Deputy Inspector General of Police Anil Palta said an assistant sub-inspector, two havildars and 11 jawans of the Special Task Force were killed in the blast this afternoon in Kanchkir village, about 50 km from Bokaro.

According to officials in the control room here, two vehicles with security personnel were returning from a patrol at around three pm when the extremists triggered the improvised explosive device hidden in a milk can in the Maoist -infested village. The second vehicle bore the brunt of the blast while the first one escaped.

The injured were admitted to a local hospital in Bokaro and the condition of two personnel was serious, officials said.

Shortly after the blast, a CRPF battalion reached the spot from Bokaro and cordoned off the heavily-mined jungle area to search for Naxal insurgents responsible for attack.

The Centre has rushed a bomb disposal squad of the elite National Security Guard to examine the site.

A CRPF spokesman in the national capital said an electric circuit, used for triggering the IED, had been found at the blast site.

In the eyes of the Indian state, 28-year-old Kharen Roy is a lucky man. But the government forgot to tell him that. Roy lives in Gudhiyarkuthi village in Jalpaiguri district in North Bengal. The village, well off National Highway 31, is reached by trudging through miles of fields and over kachcha tracks just wide enough for a single vehicle to pass through. But not many vehicles go to Gudhiyarkuthi, especially in late June. With the monsoon well underway in North Bengal, the tracks get waterlogged and are nearly impassable.

Kharen Roy, like many in his viilage Gudhiyarkuthi, is unemployed most of the year

When BW met Roy, he was sitting outside the village, trimming bamboo culms. He had stopped studying after Class VIII when his father died, and started taking up odd jobs - mostly seasonal agricultural work. Now he is unemployed for much of the year. "I earn Rs 500 a month when times are good," he says. "Otherwise, I earn nothing." He lives with his mother and younger brother, both of whom he supports (two elder brothers live elsewhere). Many of the boys he studied with have moved to cities like Kolkata, Mumbai and Delhi to look for work.

Jalpaiguri occupies a special place in India. Out of 580 districts, it receives the largest amount of money under the government's biggest anti-poverty programme - the Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojna (SGRY). In poor rural areas, where there is no work, villagers can work on public works projects (building a road or a school) and get paid for it, partly in cash and partly in rice or wheat. And using the labour of people who need the money and the food, the government constructs schools, roads, culverts, bridges and other public assets. This year, in his recent Budget speech, finance minister P. Chidambaram has allotted Rs 4,590 crore to the programme. Jalpaiguri had received Rs 30.19 crore under the interim Budget announced in February this year. And Roy's gram panchayat, Gudhiyarkuthi, had received around Rs 23 lakh.

Because of its hallowed place in the government's anti-poverty programme, BW paid a visit to Jalpaiguri two weeks ago. Thousands of crores of rupees will be allocated in this budget to help Roy and millions like him. Many analysts see the recent election results as a rejection of the BJP government by the unemployed and poor, who see themselves as having been forgotten in the rush of reforms. Recently, prime minister Manmohan Singh, as part of his focus on such programmes, told state chief ministers that money for poverty programmes would go directly to the panchayats from the Centre. All this means that Jalpaiguri, and Gudhiyarkuthi, are sure to get even more money than they get now.

Does Roy know how lucky he will be?

"I haven't heard of it (the scheme)," he says flatly. "No one else in the village has, either."

There are around 2,000 people in the village, the majority of whom have been educated at the local school. In 1998, Gudhiyarkuthi was hit by a flash flood when the Jaldhaka river, which passes nearby, burst its banks. Since then, agricultural activity in the area has been devastated, as the fields have remained waterlogged and the funds for their restoration never adequate. Moreover, the whole district is sensitive strategically, being located near India's borders with Bangladesh and Bhutan. In 2002, the area was hit by violence as insurgents of the Kamatapur Liberation Organisation, supported by the ULFA, killed five communist party workers. But since then, the violence has abated.

