Breaking a ship146;s back

On the deserted roads of Alang, the silence is deafening. Once a prosperous, if tattered, town 8212; providing jobs to over 100,000 migrant...

On the deserted roads of Alang, the silence is deafening. Once a prosperous, if tattered, town 8212; providing jobs to over 100,000 migrant workers 8212; it is waiting for the return of a roiling tide of opportunity that will bring ships back to meet their end here in the Gulf of Cambay.

Alang, 50 kilometers from Bhavnagar off the South East coast of Gujarat, was till May last year humming with activity. Almost 30 ships were scrapped every month on its 185-odd plots 8212; leased to private entrepreneurs by the Gujarat government. Now, less than 10 ships are being scrapped at one of the world8217;s few natural sites suitable for beaching ships.

As you travel towards Alang, you can8217;t miss the open air shops 8212; albeit devoid of customers 8212; displaying all manner of furniture, beds, refrigerators, washing machines and crockery, all cannibalised from luxurious passenger liners that came here to die.

You can buy a Romanian or British crockery set for less than Rs 300, imported chairs at 80 per cent less than similar chairs manufactured in India. If you8217;re in luck, you might get an antique treasure from a ship8217;s ruins.

Demand is so high that within a week these resellers who buy the entire stock from ship breakers in bulk sell off their entire 8216;8216;accommodation8217;8217; items to either hotels owners or to locals in nearby areas. Shipbreakers, on the other hand, are interested only in steel.

But today, thanks to a massive rise in ship prices, shipbreakers are waiting for the right tide.

8216;8216;Shipowners all over the world are not interested in selling ships as freight rates are very high. Once freight rates come down, shipowners will sell ships at lower prices and we will be able to buy ships,8217;8217; says Vinay Bansal, a local shipbreaker.

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Indian shipbreakers are unable to buy ships for scrapping as it8217;s the Chinese companies which are offering better prices, their consumption having shot up due to Olympics 2008.

During the glory days, says Captain Y P Deulkar, port officer of Gujarat Maritime Board, you could hear the continuous crash of ship-breaking a mile away. Now, the noise of giant cranes smashing ships is infrequent enough to give ship-breakers sleepless nights.

With business down, the quality of living has fallen, especially among the workers. 8216;8216;Even before a ship arrives in our plot8230; the workers start queuing up for work,8217;8217; says Bansal.

Interestingly, says he, it8217;s only the migrant workers from UP, Bihar and Orissa who work in Alang: the job is too tedious and laborious for anyone else. 8216;8216;There were no jobs in my native village in Orissa. In order to survive, I came here to search for a welder8217;s job. If any ship-breaker hires me, I can make upto Rs 200 a day which is a huge sum back home,8217;8217; says Sooraj Mahato, a 45-year old skilled worker.

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Safety is another issue which haunts the ship-breaking yard, though the Gujarat Maritime Board is making all out efforts to inculcate precaution measures among the workers and their employers. 8216;8216;As soon as a ship arrives we need all kinds of manual help to tear it apart8230; this place hums with activity. But as you can see, we have no jobs now8230; all the cranes8217; booms are down and even lights inside the plots have been packed off,8217;8217; he adds.

The good news? The fortunes of the industry could change quickly 8212; just like the tide.