During day time you can inspect the produce thoroughly,” says Darade,who gets up at 7 am and has a quick bite and tea before he reaches the market, 2 km away, by 8-8.30 am.

Before the market opens,Darade speaks to buyers in markets such as Delhi, Kolkata, Bhopal to confirm the demand. “Based on their demand,I go around the marketplace inspecting the produce and placing bets in auctions. The morning session ends at 12 pm. The market resumes again at 3 pm and closes at 6 pm. Remaining in contact with prospective buyers is most important part of the business,” he says.

They can only flourish if traders even far away associate their name with good quality, Darade underlines.

On any given day, he can be seen among the reddish-brown heaps Lasalgaon traders do not deal with produce in gunny bags inspecting the onions closely. We traditionally deal with loose onions. The grower has to empty his truck in front of us. It makes quality control easier,you can check the produce thoroughly and it reduces the chances of a farmer selling you spoiled onions hidden at the bottom of gunny bags, says the trader. No other onion be it from Karnataka, China or Pakistan can rival the Nashik varieties in taste, size and colour. But you have to make sure that you only supply best of the best to do good in the long run.

On an average,the Lasalgaon market receives 8,000-10,000 quintals of onion everyday. This is down to 5,500 to 6,000 quintals this season.

Darade has been in the business for 13 years,having inherited it from his father. “My father worked in another trader’s shop for decades as an employee. Later he set up his own shop in the APMC. I studied in a local college till Class XII and then dropped out to help him in the business. For the past five-six years,I have taken over entirely,” says the father of a two-year-old daughter.

There is another reason the accusations of hoarding large quantities don’t hold water,Darade says. During periods of supply shortage,the marketing board vigilance is so strict that it is impossible to hoard big amounts illegally. “This year several traders had stored onions,which were bought from farmers in April-May during the harvest glut, at Rs 1,000 per quintal. However,when the prices started climbing up in July and reached Rs 1,500 per quintal,most of the stored produce was sold off at a profit of Rs 500 per quintal. We had not imagined that the prices would go as high as Rs 4,500. At present,we are buying and selling onions at a margin of Rs 50 to 100 per quintal. The APMC administration checks the total buying,total selling and storage on a daily basis and sends a report to Mumbai,” he says.

Storing also comes with its own costs as well as the ever-present risk of prices falling. “You have to pay the rent of godowns and there is a 15-20 per cent weight loss of produce due to evaporation. There have been years when we had to sell a produce which was bought at

Rs 1,000 per quintal at Rs 800. You can’t store the produce longer,for onions get spoiled, Darade says. Even if you take utmost care and make sure that not a single onion rots, you lose 20 per cent of produce weight to evapo-transpiration in a couple of months. There’s no way you can escape it in the hot weather.

Giving a more recent example, he points to a pile of onions lying in his shed. “I bought two truckloads of this (400 quintals) on August 14 at a price of Rs 4,500 per quintal. The next day was Independence Day and by the morning of August 16,when the market reopened,the prices had collapsed by Rs 1,000 per quintal to Rs 3,500 due to news of banning of exports and imports from China and Pakistan. In the past few days,the prices have further come down and now I will have to sell this produce at a net loss of about Rs 1,000 to 1,200 per quintal. Such is this business,” he says.

After getting home from work,Darade likes to spend some time with family,which mostly involves business discussions with father and taking strategic decisions on investment. “Before going to sleep I spend some time with my daughter and watch TV. I like comedy shows and Hindi films,” he says.

The tears shed over onion daily on news channels don’t escape his attention, but Darade is not disheartened. Irrespective of the highs and lows,I will stick to onions because it is the business of onion which has not only sustained my family but the entire region for decades,” he says.

As the government ponders a ban on all animals in circus, Nittya’s mahouts and ringmasters talk about how loved she is and say releasing her means certain death in the wild

ATIKH RASHID

mong the four elephants with Rambo Circus, Nittya, 22, is the naughtiest. She is also the youngest and,according to the nine mahouts who look after the elephant herd,takes up almost all of their time. The two ringmasters have to struggle to groom her for the performance and then use all their persuasive powers to get her to leave the elephant house for the performance tent.

However,once in the ring,Nittya is a different being. She even renders the ringmaster almost useless as she nonchalantly grabs hold of a cricket bat with her trunk and smashes every delivery —a volleyball bowled by a diminutive clown—over the boundary line (here the tent wall).

Her audience bowled over, she exits a couple of overs later, her bat raised in a salute and with an equally careless saunter. A certain Mahendra Singh Dhoni comes to the mind.