A small crowd gathers around Roy as he speaks. Others pitch in with their observations. Though the government has built around 37 houses in the village under its rural housing scheme, none of the people there have heard of the SGRY programme. Someone in the crowd ticks off on his fingers the number of people who have found regular employment in the last five years... around 10. "Three or four have been employed as school teachers or policemen," says one. "In the last five years, the government has also given six of us cycle rickshaws to operate. Last year, after the panchayat election, one more person got a rickshaw." Most of the villagers work on their own small plots growing rice or vegetables. Most of their income is spent on other food.

"The problems are massive in the area but so far solutions have been only cosmetic," says a local official. "It does not even begin to address the losses sustained by the locals... (due to) the flood." During the rainy season, or just before it, unemployment in the area is at its peak.

THE Rs 30.19 crore that Jalpaiguri got this year amounts to just Rs 100 per man, woman and child in the area (not all of whom would need the money). So, at first glance, it would seem as if the money just isn't enough to tackle the scale of the problem. But last year, the district was allocated Rs 46 crore under the scheme - nearly one-and-a-half times as much. Yet the district used only 78 per cent of the money (Rs 37 crore) despite the serious problems in villages like Gudhiyarkuthi. The balance was returned unutilised to the government. So it seems that the problem is deeper than just a mere lack of funds.

How the SGRY works The Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojna, or SGRY, as it is known in policy-making circles, was born in 2001 with the merger of two other poverty alleviation (or food for work) programmes. Since then, its funds have grown steadily. The employment guarantee scheme announced by the UPA government in its Common Minimum Programme will undoubtedly be based heavily on SGRY, which is seen by many government officials as a relative success story compared with other government welfare schemes. The programme is intended to be 'self-targeting' - only the very poor are likely to turn up and avail of the benefits since the kind of work that is offered under the programme is menial in nature. How is the money under SGRY allocated among districts and states? According to SGRY guidelines, the cost of the programme is shared between the Centre and the states, with the Centre putting up three quarters of the cost and the states investing the rest. First, the Centre allocates money and foodgrains across states on the basis of the proportion of rural poor in the state to the total rural poor in the country. Then, each state distributes money and foodgrains among the districts. This is done directly according to the proportion of rural scheduled castes and tribes (SC/ST) population in that district to the total SC/ST population in the state and inversely according to the per capita production of agricultural workers in the district. Both criteria get equal weightage. According to these criteria, Uttar Pradesh, because it has higher numbers of rural poor than any other state, gets the most money (Rs 784 crore in 2004-05), followed by Bihar (Rs 465 crore). However, the districts that get the most money are in West Bengal - Jalpaiguri (Rs 30.19 crore) and Purulia (Rs 29.74 crore).

Aparna Roy is the village schoolteacher in Gudhiyarkuthi. She teaches the primary classes while her husband teaches the senior students. The villagers, with no help from the government, got together, pooled their resources and built a school (though the government pays her salary). "Till date we have received just one trunk, two blackboards and nothing else (from the government)," she says. "The government has made many promises but there has been no support. Conditions here are miserable. No facilities for the education of the children, no road construction and no employment."

We ask her if she knows about SGRY. "No. See for yourself. The government has done nothing," she says.

According to the SGRY guidelines prepared by the ministry of rural development, the list of projects that have to be implemented under the SGRY scheme in any panchayat have to be prepared after a gram sabha is held involving all villagers under that panchayat. "This is one of the most important rules of the scheme," says an official in the ministry in Delhi. "It's absolutely crucial to the working of the scheme that the villagers who are supposed to benefit are fully informed of the scheme and how it works. But in many cases, panchayats flout this rule."

Researchers and NGOs have repeatedly shown that in Jalpaiguri, as elsewhere in the country, one of the biggest reasons why money doesn't reach the people it's intended to benefit is that they simply don't know about it. "In many cases we found that the gram sabhas... were not held," says Anik Mukherjee of the Centre for Development and Human Rights, an NGO which has conducted studies for the rural development ministry on its anti-poverty schemes and their functioning. This is a problem in Jalpaiguri too. "Very few people used to come to the gram sabhas," says a district official.

In fact, panchayat officials are sometimes cagey about making even basic details of the scheme public. One of them flatly refused to disclose the SGRY allocation to his gram panchayat to BW.

