Look, It’s an Orphan Soul Hanging like a Dead Crow on the Tree…!

EVERY TIME I visit a super market or a mall to buy something, I come away with a sense of guilt because invariably I am holding a plastic carry bag like a dead rabbit.

I say dead rabbit because a rabbit is one of the cutest little animals I have ever seen in my life. I still remember the little white rabbit we used to have at home as a pet, and when I came to know people would eat it as a delicious dish I was aghast. But I think my revulsion was quite out of place because people must eat to keep themselves alive and there is a saying in our language that the sin you incur in killing is washed away in eating. So there is a natural and symbiotic relationship between the hunter and the hunted; the prey and the predator. It is the natural order.

But why describe this ubiquitous plastic carry bag as a dead rabbit? Because like a dead rabbit's rotting carcass, these plastic carry bags keep proliferating, clogging our sewage systems and endangering the ecology of our planet. Go the remotest parts of Pacific Ocean’s islands or the most inaccessible parts of Amazon’s evergreen forests, and you are sure to come across abandoned water bottles or plastic food carriages.

Even the dead are not free from this plastic menace. Some time ago I went to the ancient temple in Thirunelli, on a steep hill in Nilgiri Biosphere, off Mananthavady in Wynad, where people conduct the final rites for the dead and gone. The Hindu belief is that once you carry out these rites, the soul comes to its final resting place, or kaivalyam; it would not wander in purgatory. So when someone is dead, his or her bones are collected from the ashes and then kept in an earthen pot to be carried off to Thirunelli(or any other sacred place) for immersion in sacred waters in the steam there. This river is called Papanasini, or the destroyer of all sins, a beautiful imagery of a person’s soul being washed clean of all her worldly sins for her final journey to the Almighty’s presence.

So I was there in Thirunelli to do the final rites for a close relative who had died. We had taken the ashes in an earthen-ware to be broken for immersion in the waters.

As I reached the ghat for the rites I was aghast that times have changed and even ancient customs have changed. Many had brought the ashes in plastic containers which were of course very convenient and they had the added advantage that they would not break, and the ashes and bones accidentally spilled out. But what was heart-breaking was that people instead of breaking earthen pots, were shedding out the bones and ashes into the water and then to ensure that all the remains did get immersed, simply throwing the plastic containers into the stream.

Papanasini is a small stream in the hills where wild animals roam about for food and water. I saw these containers in muddied pools of water everywhere in summer and they were seen even on the branches of huge trees downstream as when monsoon comes and water levels rise, they float about wildly. The poor ancestor’s soul, trapped in a plastic container, then hangs on the branches of a tree like an orphaned bat!

But local people told me they do much more harm than that. These containers often carry bits of food and other articles and foraging animals devour them, causing death. They said even elephants had been killed that way. A fine example of a soul on a murderous spree on its march to the heavens… Good heavens!

That is why I feel guilty every time I purchase something in a plastic container. But often one has no option. But today I was thrilled as I was offered a new, beautifully designed paper-and-yarn carry bag at a super-market, which weighed only a gram or two and looks elegant. The girl in the shop apologetically told me it would cost me one rupee extra. I said I am glad to pay that because I do not want my ancestors hanging on a tree like a dead crow with their souls trapped in a plastic bag.

(A version of this article is published at www.globalcomment.com, from London, Dec. 2008.)

Vanishing Hillocks in Kerala: An Ecological Disaster in the Making

SMALL AND medium-sized hillocks are a common sight in the midlands of Kerala. They are beautiful, giving a curvaceous shape to entire landscape, with plenty of vegetation, most of them covered with all kinds of plants and trees and providing rich grazing areas for cattle. Ecologically they are critical to the region, as they are the main repositories of water resources keeping the millions of wells well furnished, providing drinking water to the people.

Sadly, this is undergoing a fast transformation today. The growing commercialization of land, expanding urbanization and the consequent hectic activity of a booming construction industry has put a death knell for the hillocks. In the past ten to fifteen years, a substantial part of the hillocks in Kerala's countryside have been demolished and carried away for filling low-lying lands for the construction industry, say recent studies which highlight the threats posed by the massive excavation activity now on in various parts of the State. Recent micro-level studies conducted by the Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad (KSSP), a people's science movement with widespread network in the State, point to the alarming fact that since 1987, more than 50 per cent of the hillocks in the various panchayats and municipal towns that came under their survey, had been subjected to heavy excavation and removal of earth; among them 10 to 15 per cent had suffered extreme levels of losses, if not complete eradication.