Even if that comparison is an exaggeration by her doting mahouts,they are sure of one thing: the proposal to ban all animals from circus,like done with wild animals earlier,makes no sense.

” can’t understand why people talk about sending them back to the forest. Will it be such an easy life? Itni seva,itna pyar,khana-peena… discipline se rakhte hain inko yahan. Jungle mein kya milega (We keep them with such care,love,good food and discipline. What will they get in the jungle)?” says Jalauddin Shaikh,34,one of the ringmasters.

One of India’s biggest circuses,Rambo has four elephants,six horses,12 dogs and five parrots. The Animal Welfare Board of India recently proposed to the Environment Ministry that all animals be banned from circuses following an investigation authorised by it on their living conditions. While wild animals like tigers and lions were banned from circuses more than a decade ago,others like elephants,horses,camels and dogs are still being used.

The report specifically talked about “physical and psychological abuse of elephants.

Rambo Circus owner Sujit Dilip opposes such a ban,saying,The motto of the organisations pressing for the ban, it seems, is to shut down the circuses.

He claims that after the government banned the use of tigers and lions in circuses,authorities packed off wild animals to zoos,where they died. “We at Rambo Circus had 14 lions and two tigers. The authorities took them away and lodged them in Tirupati Zoo. Ideally,they should have released them into the jungle. All of them died in a short span. If this is not cruelty,then I don’t know how it is defined.”

All the elephants at Rambo— including Nittya, Saraswati, Champa and Anaar, all female, share one shed. The mahouts agree that one reason Nittya is the most cheerful is that she gets to stay with her mother,the 49-year-old Anaar.

“Nittya was born to Anaar when she was with another circus. When Dilip babu bought Anaar in 1994,he also bought Nittya,” says Bachcha Miyan, who heads the team of mahouts.

Last week, Rambo Circus was in Hubli in Karnataka for a 20-day tour. “Due to a last-minute glitch,we couldn’t get a proper playground and had to set up tents in an abandoned black soil plot,” says Raju,the circus manager,trying to manage that day’s shows on ground left slippery by rain.

A usual day begins at 6 am for the elephants. “We offer them fodder and then one by one they are taken for their morning stroll. Each has to walk 500 to 600 metres. Then they are brought back and washed. During summers and winters we wash them everyday and in the rainy season on alternate days. They are then offered fodder and other supplementary food,and later allowed to rest,” says Bachcha Miyan.

At this time a veterinarian comes for a health inspection. “It’s the Environment and Forest Ministry’s order that a local vet should inspect the animals . Only after the vet declares them fit can they be taken to the ring,” says Dr Prasad Durappanavar, the veterinary officer, Hubli, as he records Nittya’s temperature.

By now it’s noon and time for the jumbos to be groomed for the first show at 1 pm. “At present we have three acts involving elephants, says Raju. “Anaar used to do a few numbers earlier. But due to her age, she goes in the ring only occasionally,” adds Shaikh.

“Nittya is adorned with shawls. When she enters the ring wielding a cricket bat,the kids scream “Haathi aaya re aaya (Elephant has come)” says Shaikh.

Bachcha Miyan says they start training the elephants by the age of 5-7,admitting they use the reward and punishment method. If the animal does good,she is fed sweets and patted. If she disobeys,she gets a light beating with a stick. In a few months,the animal becomes fluent with the acts,” he adds. Apart from batting,Nittya can perform puja of a Shivalingam.

After the act,she returns to her tent and is chained by one of her feet next to Anaar. They cuddle up,wrapping their trunks around each other. Anaar occasionally plants what appear like kisses on Nittya’s head.

“Nittya never lets her go away. They can’t speak but they manage to express their love for each other. Only animals can have such selfless love. We human can’t,can we?” says Bachcha Miyan. Anwar Miyan, another ringmaster, adds, “Since the day I joined,I see them together. If Anaar is taken away or passes away,it will be very difficult to handle Nittya.”

However,the breaks are short. Nittya has to return to the ring twice again,for the 4 pm and the 7 pm shows. By 8.30 pm,Nittya’s act in the last show is over.

Contrary to the picture that Rambo Circus owner and mahouts paint of Nittya’s day, animal rights activists say a life in the jungle is far better than such a confined and controlled existence.

“The way animals are trained is the height of cruelty. You can’t train an elephant without torturing her. The harassment goes on for months before the animals start to obey only to escape the sufferings,” says Ahmednagar-based Anil Kataria.