Another official, however, told us about the details of the scheme and its implementation in Gudhiyarkuthi. Gudhiyarkuthi gram panchayat is situated some distance away from the actual village of the same name. Nine villages are covered by it. Officials say that last year, the money allotted to them was used to build three schools, rebuild flood-affected roads and renovate ponds. BW could ascertain that at least one school had been built.

Why has the district as a whole 'saved' money? Part of the reason is political. "The problem is that when funds are allotted, it's used by the local politicians to favour their cronies," says a local development official who has worked for years in the area around Gudhiyarkuthi. "If you look at the pattern of the spending, it tends to cluster around election time, favouring special interests rather than being spread evenly over the year. This means that at the end of the year, some of the funds tend to remain unused."

Another reason for Jalpaiguri not spending all of its allotted funds rests with bureaucratic inertia in extending the scheme to one major class of people who are supposed to benefit - the scheduled castes and tribes (SC/STs). One of the major criteria for distributing funds between districts within a state is the proportion of the rural SC/ST population within that district to the total SC/ST population in the state. Also, 22.5 per cent of the annual allocation under SGRY is reserved for SC/ST families.

Well over half the 3.4-million people who live in Jalpaiguri are SC/STs (in the 1991 census, it was nearly 60 per cent) - the main reason why Jalpaiguri gets so much money. Over half that SC/ST population live on nearly 150 tea plantations. However, till recently, government regulations did not allow welfare schemes to cover those living on tea plantations; workers on those plantations are supposed to be helped by the owners. So a large chunk of the SC/ST population in the district could not even benefit from SGRY, even though the major portion of the money was supposed to be spent on them. "The conditions of the workers in the tea plantations is terrible," says the official. "Many of them are desperately poor and with the failure of many of the tea plantations in the area, it's become worse."

A study of tea plantations in Jalpaiguri district conducted by IUF, a trade union, in December last year said that as many as 22 plantations with 95,000 workers have been affected. "Around 25,000 people in North Bengal as a whole are facing starvation as a result of closure of tea plantations, many of whose owners have simply vanished," says Meena Patel of IUF. The researchers even report cases of starvation deaths.

Only late last year did the state government issue a circular asking all development officers in the districts to give plantation workers too the benefits. So, between 2001 (when SGRY was launched) and 2003, a major chunk of the SC/ST population in the district did not benefit from the scheme despite the fact that Jalpaiguri gets so much money just because of them. "Most of the time, our planning is structured in such a way that the benefits don't reach them," says a development officer in the district.

The self-employment scheme The Centre's other large employment scheme is the Swarnjayanti Gram Swarozgar Yojna (SGSY). Unlike the SGRY, this is a self-employment programme where the poor are given financial support and access to bank loans to start a business. Around Rs 800 crore was allotted to the programme in 2002-03. A CAG report on the working of the scheme between 1999 and 2002 was highly critical of the functioning of the programme, pointing out that there were "large-scale diversions, misutilisation and parking of funds..." and that "there were several deficiencies at all stages of implementation". The report concluded: "The programme has not emerged as an improvement over the earlier IRDP and other... schemes which it had replaced." "We found that the ventures of 40 per cent of people who actually receive the money fail," said a researcher who has studied the scheme in a number of districts. "There was no compatible infrastructure and no market linkages which were provided." For instance, in a village in Jharkhand, one household received a pumping set under the scheme, but it couldn't use it because there was no power to operate the set. In Jammu and Kashmir, each family in a village was provided with dairy cows. "There was an overproduction of milk," says the researcher. "There isn't enough assessment of the market for the products that these people are selling. The actual needs of the people are not assessed, but are decided from above."

The ministry of rural development asks outside agencies to routinely conduct so-called 'impact assessment studies' of its programmes. Says a researcher who conducted such studies in four districts in Punjab and the North-east: "The aim was to create 100 man days of employment per poor family. In none of the districts where we conducted the studies did we find that target reached. In some cases, the shortfall in creation of jobs was as much as 50-60 per cent."

If a district doesn't use all its funds, it faces a cut in funding the following year. This was supposed to provide districts with an incentive to use all funds. But that threat doesn't work. "When districts prepare their demands for grants, they automatically demand much more than they need," says a district officer. "That way, even with the penalties, they still get a substantial increase over last year's allocation. Also, it's usually the case that the amount of money allocated under government programmes increases every year anyway."

