Bamnipal: At least 12 children died during March-June this year in a tribal village in Odisha, eastern India. Local medical authorities and community workers blame malnutrition for the death in Nagada village in the forests of Odisha’s Jajpur district.
The residents of the village belong to the Juang, one of India’s ancient tribes, declared ‘particularly vulnerable’ by the government. For the past two months, a chicken pox epidemic has been raging in the village, with at least 35 kids displaying the typical blister-like rashes.
The local authorities made a few trips to the village to distribute medicine only under pressure from Aspire, an NGO that works with school dropouts and never enrolled children in the region.
G Naresh, an activist of the organization, told The Times of India that that doctors have found several children suffering from bronchial pneumonia, which often occurs among malnourished children.
A recent survey by the NGO among children of 5 to 12 years showed that a third of 83 kids suffered from malnutrition. Another 17 percent were just marginally ‘normal’.
But why does Nagada have rampant malnutrition and why do diseases go untreated? This question acquires significance because the village is located in the middle of one of the richest iron, chromium and manganese deposits in the world, stretching across Jajpur, Keonjhar and Sundergarh districts in Odisha, spilling over into Jharkhand to the west.
So, how come time stands still in Nagada? The inaccessible village of 275 people has no kindergarten, school, health sub-center or price shop. Technically, the government has the village covered under the anganwadi (kindergarten) system by making it part of the Chingdipal anganwadi. However, Chingdipal is five forested kilometers away. The anganwadi and health workers based there are supposed to look after Nagada villagers.
Adults and older children work as daily laborers in nearby mines under contractors, earning about 3,000-4,000 rupees a month.
The Juang tribal people grow paddy and vegetables in small plots. They collect wild edible plants or hunt small fowls from the forest. In the absence of an anganwadi or school, children are deprived of the basic lifeline available to most poor children in the region — nutritious meals. And, in the absence of a fair-price shop, they are mostly deprived of another lifeline — 1 kilo rice for 1 rupee, provided by the state government.
The nearest government hospital is at Kuika, 27km away. There is also a Tata Steel-managed hospital 18km away in the Sukinda mines area. This is where nine seriously afflicted kids were taken by the district medical authorities after news of the chicken pox outbreak and child deaths broke out in June.
There are an estimated 10,000 Juang tribal people, living mostly in the forested hills of Jajpur and adjoining Keonjhar. They have no rights over their forest and can hardly claim any right over the minerals.