Experiencing Adversity, Fighting Adversity and Living in Adversity... The Big Question???

This is about a small fishermen settlement of about 35 families located on the outskirts of Kandla in Kutch district of Gujarat. The place is Paarth.

                                                                 Paarth Settlement

I happened to visit this settlement as a part of my IRMA fieldwork study with Kutch Navnirman Abhiyaan. The study involved analysing the effects of industrialization in the coastal villages of Kutch, Gujarat. During the visit to this area, the car could be taken only upto a point, and after that, we had to walk some 300 meters in marshy sand to reach this settlement.

This isolated settlement of fishermen welcomed us as if we were their saviours. Most of the eyes were filled with anger of government apathy, despair, helplessness, worry and fear.  There was also a small tinge of optimism and unwavering hope of an end to their woes; and to have a decent life. The fishermen of this settlement are mostly residents from nearby Khariror village. These fishermen usually migrate to the village during non fishing season, and come back during season for their livelihood.

The residents of this Bandar (Fishermen settlement) claim it to be one of the oldest Bandar of the region. Some 150 years ago, this place was supposed to loose its existence due to some private vested interests. Their ancestors had filed a case in their defence and won it too. Nobody had then dared to harm them since then. This incident is proudly narrated to every visitor. But, after inhabiting place for such a long time, now, they are told to vacate this place owing to expansions and security at the Kandla port located closeby.

The settlement has no light, no road, no medical facilities, and no close by transport facilities. The fishermen are mostly “Pagadiyas”, These Fishermen generally catch fishes at shore, going bare feet in the waters. Some fishermen of this settlement also go for fishing on boats. They go for fishing deep inside creeks and come back only after 2-3 days. The main catch of these fishermen includes small fishes, crabs and prawns.Fishing is their only livelihood. The day they get a good fish catch, they have a meal; otherwise, they go to rest on empty stomach. They are not taught nor given any opportunity for learning alternate livelihood condemning them to this difficult life. They carry out fishing since their childhood, and believe, it is the only thing that they are good at, only thing that they could do.

The fish catch has drastically gone down due to port activities and also of the dangerous effluents released from hundreds of industries dotting the shoreline. Also, salinity has drastically gone up due to hard water discharge from salt pans (Kutch produces 60% of India’s salt) and private & commercial utilization of fresh water that otherwise used to enter the sea.

This settlement virtually becomes an island during high tides, when tide water totally covers their high raised hutments. Apart from slightly raised wooden houses, they have almost nothing to protect themselves from the wrath of nature. They procure water from place some 3 kilometres away at variable exorbitant rates ranging from some 7 Rs per small drum upto Rs. 10 (In Oct’2009). A high prevalence of skin related diseases as well as deficiency diseases was also observed due to under nourished food consumption and living in unhygienic conditions.

Access to the settlement

Off the several disasters this place has witnessed, the last one  during the cyclone of 1999. A tragedy of all 9 people of family dying in cyclone still haunts their memories. The family of  all the deceased of this settlement were offered a meagre Rs. 5000 as compensation after cyclone, which was nowhere enough to fill the void of losing the bread earner.  

People here are extremely poor. Literacy rate is almost zero. The families are large, with peculiarly high female to male ratio. Males here learn fishing at early age, get married early, and have a short life expectancy. Their short life expectancy is mainly due to environment factors of their livelihood and addictions mainly in form of tobacco.Females are mostly involved in household and fishing related allied activities.

As if this was not enough, families here marry amongst themselves. This has led to weakening of their gene pool. Every one of ten live births is marred by physical or mental handicap. All the difficulties that I expressed could explain only a decimal of what people actually faced there. In one word, I could explain their condition as "INHUMAN"!

“If you think your life is difficult, Think again.” This is the only thing I can comment after seeing this strong community almost staying inside sea, and facing ecological, social, political, environmental, biological, legal, livelihood, food, shelter, education, health, and every obstacle one could think of. Inspite of all these obstacles, although destroyed many times; sticking to their tradition, culture, livelihood, value system and production system; this settlement still stands tall and strong. They display the spirit of human endurance, tolerance and a never say die attitude.

It is amusing and confusing how government although spending crores of rupees; even a fraction of it never reaches the people who need it. This is just one of the many places in India that is facing such conditions, such horrific conditions. The fact that this place lies in one of the most industrially advanced & rich states of India; gives us an idea of what others in other states are facing. Some other amusing things are that this place is stone throw distance from Kandla port where multi million dollar transactions take place everyday, and still this condition. It is also amusing that India is trying to conquer moon, become a super power, manages to do scams of over 1,70,000 crore rupees but  so many places in India still goes hungry. Another aspect which confuses me is their unwillingness to accept change, or to switch over to other livelihoods. Their unwavering spirit, never say die attitude and endurance to live such a difficult life is a question in itself. It is a question to themselves, government, civil society, development organisations and to life itself!