Jalpaiguri isn't unique when it comes to 'saving' development money.

In 2003-04, West Bengal spent only 66 per cent of the funds available to it. Poor states like Orissa and Uttar Pradesh also underutilised their funds.

Miles away from Gudhiyarkuthi, in Delhi's Krishi Bhavan, the building housing the main office of the ministry of rural development, officials struggle with the fact that in 2003-04, Rs 264 crore was not used by the states to which the money was allocated by the Centre. "The problem is that, at the end of the year, when states don't use the funds they are allotted, this surplus money is allocated to other states. The problem is that the decision to allot the surpluses to another state is an essentially political one," says an officer. States like Andhra Pradesh and Rajasthan are allotted the surpluses that other states will not spend.

Adds the officer: "Why should the surpluses be distributed to others? Not being able to use the funds reflects a failure of the bureaucracy in a state and in the districts. It's not that there is no poverty in those states." The officer points out that states like Punjab and Haryana are also allotted a large volume of foodgrains under the scheme. "This is absurd. Why do these states need the foodgrains when even the poor in these states buy directly from the market?"

The other problem is with the assets themselves that are created. Around 15 per cent of the funds are supposed to be for maintenance of the assets created in earlier years. "Unfortunately, we've found that not much of the money is used for maintenance," says the officer.

Ironically, even despite these problems, many believe that the Sampoorna Gramin Rozgar Yojna is more successful than most other government schemes (See 'How The SGRY Works').

Will Manmohan Singh's proposals to transfer funds directly from the centre to the panchayats work? For all its faults, even in West Bengal where panchayati raj institutions are supposed to function more efficiently than in other states, village panchayats are the best institutions to judge how government money could be used in those areas. But they need to be made to work better. And one of the most important ways to do that is to put information in the hands of people like Kharen Roy.

Till that happens, Singh could spend all the money he wants - but the poor might still vote him out of power five years from now.

 

http://www.businessworld.in/july1904/coverstory07.asp

 

Steel Authority of India Ltd (SAIL) today ruled out the possibility of sharing Chiria mines with any other player.

The statement assumes significance since Mittal Steel has ruled out the possibility of setting up a plant in Jharkhand without Chiria.

S K Roongta, chairman said at the sidelines of the Bengal Chamber of Commerce & Industry (BCCI) Metals 2006 that the PSU was working on an amicable settlement on Chiria, but would not share its resources.

As part of the settlement, SAIL was willing to set up greenfield capacities in Jharkhand.

On what would be the capacity of the greenfield plant, Roongta said it would be in tandem with the aspirations of the Jharkhand government. Over and above the greenfield facility, SAIL was also expanding the Bokaro steel plant.

Chiria was originally leased out to IISCO, but post-merger with SAIL, it is under SAIL. The steel major has also lined up an investment of Rs 1,800 crore for Chiria.

The environment impact study has been completed and the detailed project report was being worked upon.

S Satapathy, Jharkhand mines secretary said, Mittal Steel had been offered an alternative, Ankura mines, but the company was yet to respond.

Sanak Mishra, chief executive officer (CEO) Mittal Steel India was not available for comment.

Ankura has reserves of around 500 million tonne. However, it was only partially explored by MECL.

Mittal's 12 million tonne plant required 600 million tonne of iron ore over a 30-year period.

The project is proposed to be set up in two phases at an investment of Rs 40,000 crore.

Mittal Steel was eyeing the two Chiria leases which were under litigation in the Jharkhand High Court, as they had been cancelled by the state government.

The leases were much coveted since Chiria happens to be Asia's largest iron ore belt with reserves in excess of two billion tonne.

