A place time forgot

The day begins at 4 in village of Nainiaki, in the unforgiving Karauli ki Dang, some 50 km southwest of Dausa, Rajasthan. The sound of a cha...

The day begins at 4 in village of Nainiaki, in the unforgiving Karauli ki Dang, some 50 km southwest of Dausa, Rajasthan. The sound of a chakki cuts through my sleep. A woman is grinding wheat for chapattis that she will serve with chchaach in the morning. The men are asleep. My own sleep was punctuated by the sound of a buffalo chewing its cud and a restless cow. Around 5.30, my driver and companions get up. I follow suit, hopeful of companionship for the walk to the forest for morning ablutions.

It’s not a forest. Just red sandstone, red soil and stunted trees a little taller than people here. Once, say elders, there were forests. Then came the forest department. The forests disappeared under its watchful eye. I see others follow me into the ‘forest’, mercifully at a distance. Women, too, ghunghats clenched in teeth. Job over, I walk to the handpump, one of two sunk for a village of 200 by the government. The other is out of order. This one fills a bucket. Then you wait half an hour for it to recharge before using it again. It’s the only source of water around.

The men set off to graze their animals. The Dangs are inhabited by Gujjars, a few Jats and a sprinkling from other castes. The most recent generation opted for agriculture though. They coax one crop of wheat, mustard or millet from the soil if rains are good. The average income in the Dangs wouldn’t exceed Rs 20,000 per household per year. With six per household, this means a per capita income of just over Rs 3,000 — well below our poverty line.

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It’s a day’s drive from the nearest town, Sapotra, to Nainiaki. Drive is a misnomer; there are no roads so it’s more a jolting jeep ride over boulders. Emerging behind Sapotra we climb the Dangs’ plateau up a trail designed more for camel carts than motorised transport! At midday, we see a group escorted by a man wielding a gun. They are surveying to build a road. The gun wielder stops. He is Sheonarain, sarpanch from the nearby Daulatpura village. The forest department stopped them building a road for some 10 years, to preempt mining and logging ostensibly. The mining bit I can understand. The sandstone may get spirited away. The logging angle makes no sense. Nothing to log.

As there is no road it takes people a couple of days to walk to Sapotra. Each village has reported childbirth deaths. There’s no transport save for a rare cycle and even rarer jeep.The one saving grace are the schools. Nainiaki has a primary school and its neighbouring village, a middle school. Children wanting to study further find a relative in a town. But education is a recent entrant; the older generations are nearly completely illiterate.

Change is coming slowly. The Dangs have sent several dacoits to the Chambal. Many surrendered and mended their ways. Loners and fearless, they spearhead change now. Villagers realise that they need to take things in hand. They have begun constructing ponds. Teachers used to play truant but now less so. But electricity and roads remain a dream in this corner of Rajasthan that time — and the government — forgot.

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