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[Note from the Hindu Vivek Kendra:
This report will be conveniently ignored by those who go under the rubric
intellectuals in India, and the foreign media would like to believe that
it does not exist. Now, if such a report had been made relating to a BJP-ruled
state?]
This 64-page report, compiled by
Dr. Zafar ul Islam Khan, editor of the Delhi-based magazine Milli Gazette,
details the starvation deaths that have taken place in and around Jalangi
in Murshidabad district in Werst Benegal in recent months, which have received
but scant attention in the media. In the supposedly Marxist state of West
Bengal, the report says, grinding poverty is widespread, particularly among
the state's Muslims and Dalits, who account for more than half of West
Bengal's population and who are the principal victims of the near famine
conditions in the Jalangi area.
According to the report, near-starvation
conditions in Jalangi have been caused by the changing course of the river
Padma, which has destroyed farmlands, leading to numerous deaths and rendering
hundreds of people to destitution, forcing them to beg or else to migrate
outside the region in search of survival opportunities. Stark poverty has
reduced many people to surviving on roots and leaves, leading to widespread
disease and malnutrition. To make matters worse, apathetic local and state
administrations are allowing food supplies to rot in godowns while a majority
of the affected people are not even issued below-poverty-line ration cards.
Poverty eradication programmes are not being properly implemented and people
working under the Food For Work programme remain unpaid for long periods
despite funds having been released to the local authorities. People complain
that money is being deducted from the paltry wages that they are entitled
to under the poverty eradication programmes in order to fund local CPI
(M) party activities . It is also alleged that beneficiaries of these programmes
are selected on the basis of party affiliation. Besides these programmes,
the only alternative for many people in the area is casual work on private
farms, for which they are often paid a measly Rs.20 for a day's work (and
that in a state that has been ruled by an avowed Marxist government for
decades now!). To protest against the apathy of the West Bengal government
and to promote awareness about the issue, the compiler of this report,
Dr. Khan, has filed a Public Interest Litigation in the Supreme Court.
The report, priced at Rs. 50, may
be procured from
Dr. Khan, by writing to him on info@pharosmedia.com.
Proceeds from sale of the booklet will be donated to an NGO working among
the starvation victims in Murshidabad.
