Piyali is a commercial sex worker in India’s biggest red light district, Sonagachi in Kolkata. She is also the guardian angel of a small village of 300 nomadic tribals in Amlasole, a hilltop village about 260 kilometres to the southwest. Piyali (name changed) and a few of her friends, all commercial sex workers, first decided to help out at Amlasole after they read about the starvation deaths there.
Through an NGO they set up in Kolkata 14 years ago — called Durbar (Irrepressible, in Bengali) — they now run a school and a vocational training centre in Amlasole.
In a state where thousands of crores are pouring in as foreign investments and massive special economic zones are being created by a Left Front government that champions communism and equal opportunity, these are the only such facilities with a 20-kilometre radius.
The Sabar and Munda tribes who live here depend on the forests for food — they do not farm or rear livestock but survive mainly on wild potatoes. In 2003, the local police barred them from entering the forests surrounding their village, claiming they were helping transport arms, ammunition and supplies for Maoists in this Naxal-infested area. Within months, seven people had died of starvation.
As news of the deaths spread, a few local politicians visited the village and promised aid. Many of them, including local legislator Chunibala Hansda, had never been to the village before.None of them returned — except Piyali’s group.
“The nearest high school is in Belpahari, 23 kilometres away says Prabhas Munda, a ,” teacher at Beda Bhenge. “Till five years ago, villagers had to travel 15 kilometres to buy salt and cooking oil.” Now, 46 Sabar children are getting free education, food and clothes at the school. Young women are often taken to Kolkata in batches for vocational training.
A few have even got jobs making handmade mats and ropes in the metropolis. “We started with a fund of Rs 1 lakh,” says Mahasweta Mukherjee, Durbar’s liaison officer. “Since then, we have set up a school called Beda Bhenge (Breaking Fences, in Bengali) and the Sonagachi Training and Research Institute for Women.” The sex workers collect up Rs 10,000 every month for the children’s school uniforms, study material and mid-day meals.
For the 380 residents of the village, where the literacy rate is in the single digits and there was no motorable road till last year, Durbar has opened the doors to the world. The only time they see any government officials, they say, is when the police rush into the village to arrest suspected Naxal collaborators. “What’s the point of voting?” says Pakhi Sabar, whose husband and daughter died of starvation. “The officials came and disappear again. Piyali is the only one who returns.”
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