Metal major gives state a miss

President (HR) of Vendanta Group S Venkatesh addresses the CEO Forum at XLRI. Picture by Srinivas Jamshedpur, Nov. 27: The beeline of MoUs in the state notwithstanding, mining major Vedanta has decided to give Jharkhand a miss, at least for the time being. S. Venkatesh, president of the human resource group of the company, said this while addressing the CEO forum at XLRI. During the session, Venkatesh laid emphasis on the various mining projects undertaken by Vedanta to rank itself as one of the top five metal producers in the world. Vedanta, however, is a subsidiary of the Bangalore-based Sterlite Industries Private Ltd and is the only Indian company to get a primary listing in the London Stock Exchange. Ironically, the company has today invested in a multi million crore project in Orissa and Chhattisgarh but somehow Jharkhand has been completely left out of its agenda. Venkatesh said: "We would surely like to explore new opportunities in the state but for now we are not making any investment in Jharkhand," said Venkatesh. While a 2,400 MW power plant is coming up in Jharsugoda and a similar project is also in the pipeline in Chhattisgarh, the HR president, said, if the situation changes, the company might be interested in the state's coal mines. "We are not interested in selling coal. What we are looking at is taking coal mines and using the coal for our power plants and other mining units, but that would only happen if the state government opens up its bid for privatisation of coal mines in the state," he added. The corporate head also showed concern on the lack of enthusiasm among engineering students in taking up careers in mining.

 

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1061128/asp/jamshedpur/story_7060638.asp

 

 

 

 

         600 tribals convert to Christianity in Jharkhand

 

 

Ranchi, Nov 27 (IANS) At least 600 tribal people were converted to Christianity in Jharkhand, news reports here said Monday.

Reports said around 600 people belonging to primitive tribes like Birhor, Birajia and Nagaesia were converted to Christianity. The conversion took place in Vishunpur locality of Gumla district, about 140 km from here.

Before the conversion, the tribals took a dip in a village pond and recited Bible in a local Church.

'I was making an effort to convert people for a long time. I took help of the fathers to create awareness among the people about Christ,' reports quoted Obed Minz, a convert, as saying. Minz embraced Christianity in 1984.

The conversion is seen as a move to counter the re-conversion enacted by Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) leader Dileep Singh Judeo.

Two months ago Judeo had reconverted around 45 Christians into their tribal religion.

Conversion is rampant in the state with the tribals making up 27 percent of the total population. The poverty-stricken tribal people were allegedly offered allurements for conversion.

'In the name of social work the Christian missionaries are involved in conversion in the state,' alleged BJP leader Ramesh Puskar.

© 2006 Indo-Asian News Service

 

http://news.monstersandcritics.com/india/article_1226506.php/600_tribals_convert_to_Christianity_in_Jharkhand

 

 

 

 

Nearly all the time new buses are being added, new routes are charted out and number of passengers are growing too. But the growth notwithstanding, the public transport system remains somewhat in a dubious state in Jharkhand. Although over 2,000 buses ply within and outside the state, ferrying 1,000-odd passengers each day, there is no fixed tariff on different routes nor are there are any facilities for the commuters at terminuses. On top of that, the condition of vehicles remain deplorable.

"Try travelling between Jamshedpur and Ranchi. It takes over four hours to reach Ranchi. That's because drivers make a number of unscheduled stops. Normally, a bus should not take more than three hours," said Partho Roy, a medicine company official, who does a lot of travelling on this route. And the problems don't end here. Commuters complain that most vehicles have no proper windowpanes and seats are mostly broken. Also, there are no fixed stops, which causes inordinate delay.

Before the new state was carved six years ago, the number of buses plying within and outside the state was not more than 1,300, recalled state transport department officials. "Since then the number of buses have swelled, largely due to the former NDA government that gave buses to Adivasis and other backward groups at a subsided price," officials said adding that 500-such buses operate in the state, plying on shorter routes .

Though the numbers have risen, it seems so have the instances of "bad" service. While private bus owners blame the "system", bad roads, transport department officials, corrupt police, unsafe roads for their problems, the transport department blames the "circumstances" for the problems.

However, sandwiched between the two, the travellers end up paying a price.

For instance, eight months ago, private operators increased the fare on their own, on different routes after their repeated requests to the government to increase fares fell on deaf ears. The hike was about Rs 30. "There has been a hike on fuel price, cost of tyres, tubes and accessories. Apart from that hiring drivers and helpers, too, have become expensive. We had no option but to increase the rates," says Ranchi Bus Owners' Association president, Krishna Mohan Prasad.

