THELIGHTOFANDAMANS: CHALTE | CHALTE: Innocent or Unaware

Wednesday, November 14, 2012

CHALTE | CHALTE: Innocent or Unaware

THE LIGHT OF ANDAMANS | VOL 36 | ISSUE 04 | 15 NOV 2012

CHALTE | CHALTE:

Innocent or Unaware

He had worked for more than 7 years in tribal areas in parts of India. During his tenure with such activities he was on a visit to a tribal village accompanied by a doctor to have a health survey, when he came across a girl suffering from TB. Neither her parents nor the villagers would know her ailment and a government doctor of that area was treating her as a private practitioner. Following the government scheme the girl was being administered the DOTS course with vitamin capsules and tonics, but the family had to pay for everything to the doctor. The parents and villagers were happy as the patient was recovering fast following the medicine for which they had to cough off a hefty amount of about 70-75 thousand rupees in favour of the government but private practicing doctor. The parents had to be parted away with an acre of their fertile land to meet the expenditure. They were innocent or unaware!

In another case, 17 tribal families were identified as beneficiaries in a drought prone area to be assisted to purchase pair of bullock. The office of the Project Officer had sanctioned an amount of Rupees 23000/- to each beneficiaries against some documents to receive the cheques. An official in the same office lent a hand to those innocent but unaware tribal beneficiaries with the promise to help them to get them the cheques. He managed their signatures and received the cheques, xeroxed them and gave the xeroxed cheques to the beneficiaries with an advice to approach the bank after a fortnight. The plea was the bank did not have enough money to pay them. Meanwhile, in connivance with bank official he managed to withdraw money. After the fortnight when the beneficiaries approached the Bank and produced the xeroxed cheques, the same Bank official simply sent them back saying that the cheques were duplicate and the government played a gag with them. The tribal beneficiaries believed it as if nothing new had happened. They tore the xeroxed cheques and took their way back to village cursing the government as they lost a day's labour and bus fare.

— Musafir

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About The Light of Andamans

The Light of Andamans’ was born out of the zeal and determination to fight against the suffocating Kafkaesque atmosphere on the society that existed even after 30 years of Independence under bureaucratic rule. It was a hangover of the ‘Raj’that extended much too long in the Islands.

The Light of Andamans’ was started in 1975. The paper had always been a crusader, taking up the causes that no other newspaper would touch. In doing so, it very often stepped on the toes of the authorities and had to face persecution in the form of denial of advertisements and numerous court cases against it. For a small stint, the publication came to a halt in 2003.

Gezira Publications Private Limited took over the paper in the year 2005 and transferred the title in a bid to revive the second oldest newsmagazine from extinction and also to carry forward the mission.

The Newsmagazine, under the new management, has undergone a sea change both in form and content. It turned into a full-fledged tabloid with 10 pages with plenty of photographs making both pleasing to the eyes and soothing for the mind. “It has acquired a position where it influences the policies in vital matters concerning the development of the islands, protection of aboriginal tribes and addressing the problems of the disadvantaged groups. The newsmagazine is known and appreciated for its bold, free, fair and balanced reporting.”

Late Govinda Raju and his team worked very hard to rebuild the reputation, goodwill and a healthy new image of the newsmagazine brick by brick. After the demise of Mr Raju in 2010, the magazine is now being edited by Zubair Ahmed and published by Basudev Dass. The newsmagazine continues its mission of highlighting policy issues pertaining to the Islands.