The destruction of hillocks can have very serious and long-standing repercussions for the state's drinking water availability, says Dr A Achuthan, an eminent hydrologist and conservationist who was one of the pioneers of the Sastra Sahitya Parishad movement. He said in the next decade, the most important ecological problem the people of the State likely to face is the drinking water scarcity as the State's traditional water sources are now being upset and no new sources are identified. Already in recent years, every summer the scarcity of water in local wells has become such an acutely felt phenomenon in most parts and the gram panchayat, corporation and municipal authorities are hard-pressed to supply drinking water in container lorries in those places, he pointed out.

the problems of water scarcity now being experienced in most parts of the State, the demolition of hillocks and the filling up of low-lying lands, paddy fields and water-bodies are interconnected. The alarming nature of this problem has been recognized by the authorities and has led to adoption of harsh measures like the recent legislation like the Kerala Conservation of Paddy fields and Wetlands Bill, 2007 passed by the State Assembly in July 2008. The Bill seeks to protect the remaining paddy fields for cultivation of rice and other food articles, as according to the State Planning Board, in the period from 1980 to 2007, the State has lost as much as 500,000 hectares of wetland and paddy fields for construction and other commercial activities including conversion of lands for cash crops like rubber.

Much of the low-lying lands and water-bodies were filled up with earth made available from the demolished hillocks that were excavated making use of JCBs, the ubiquitous excavator that is seen in every village today. Village roads are full of earth-mover vehicles which cause frequent road accidents because of their reckless speed to avoid authorities. In a recent accident in Malappuram, an excavator itself was crushed under the crashing earth from above, killing two people instantly. (See picture.) Such accidents are now quite common and go without much comments in local newspapers.

The seriousness of the situation has not been formally assessed by any official agencies though the non-governmental sector has done some studies to highlight the risk. The Kerala Sastra Sahitya Parishad conducted its survey during May-June 2006, focusing on the changing land use patterns and the impact of these changes on environment and people's lives, selecting a number of panchayats and municipal towns in all parts of the State. Though the survey was of a preliminary nature, its findings point to the massive tendency to fill up water-bodies and for demolishing hillocks which are known as the major sources of water storage, say its activists who were involved in the study.

C M Muralidharan, secretary of the KSSP during the period of the survey, said that it was conducted mainly with a view to identifying the land use patterns in Kerala in order to finalize a strategy for campaign on these issues. He said after the preliminary results were compiled, the organization had plans to go for a multi-disciplinary study involving government agencies like the Centre for Earth Science Studies (CESS), Centre for Water Resources Development and Management (CWRDM), Kerala Land-use Board, etc, to assess scientifically how the changing patterns were going to impact the society in the long term. However, no such comprehensive study had been undertaken later even though the past few years have seen an intensification of the process.

The KSSP had conducted the survey in as many as eight districts out of the total 14 in the State and the district-wise data show that in comparison with the southern parts of the State, the north had witnessed a heavier assault on its land resources though the commercialization and industrialization has been much faster in the south. In fact the two districts which had witnessed the severest attacks were Kannur and Malappuram, both in the north. In Kannur, the survey had examined 33 gram panchayats and two municipal areas which had as many as 196 paddy fields and 163 hillocks. Of these paddy fields, 146 -- a whopping 81.6 per cent -- had already been filled up for either planting cash crops or commercial activities, building houses, etc. The study had included areas with a minimum of ten metres in height and 1390 hectares as base in the category of hillocks. Of the 163 such hillocks identified in the study, as many as 57.67 per cent (94) had been affected by excavation at various levels of progress. According to the study, 68 hillocks had lost as much as 25 per cent of the total area, while another 12 had been in the region of 25 to 50 per cent loss and 14 of them had lost more than 50 per cent.