Insiders admit that travelling on Bihar State Road Transport Corporation (BSRTC) buses is cheaper by about Rs 15 . "But in terms of facilities we provide better services. We provide video, music and pushback (read comfortable) seats. None of the facilities are available in corporation buses," a private owner claimed.

"And try driving on any national highway that connects other neighbouring states. Potholes, robbers and drunk drivers make driving dangerous," said Akhlu Ram, who plies between Ranchi-Patna. Also Anish Ahmed, who has been driving for the past 20 years echoes Ram's concerns: "The condition is so bad that tyres last for three to four months only."

All the problems apart, owners often have to keep "requests" of government personnel, mainly police and transport departments, to take their relatives, friends or even acquaintances — free of cost. "We have to grease the palms of a section of the police and transport personnel, who constantly find excuses to harass drivers and helpers during the journey. Our miscellaneous expenses is nearly Rs 300 each day to meet the demands of such unscrupulous officials," said some.

And the owners' complaints don't end here. There are two terminus at Ranchi, one for private and the other for corporation buses. "In both the lavatories are hardly cleaned. There are no proper sitting arrangements for the commuters. At night there are no proper lighting and the place is frequented by dubious characters after dusk," claimed a owner.

But it seems that transport department officials, too, have washed their hands off the matter of maintenance. They say it is Ranchi Regional Development Authority (RRDA) that's entrusted with the task. "It (RRDA) collects about Rs 45 lakh per annum as tax for maintaining the private terminus at Kantatoli. If the place is not maintained properly, the RRDA should shoulder the blame," an official said.

Another issue that strikes the eye is the acute lack of what may be termed as "luxury buses". And there are no proposals from any owner to introduce Volvo buses in view of the prevailing condition. "We do not have executive-class of people travelling by bus. Most people who travel want to pay less. Then how can we think of bringing a Volvo?" asked Upender Sharma, an owner, while talking about future plans.

"We do want to augment passengers' amenities. But it depends on revenue generation, too. We have to run the business competitively. Passengers also have an attitude to travel at the minimum cost. Then how can we improve facilities?" asks Upender Sharma, president of Jamshedpur Bus Owners' Association. "We have to carry out a minimum maintenance, besides pay salaries to staff regardless of whether our income remains proportionate to our expenditure or not," Sharma said, adding that except the festival and marriage periods, they hardly make any profit.

Although the government was keen to form a separate state road transport corporation, the proposal ran into rough weather following disputes about the distribution of liabilities and assets between Bihar and Jharkhand about the BSRTC. A tribunal is presently sorting out the issue. Once that is settled, it would pave the way for formation of the Jharkhand State Road Transport Corporation. Some believe that despite a plethora of problems the future of transport looks bright in the state. It is not so much about better services, but a genuine lack of options for the ordinary traveller. The main reason, informed transport officials, is that the railway connectivity is not up to the mark in the state. Consequently bulk of the commuters depend on road transport.

 

http://www.telegraphindia.com/1061128/asp/jamshedpur/story_7060515.asp

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Who cared about Chiria, the world's second largest reserve of iron ore, before the Indian steel makers began to think big and the market got really hot? Since 1907, Chiria's ore has slumbered under the forests of Bihar, with Indian Iron & Steel Co, which had the leases, being a small consumer to begin with and later in no position to invest much. But Chiria is now a magnet, whose projected reserves of 2 billion tonne are enough to make any steel maker's blast furnaces rumble with desire. (India's total reserves of iron ore are around 18 bn tonne.) Players like the Tatas, Jindals and Essar, and Mittal Steel have been attracted to Jharkhand. Even Sail (Steel Authority of India Ltd), having absorbed IISCO, is promising to invest heavily (Rs 1,000 crore) in Chiria.

