Staying with Tasleem saheb’s family in Kubaul village of Kiratpur as part of Praxis’ internal immersion arrangements was memorable on many counts. One, it brought about a relaxed and rare opportunity of living in a rural household without being driven by any specific research agenda that many of my earlier visits to villages had been based on. Two, it offered a great opportunity to understand the daily struggles of life in a remote cluster of villages disadvantaged on account of its location between the Kosi and Kamla Balan rivers and the resulting proneness to periodic submergence. As it turned out, the visit provided a highly insightful account of lives trapped between embankments, devastated by floods, shaken by compulsions of distress migration and affected by acute exclusion from basic services.
A brief account of Tasleem Saheb’s family and the village would be useful at this point. Tasleem Saheb, now in his seventies, is a descendant of Hyder Ali, a traveler from Samastipur who settled in Kuvaul village along with his three sons – Saburi, Sardari and Darbari. He is the oldest surviving member in an extended family of more than sixty members and lives separately along with his wife in a thatched cottage located on the southern edge of Kuvaul village. The great-grandson of Hyder Ali, Tasleem saheb has three sons of his own, other than the children of his three deceased brothers, all of who live in Kuvaul constituting the largest extended family of the village. Most of the adult male members of the family are away working in cities like Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata, Varanasi and an attempt of tracing the genealogical descent of Hyder Ali’s lineage indicated that the phenomenon of distress migration started mainly after the flood of 1987.
As regards the village, it is situated to the west of the western embankment over Kosi, at a distance of about 6 km from Kiratpur block. Balaan, a tributary to the Kosi river is located to the east of the village and causes floods almost every year. The village is also affected by the waters of Gehuan stream located to its north. Reaching the village had its own elements of adventure, as we had to change buses at two places due to sudden breakdowns, had to traverse a dusty terrain of eight-odd kilometers on a jeep and then had to cover the last stretch of eighteen kilometers on a boat.
Many in the village remember the year of 1987 on account of devastations caused due to a breach in the Kosi embankment near Nauhatta. Till date, the village hasn’t fully recovered from the damages caused by the silt deposited on its agricultural land. For instance, the productivity of maize, one of the main crops of the village, has declined to only about 0.64 quintals (1.6 manns) per kattha (one kattha equals less than twentieth part of an acre), which is less than half of the total yield harvested before the floods of 1987. Farmers with large land holdings, e.g. Triveni Kumar Raman who owns over 80 acres of land in the village, are forced to either leave large parts of their land holdings fallow or contract sharecroppers to cultivate some parts of their land. According to Triveni, only about 6 acres of their land is currently under cultivation, which provides a good account of the reduced scale of agriculture practiced in the village since the floods of 1987. This is also attributed to the migration of a large number of agricultural labourers and farmers to faraway places in search of livelihood.
People migrate to a variety of places in search of livelihood. The trend set in after the flood of 1987, as indicated by the family members of Tasleem Saheb in a genealogy diagram facilitated by us. The prevalent agricultural wage rates in the area are as low as Rs. 25/-. The commonest destinations are the urban centres of Delhi, Mumbai, Kolkata and Varanasi. Of late, closure of several popular livelihood sites located in the cities has started forcing people to explore alternative options, and has triggered off a trend of reverse migration.
One of Mohd. Ramjani’s daughters passed away while delivering. Ramjani is the second son of Tasleem Saheb, our host. Deaths during childbirth are felt to be very common in the remote area suffering from an acute dearth of basic health care facilities. Though Kiratpur was accorded the status of a block about twenty years back, the administrative offices continue to operate from Ghanshyampur. Ramjani’s daughter-in law suffers from TB, and has to take care of her small children in the absence of her husband who has been away at Varanasi for many years. The area also suffers from a high level of incidence of diseases like Kala Azar, Malaria and Diarrhea. Establishment of Asha Kendra – a primary health care institution located in neighboring Tarvada village – is believed to have brought some relief to the inhabitants of the area. However, the villagers have to go all the way to the district headquarters at Darbhanga to seek cure for most major ailments.
During our stay in Mohd. Tasleem’s house, we were cared very well by members of his extended family, especially by his wife, daughter in law and the children. Our occasional attempts to offer assistance in their household chores helped in striking a good rapport with them. We threshed grains, washed dishes and did some shopping for the household. Tasleem Saheb’s wife, probably in her late fifties, would wake up very early in the morning and get occupied in various activities in the house and the kitchen. We would have visitors from morning till night, and invitations to visit different families. In the night, we would share magic tricks and ghost stories with the children of the house before going to bed. Anwarul - one of the children of the family who was about to be married, would be the target of many jokes and teasing remarks.
The day we left the village, we were seen off by a huge number of people, including Tasleem’s family members and his neighbours. We got invitations to attend Anwarul’s wedding, and invitations to visit the village whenever we happened to be in that area again. Unfortunately, we could not meet Mohd. Tasleem at the time of leaving the house, who had gone to Kusheshwar Asthan to discuss arrangements for Anwarul’s wedding with the latter’s prospective in-laws. He was expected to return the previous night itself, but could not undertake the long journey by foot due to extreme heat conditions. We said goodbye to our hosts, expressing hopes for the safe return of Tasleem Saheb, and made our way to the river.
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