P V Divakaran, a KSSP activist who was involved in the study, said that they had noticed 73 hillocks in the areas during the survey, without any damage. But since then, at least some of them had faced threat, he said. He said the eastern hill regions had experienced severe ecological damage because of the excavation of hills as proved by the fact that traditionally water rich areas like Iritty are facing water shortage these days. In this region, another ecological development causing concern is the frequent land slips that have destroyed property and lives. The instability created in the hills' landscape because of uncontrolled excavation has contributed to land slips, say local people. In a small village called Thillankkeri, which had six hillocks, all of them have been demolished giving the once leafy village a barren look.

Dr Achuthan, who had done extensive studies on the soil and water conversation patterns in the State, said the loss of hillocks in the north could prove to be a very serious hindrance for water safety in these regions as the laterite rich hillocks were the most important storage of water here. In fact, the rivers are fewer and far between in this region and even when they are full after rains, they take less than 48 hours to empty much of it into the sea. In Kasargode and parts of Kannur, a tradtional way to sourcing water is known as surangam, which is a unique way of collecting water dripping from the interiors of rocks and other laterite formations.

Compared to the north where the survey found loss of hillocks to the order of around 58 per cent, the actual loss in the south was much less, around 34 per cent, said K M Elias, convener of the environment sub-committee of the KSSP. They had surveyed 147 hills in Ernakulam district, one of the most industrialized areas in the State, and found that around 50 of them had been subjected to excavation, suffering moderate to heavy losses. Of them, 35 had suffered losses up to 25 percent; four had been in the region of 25 to 50 per cent damage; and 11 had been heavily damaged. However, majority of the hillocks, as many as 97, had not been as yet touched by the excavation lobby.

He said the situation was most likely to have changed since then, as new development projects in the area like the Vallarpadom Container Terminal, the Smart City project, etc, were now on full stream making construction booming. In fact as Dr Achuthan pointed out, recent data released by World Watch Institute point out that while the construction industry grows at five per cent globally and at nine per cent in India, it grows at 15 per cent in Kerala. Still one of the interesting facts borne out of the survey is the higher level of demolition of precious natural resources in the north. The reasons seem to be the comparative lack of public resistance and environment activism in the region, coupled with a higher level of poverty in villages, as most land owners have no option but to lease out their lands for construction purposes because of poor farm earnings. In fact, most of the farmer suicides were reported form the northern districts in Kerala in recent years compared to the southern parts.

The government action of preventing paddy field conversion with the recent bill providing for strict punitive provisions including jail term and hefty penalties as fine has been welcomed by a section of environmentalists, but many feel it could only aggravate the problems faced by farmers and land owners who are in distress. As the statistics on the damage to hillocks itself seem to suggest, the real issue behind this ecological disaster is not a lack of concern for environment, but the pressing problems of poverty and destitution.

(A version of this article is published at www.infochangeindia.org October 2008.)

A River Returns to Life: The Story of Chaliyar

Walking on the banks of the river Chaliyar is a pleasant experience these days. The river that takes its life in the Western Ghats and meanders through the interior and backward villages lying between the districts of Kozhikode and Malappuram in north Kerala, is today full, its clean water a source of life for dozens of panchayats and the city of Kozhikode. On normal days one can see scores of fishermen in small canoes on the river, looking for a good catch.

As tourism industry is booming in Kerala, the banks of the river are now turning into a tourist spot in Malabar with resorts and pleasure boating yards coming up, giving a new lease of life and income to the people in these villages.

It is a wonderful transformation, because a few years ago Chaliyar was a stinking pool of dirty and blackish water highly polluted with chemical effluents and hazardous material like mercury that took the lives of hundreds of people in the villages around it. Often, large groups of fish could be seen floating upside down, as the effluents discharged into the water was practically exterminating the fish population in the river. Chaliyar turned poisonous as a highly polluting industrial unit, the Gwalior Rayons (Grasim Industries) was set up in on its banks at Mavoor, early in the sixties. When the factory started its production in 1963, there was no awareness about the harmful effects of industrial pollution. The industrialists freely polluted the environment leaving the poor people around with no ways to stop them as there was neither legislation nor any effective mechanism to stop industrial pollution.

Thus when the factory started its work, the people in villages like Mavoor, Vazhakkad, Vazhayoor and Areekkode, on both sides of the river, were at the receiving end. Those who visited Mavoor and other places in those days inhaled a highly noxious air, and the thick dark clouds hovering above the skyline was a regular feature burning one’s eyes and congesting the lungs.