The story is heating up, with Mittal Steel's head of Indian operations reported to have said that the company would not be interested in setting up its promised 12 million-tonne project without Chiria. Jharkhand's new government has said, Sail would get priority as a government company. Sail bounced back by promising a new 5 mt project to satisfy Jharkhand's desire for value-addition, even as three mines are in dispute. Should Jharkhand favour Sail? Or should it side with the Mittals to get the big-ticket investment (Rs 40,000 crore)? Both questions deserve a 'no'. The larger issue is that mines are located in backward areas, where development is key. While, ideally, the fate of the mine needs to be delinked from the project, political reality demands a compromise with economic merit in the current situation. So, if captive mines are being allocated, the state would need to use its discretion—after the basic criteria are met, set by global best practices. The way out would be to create competition. Jharkhand could divide up the spoils, if that were legally and physically possible too. So if Sail were to get access to 1bn tonne, it would be enough to feed its new ambitions for a few decades. And Mittal should then be satisfied—does he own all the ore sources that feed his furnaces? Another solution would be to release leases to either party, as and when they bring in the investment

 

http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=147386

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Top-ranked woman archer Jhanu Hansda of Jharkhand, on Saturday broke
the world record in compound category by scoring 1405 points out of a
maximum 1440 on the second day of the selection trial for the Indian
team being held at the J R D Tata Sports complex in Jamshedpur.
http://ia.rediff.com/sports/2006/sep/09arch.htm

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Date:	Tue, 14 Nov 2006 15:42:40 +0000 (GMT)
From:	"arundhati thakur" <arundhati_a1@yahoo.co.in>
Subject:	Re: [ >>> Jharkhand <<< ] Jharkhandi World - www.jharkhandi.org
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Hello Friends

It was really a good news to know about ‘Jharkhandi music video sharing blog’
As it was mentioned in the mail that currently the  focus is  on Jharkhandi music video including Bengali, Chhattisgarhi and Oriya, But there is no name of Bhojpuri or Maithil songs in the series of songs?

I would like to request to add bhojpuri & maithil videos in the blog.

This mail is not intented to hurt anyone.

Thanks & regards.

Arundhati


Jharkhand e-Groups! <jharkhand.egroups@yahoo.co.in> wrote:

Dear friends,

 

Greetings you all the on the eve of Jharkhand State foundation day!

 

Today, we are launching a first ever ‘Jharkhandi music video sharing blog’ – Jharkhandi World (www.jharkhandi.org). Here, we are trying to compile all Jharkhandi Music Video at Jharkhandi World. Right now we are focusing on Jharkhandi music video including Bengali, Chhattisgarhi and Oriya

 

How you can explore Jharkhandi World?

 

• Click and Watch any music video for free at www.jharkhandi.org

 

• Upload your collection at YouTube or Google and please, let us know to up load it on www.jharkhandi.org or directly send your video file to info@jharkhand.org.uk

 

 

 

 

Enjoy!

 

Jharkhandi World

www.jharkhandi.org

 

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This is a announcement only list of Jharkhand Online Network (JON), if you have any announcement to post all e-Groups of JON then, please email it to info@jharkhand.org.uk

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• Upload your collection at YouTube or Google and please, let us know to up load it on www.jharkhandi.org or directly send your video file to info@...

The festival, which centres around farm animals, is celebrated for an entire week by tribals in areas like Gaobandh and Badhana.

During the entire period, cattle are garlanded, decorated and given much needed rest. 'We worship cattle, particularly bulls, as they are important for farming,' said Sheela Mali, a tribal.

The sentiment is echoed by Ganesh Manjhi, another tribal: 'Bulls are used for farming and are part and parcel of our harvesting system. We traditionally worship the animals to mark their contribution to our life.'

So, bulls are washed and their horns and bodies painted with different colours while they holiday and feast.

'Cattle worship is part and parcel of tribal societies. Tribal people are closely associated with nature and worship animals, hills, forests and other nature related things,' explained V.S. Uppadhayay, a retired anthropology professor of the Ranchi University.

'Tribal society has yet to catch up with modern technology and bulls are still used for the harvesting and ploughing purposes. This has kept alive the tradition of worshipping bulls.'

Other cattle form part of the pantheon too.

'I have two goats and I worship them. I feed them good food and allow them to rest. We also do not take milk during this festival,' said Manohar Mali.

Part of the festivities is bullfight called Khunatu.

'The bullfight is symbolic one and bulls are not killed. It is a century old tradition organised at different places,' said Demka Soy of the Jharkhand Adivasi Sarna Samittee.

