In yesterday's newspaper I read an item titled “DC takes tribal development officers to task.” The Deputy Commissioner Mr. P. Manivannan was talking to the officials of the District Integrated Tribal Development Project (DIT - DP) at the Taluk Panchayat meeting hall in H. D. Kote on Thursday, Nov. 25, 2008. As we know, H. D. Kote is one of the many forest areas where we find tribal habitats.
By a fine coincidence on the same day, 25th Nov. 2008, I was in Kodagu to attend the Court where an NGO had filed a defamation case against me and my colleague. In the court premises a person with a pouch under his arm advanced towards me wearing a half- smile and asked if I was KBG. I nodded and he was quick to congratulate me for getting the Rajyotsava Award - 2008.
He also spoke well of my newspaper and particularly “Choomantra” of which he was a regular reader. A little embarrassed, to divert him from his uninhibited eulogy of KBG and Mysooru Mithra, I asked his name. He said he was Kudiyara Muthappa. Being from Kodagu, I immediately knew that he was a tribal and to my delight, he happened to be from my neighbouring village. Since he was quite articulate and was found to be worthy of being dragged to the court, either as a petitioner or respondent, or as a complainant or defendant, I assumed him to be an educated tribal. Hence, dangerous in the eye of the non - tribals! However, to my surprise he was apologetic and told me he never went to any school, but learnt to read and write through “Saakshara Kavery”, apparently a government scheme like Adult Education, to educate the tribals.
This was the reason why I was not surprised to read in yesterday’s paper about our Deputy Commissioner taking those officers to task. Here is just one example to show that the funds allotted and released for the projects to benefit exclusively these tribals do not reach them at all or benefit them.
According to Kudiyara Muthappa, who lives at the foot of the thickly forested tallest mountain of Kodagu, Thadiyandamol, with his fellow men and women, he is acting as an NGO of sorts to help the folks. He says there are 55 families with about 300 people. Over 60 years after independence, under the DITDP only 30 houses (you can well imagine the quality and size of these houses; they could as well be pigeon holes!) were constructed and are occupied. The remaining houses are yet to be taken up for construction. Who knows, they may already have been constructed on paper and bills paid!
One of the projects under DITDP was a 2 - km road in Yavakapadi village, starting from the house of the upper caste Kodava family by name Madanda upto the Girijana Colony where these tribals live. The Central Government had sanctioned Rs.13 lakh for making a good road to the Girijana Colony, for a length of just 2km. The Kodagu BJP MLA, K. G. Bopaiah, now the Deputy Speaker of the Assembly, performed the guddali puja (turning the clod) for this project in 2003 - 2004. Kudiyara Muthappa was a witness to this Big Hope of poor Kudiyas (a type of tribals of Kodagu) and was observing the progress of the work as an NGO. He tells me in chaste Kodava language: “Sir, they just ran JCB, that was all.”
I was not able to understand him as he was repeatedly saying JCB, which was Greek and Latin to me. It was my friend, who was standing by my side, who said what Kudiyara Muthappa meant. He was talking about an earth - mover, which is called JCB, that moved the earth for making the road. Upon understanding what he was saying, I asked what his problem was. Kudiyara Muthappa told me he had two problems.
1. He had enquired and found out that the JCB was charging Rs.800 per hour of work. He had very diligently kept account of the number of hours the JCB had worked. It was 120 hours. Therefore, Sir, he said, Rs. 96,000 was the cost of the JCB. "So if you deduct Rs.96,000 from Rs.13 lakh there still remains Rs.12,04,000," he concluded.
2. After what the JCB had done, no further work was executed to make a good road. The road work stopped after JCB left the village.
Kudiyara Muthappa then asked me a very pertinent question, "Sir, now what happened to that Rs.12,04,000?"
I told him he should have asked the concerned officers. Kudiyara Muthappa told me, "Sir, I did ask one Prakash, the Engineer of Nirmithi Kendra who executed the job and who was responsible to make the road spending, if careful, little less and if careless, a little more. However, Rs.13 lakh was the money for constructing a 2 - km road as estimated by the Nirmithi Kendra. The Engineer’s reply was, "Don’t ask me, ask your MLA. Go and complain to the MLA. Don’t talk to me."
Since the MLA was not easily accessible, Kudiyara Muthappa approached the members of the Kunjila - Kakkabe Village Panchayat who are supposed to have supervised this job. But none responded to Kudiyara Muthappa. In fact, he was ticked off as a nuisance and one who interfered unnecessarily in their great task of nation building.
Finally, Kudiyara Muthappa managed to speak to the MLA himself, K. G. Bopaiah, a gentle and helpful person and the answer Kudiyara Muthappa got was, you guessed it – "I will look into it." So it was the final reply to Kudiyara Muthappa’s complaint.
In the midst of this gloomy, melancholic scenario of this Kodagu tribal group, I was delighted to find a silver lining as I continued my conversation with him. He said his four children, two boys and two girls, one daughter Leelavathi’s education was sponsored by the famous hockey player Ballachanda Len Aiyappa. She is doing her BSW degree course in Mangalore and Len Aiyappa sends every month Rs. 1500 for her boarding, lodging and fees. Indeed a noble gesture, a sporting gesture, on the part of Len Aiyappa.
It seems, just like the road mentioned above, the drinking water scheme for the Girijana Colony too was a Rs. 7 lakh loot. The whole community is still lifting water from their traditional sources. No Deputy Commissioner ever bothered to personally inspect the works nor questioned the officials or the implementing agency as to what happened to Rs.7 lakh.
I do not know if P. Manivannan inspected the work in H. D. Kote or was holding his durbar in the office based on the complaints which could easily be tackled by the cunning officials and their “Case Workers” who are like the defence Advocates!
And finally, there is an old Palace of Kodagu Rajas known as Nalkunaad Aramane, a tourist destination, where the Kings had hired, centuries ago, some tribals with special quality to guard the Palace. They were called Aramane Kavalinga. That generation is still there in 55 families with a population of 400. They are called Kapalas in the local lingo.
The most shocking revelation was they are not included in any of the Backward Classes list of the Government nor in the SC / ST list. Probably, their number is not good enough to make a vote bank that will make a difference in election. However, surprisingly they are all registered voters and they are all Hindus. Jai Hind, Jai Karnataka and I wish Kudiyara Muthappa all the best too.