Within one year of the operation of the factory, the villagers started protesting though it was yet to take an organized form. In the early sixties an action committee was formed with people like K Chathunni Master, a senior Communist leader, E K K Muhammed, a Muslim League leader, and others in it representing to the Government to take measures to control the air and water pollution in Mavoor. But instead of taking measures to control the factory’s pollution, the Government allowed the management to start a new division in 1972 that intensified pollution and the public agitation. It was in this phase that local people like K A Rahman, who later succumbed to cancer after almost three decades of relentless struggle against pollution, took over the leadership. As the agitation took a more aggressive turn, the Government started negotiations which led to a temporary settlement in 1974. As part of this agreement, it was decided to measure water and air pollution levels regularly for taking stricter action to control discharge of effluents into the river and air. As a result of this agreement, known as Ramanilayam Pact, the Kerala State Pollution Control Board was set up in 1974, one of the first such bodies to come up in the country.

But pollution did not stop and the public agitation became quite aggressive and even threatened to take a violent form. In December 1998 around 8000 villagers marched to the factory gates demanding its immediate closure. They also pulled down a bund that was built in the river at Elamarom, to enable the factory to take unpolluted water upstream for its use.

By the time, the environment movement had become strong in the country and there were stricter laws against polluters. Activists from all parts of the country like writer Arundati Roy came to Mavoor to join hands in the struggle of the local people. At the same time, the technology used in the factory had become obsolete and there was pressure from all parts on the Government and the management to take urgent steps: Either upgrade the technology that would ensure zero pollution level, or close down.

There was a hectic pace for the debates and discussions within the public at large and within the Government itself about the future of the Gwalior Rayons factory, owned by the Birlas, at Mavoor in the late nineties. All over the world a strong environmental movement had become very powerful and within the country the hapless villagers at the receiving end of pollution were being supported by powerful groups of concerned intellectuals and academics who had amassed a wealth of information and scientific data to prove the harmful effects of industrial pollution. From the seventies, the villagers and gram panchayats like Mavoor, Vazhakkad and others were raising complaints about rising incidence of ailments like lung diseases, cancer, etc, which had been abnormally high in these villages. According to the figures available with the Vazhakkad gram panchayat, which suffered the maximum pain because of the river pollution, there were 10 cases of cancer deaths in the village in 1993 which rose to 32 by 1998. Even the most important leader of the environmental movement, K A Rahman, a Vazhakkad peasant who had to sell out most of his properties for conducting court cases against the factory management and for frenetic public activities, was suffering from acute cancer to which he succumbed very soon. A survey conducted by the same panchayat in 1998 had found that during the period from 1993 to 1998, there were as many as 245 cancer patients in the village, undergoing treatment at the Kozhikode Medical College.

The going was getting tough for the management and finally in 2000 they chose to wind up shop and shift their operations elsewhere as they had set up more modern factories in places like Madhya Pradesh. Thus came to a successful end to the relentless struggles of the masses for almost four decades, who suffered immensely in those years.

Now, life is back in the river and in its environs. The fish life is once again plenty, and the traditional activities like fishing, collection of items like clams, etc, is thriving. The doctors in villages like Mavoor and Vazhakkad say that there is a drastic decline in chronic ailments that once haunted these villages.

The Plunder of Kerala's Rivers

A warm welcome to Vasco da Gama on his arrival to Malabar coast: But did he deserve it?