© 2006 Indo-Asian News Service Ranchi, Oct 26 (IANS) It's a bull run for cattle in Jharkhand in the days after Diwali with tribals celebrating the harvest festival of Sohrai by worshipping the animals, giving them the choicest food to eat - and even a week of rest.

The festival, which centres around farm animals, is celebrated for an entire week by tribals in areas like Gaobandh and Badhana.

During the entire period, cattle are garlanded, decorated and given much needed rest. 'We worship cattle, particularly bulls, as they are important for farming,' said Sheela Mali, a tribal.

The sentiment is echoed by Ganesh Manjhi, another tribal: 'Bulls are used for farming and are part and parcel of our harvesting system. We traditionally worship the animals to mark their contribution to our life.'

So, bulls are washed and their horns and bodies painted with different colours while they holiday and feast.

'Cattle worship is part and parcel of tribal societies. Tribal people are closely associated with nature and worship animals, hills, forests and other nature related things,' explained V.S. Uppadhayay, a retired anthropology professor of the Ranchi University.

'Tribal society has yet to catch up with modern technology and bulls are still used for the harvesting and ploughing purposes. This has kept alive the tradition of worshipping bulls.'

Other cattle form part of the pantheon too.

'I have two goats and I worship them. I feed them good food and allow them to rest. We also do not take milk during this festival,' said Manohar Mali.

Part of the festivities is bullfight called Khunatu.

'The bullfight is symbolic one and bulls are not killed. It is a century old tradition organised at different places,' said Demka Soy of the Jharkhand Adivasi Sarna Samittee.

The fresh diktat, issued by the banned Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist), says: 'The recruitment of people will help in the development of the village and state.'

'Who will take a risk by giving birth to a third child. There are instances of children being forcefully taken from homes and recruited in the child squad of Maoist organisations,' said Ramlal Mahto, a resident of Bagodar block of Giridih.

Dukha Manjhi echoes his sentiments. 'Maoist rebels at gun point do what they desire and we cannot protest as it will affect the entire family and village,' he said.

The Maoist decree has made panicky those people who have more than two children. Some parents are reportedly sending their children outside the state so that the rebels cannot force them to join their squads.

'Such decrees are issued by the rebels on regular basis. This time, the family planning angle has been given,' a police official involved in anti-extremist operations told IANS.

'At best we can remove the posters and pamphlets but it is difficult for police to prevent forceful induction of children into Maoist organisation,' he said.

Maoist rebels are active in 16 of the 22 districts of the state.

Sir,

As you are well aware of the fact that after independence when India launched the task of nation building, it chose the path of planned development, which was flagged off by launching of five –Year Plans. In the course of planned development of the country millions of people got displaced and uprooted from the ancestral land.

The tribal communities, which account for just 8.1 % of the total population, constitute about 40 % of the displaced persons. Displaced by big dams, big industries, mining activities, the tribal communities are socially, economically and politically the weakest and the most deprived communities in India. Independent India promised to offer equal opportunities to all its citizens by providing special provision to the weak. But evidently the poor marginalized tribal communities were further impoverished in the process of ‘national development’. They were uprooted from their ancestral lands, often forced to migrate in search of employment or livelihood. By losing their ancestral land and habitation they lost their only source of livelihood and dignity as well as identity. With this sacrifice and sufferings, they paid the price of the “development” of the country but alas they could never share the fruits of development projects, which have displaced them -the big dams the big industries, or the iron-ore and coal-mines.

Nature-based, largely self-sufficient economics of tribal people are used to be sustained and nurtured through their proximity to land, forest, rivers and mountains. These were the ancestral properties belonging to the tribal people, which got either ‘dammed’ or ‘mined’. As the areas of tribal ancestral lands have been declared ‘development areas’, the very process of  ‘development of the country’ brought utter disaster and ‘destruction’ for life and culture of the tribal communities of the country. The sons and daughters of the soil, the aborigines of the country are now destined to be categorized as “refugees” or “migrant labour “in their own motherland.

Thanks,

Yours truly,

(MUKTI TIRKEY)

Mukti Tirkey,

General Secretary,

Adivasi Mahasabha

New Delhi