Travels in the Vasco da Dama Country: Part One

By N P Chekkutty

THE FIRST wave of globalisation started some time in the 15th century when the Portuguese sailor-adventurer Vasco da Gama landed in a small village on the Malabar coast near the port city of Calicut, thus opening the sea route between Europe and Asia. The 500 years since have seen immense changes, but people joke that if da Gama happened to come back again, he would not lose his way in the city he once walked.
Overall, though, the state has seen many changes. Kerala has recorded a growth rate equal to the national GDP growth, though in the past two decades it has slowed down, showing even negative growth at times. The economic growth came despite the fact that Kerala has no special economic zones, no Nandigrams or Singurs.
Economists used to call Kerala a ‘money order economy’ because for decades it depended on money sent back by Keralites who flocked to the Gulf countries to work. These remittances still come in, but the Gulf is no longer the El Dorado for the youth. Travelling in the footsteps of the bearded sailor from Portugal, I found that there is much happening in Kerala’s society and economy these days, not all of it positive.
Kappad, where da Gama landed with his armada of ships and guns on a fine morning in1498, is a small village 30 km from the city of Kozhikode (formerly Calicut), which looks as if it has not changed much from his days. Old-fashioned thatched houses with sliding roofs are given a modern touch by the ubiquitous television antennae jutting out, tea-shops do brisk business, and a reminder of the past still adheres in a small pillar inscribed ‘This is where Vasco da Gama landed in 1498’, a fragile memorial for the powerful pirate who inaugurated a long period of colonial tyranny and occupation.
Tales of Portuguese cruelty are still told, and resurgent Islamic forces have re-published the Tuhfathul Mujahedeen by Sheikh Zainudheen of Ponnani, who called upon his people to resist the invaders. A few years ago, on the 500th anniversary of the white man’s first voyage to these shores, I saw a group of young men marching to the beach, standing in front of the granite pillar, shouting slogans and then ceremonially spitting on it…
The train from Mangalore crosses over 40 rivers to reach the capital city of Thiruvananthapuram. Most of these rivers start from the rich bio-depository of the Western Ghats that extend from north to south encompassing such immensely valuable bio-reserves as the Silent Valley National Park. Rivers are a source of life and their banks are the sites of human settlements the world over. Most ancient temples are built on the banks of rivers. There were 64 original Brahmin settlements in Kerala, almost all of them on the banks of rivers.
In modern-day Kerala, rivers are once again centrestage, the focus of huge public agitations over livelihood issues. The protest movements are now focused on the issues of pollution of water-bodies and the alienation of lands and water-sources from original users like fisherfolk and farmers. Rivers are fast becoming commercial property. In the north, the Chaliyar River saw a three-decade-long agitation against a highly polluting industrial unit, Gwalior Rayons (Grasim). Now the factory is closed and life seems to have returned to the river.
“Yes, Chaliyar is now a river reborn,” says Elamarom Nazirudheen, who was convener of the action committee that spearheaded the public agitation in the villages in the Chaliyar basin.
The Chaliyar River that courses through Kozhikode and Malappuram districts used to nurture a large number of peasant villages. When the factory started operations in 1963, air and water became polluted, and the people of the affected panchayats like Vazhakkad, Vazhayoor, Areekkode and Mavoor, protested. It was the first public agitation against air and water pollution in Kerala and it led to an agreement between the people and the factory management in 1974 known as the Rama Nilayam pact, as it was brokered in the government guesthouse bearing that name.
It was as part of this agreement that the Kerala State Pollution Control Board was set up in 1974 to monitor air and water pollution. But the government and the company management reneged on the terms of the agreement, and the agitation took an aggressive turn with K A Rahman, a peasant from Vazhakkad, taking up the leadership. He once barged into the factory offices with dynamite strapped to his stomach, say the villagers who remember the heroic fight. The high point of the agitation was in December 1998 when around 7,000 villagers marched to the factory gates demanding its immediate closure.
However, by then, things had changed. Grasim’s technology had become obsolete and its pollution had started attracting severe criticism all over the country. Raw material had become scarce and the public extremely agitated, and the factory finally closed down in early-2000.
“There is tremendous improvement in the quality of air and water now and diseases such as cancer and lung problems that were rampant in those days have come down,” says a health worker in the small town of Mavoor. He pointed out that a survey conducted by Vazhakkad panchayat had found that during 1993-98 as many as 215 cancer cases had been reported only from panchayat.
Chaliyar is a success story of a people’s environmental movement in the state -- perhaps the only one. For the fight against river pollution in this land of rivers continues in other parts of the state.
At Kuttippuram, as the train crosses Bharatapuzha, the legendary Nila River that nursed generations of poets and writers comes into view. The river is full during the monsoon months but in summer it is a vast stretch of sandbanks. Sand is a highly sought after material for the booming construction industry and the sandbanks are being incessantly and mindlessly excavated. Local people say that a load of sand fetches around Rs 3,500 and there is huge demand for the material.
Vast stretches of paddy fields around Bharathapuzha, mainly in Palakkad district, once the granary of the state, have been converted into construction sites with dozens of designer villas coming up, scooped up primarily by rich non-resident Indians (NRIs) who buy them as an investment and as vacation homes. Meanwhile, rice cultivation has been declining and the latest report from the Department of Economics and Statistics, released in January 2007, says that over the past 44 years the decline in rice production has been an alarming 63%.
In 2005-06, the total area under paddy stood at 2.76 lakh hectares as against 7.53 lakh hectares in 1961-62, the report noted. Production, too, declined from 13.39 lakh tonnes in 1981-82 to 6.3 lakh tonnes in 2005-06. That means a drop of over 50% in a period of 24 years while consumption has been registering a huge increase, now standing at 30 lakh tonnes a year.
Despite this, the conversion of paddy fields continues and construction booms. Lorries move about on the river bed and the river resembles an industrial site. Farmers complain about the drop in sub-surface water levels as sand is removed. As cultivation becomes unviable, they sell off their holdings to real estate groups. In the Bharathapuzha basin region, the river protection committee is agitating for preservation of the sacred river, but the decimation of the river through incessant sand removal continues unabated.
In Alwaye, it is another river and another environmental disaster. The lifeline of central Kerala, the river Periyar is highly polluted with over 250 chemical units working in the Eloor-Edayar industrial belt on both sides of the river. “The situation is grim as a large number of families in the Eloor-Kadungallur area are denied even drinking water,” says Purushan Eloor who leads the action committee against pollution of the Periyar River.
C R Neelakantan, environmental activist and chairman of the Committee to Protect Periyar, said the heavy influx of hazardous material into the river should be stopped; a health survey should be conducted and those with serious ailments must be given medical aid, and facilities for providing clean drinking water should be made available. He pointed out that in many places local panchayats are distributing drinking water as wells and other sources are fatally contaminated.
The grim story has been in the making for a long time. As hazardous industrial units proliferated on the banks of the river, the Pollution Control Board took little action to stop them from polluting the river. In fact, a recent proposal to impose collective fines on polluting industrial units suggested by a Supreme Court appointed committee has been kept in cold storage as industrialists put pressure on the authorities to ignore it.
In July 2005, the Supreme Court’s Monitoring Committee on Hazardous Wastes (SCMC) visited the area and in its report said: ‘The Periyar is an ecological disaster in the making.’
But most of the rivers here are ecological disasters, some of them because of uncontrolled industrial activity, others because of uncontrolled human activity. The river Pamba that nurtures the Sabarimala region, is choking to death: in the pilgrim season, millions of devotees visit the temple deep in the forest and the river has to absorb the huge accumulated wastes they generate.
“This is not only an ecological problem for the river; soon we will face a health disaster too,” said a member of the Pamba Action Committee which has been agitating against the indiscriminate use of the river as a scavenger, and the lack of effort to check the increasing number of people visiting every season. The water is highly polluted with e-coli and other bacteria that could easily trigger an epidemic. Dr B Ekbal, the well-known health activist, said that unless action is taken to control the number of people, the present facilities in Pamba will fail very soon and the consequences would be disastrous.
Ironically, in this land of rivers, bottled water is now big business. Packaged water started flooding the market only a few years ago, but today sales have overtaken even those of soft drinks, say traders’ organisations. Water has become a commercial property because, as recent studies have repeatedly proved, drinking water resources are fast dwindling in the state.
Most sources are polluted including the sub-surface water aquifers, say experts at the Centre for Water Resources Development & Management (CWRDM), at Kozhikode, which conducted a series of studies on the water situation in Kerala. They also found that sub-surface water resources are receding, posing a serious threat to water safety in this rain-lashed region. A recent study conducted by Malayala Manorama on the safety of drinking water, taking samples from all parts of the state, found that few safe water resources are left. More than 90% of samples they examined had shown excessive presence of contaminants like e-coli.
Commercial activity may bring prosperity to the state but it seems to be doing so at the cost of the environment and the health and livelihood of ordinary people. This is, surely, an unacceptable paradigm of development and least expected in a state ruled by communist parties for much of its modern history.

(This is the first of a three-part series on contemporary Kerala.)

Courtesy:www.infochangeindia.org, January, 2008.