Blind faith, official apathy and backwardness have combined with disastrous consequences in this village of 1070 people—one of the officially identified villages with malnourished children whose health is supposed to be monitored on a weekly basis.Yet, eight children died between October 20 and November 17 and no official knew about it for days. The Lorbu tribals buried their dead and resolved to keep quiet. The parents were not ready to seek medical help because the bhagat (witch doctor) had warned them against doing so. ‘‘If you bring doctors from outside you will invite Mataji’s curse and more children will die,’’ he told them. While all this was happening, a woman health worker was waiting for November to get over so that she could club the deaths in her monthly report. By that time, eight children had died. The ninth death occurred after official intervention when the parents fled with the ailing child from a medical camp in Bhimpur, about 50 kms away, the nearest community health centre they were brought to for treatment.Block Medical Officer Dr Arvind Bhatt, the only doctor for 152 villages and 129 dhanas (sub-village), said, ‘‘Malnourishment was not the only cause. Four died of persistent diarrhoea, two of septicaemia, one of pneumonia and one after developing red rashes. The last one choked on milk in his home after the family fled the camp.’’He told The Indian Express that he had recommended action against the health worker but admitted that medical facilities in the backward Betul district were poor. ‘‘Had we been informed on time, we could have saved lives,’’ he said. As many as 850 children with severe malnourishment (grade III and IV) have been identified in the district, a top government official admitted. The state government recently increased its annual budget for providing nutritious food through anganwadi centres from Rs 76 crore to Rs 113 crore. This year, 10,000 new anganwadis are being set up in the district. Gurva, too, has an anganwadi but even it failed to notify the deaths in time.‘‘The villagers warned us against approaching the authorities. They threaten us when we knock on their doors to administer medicine to ailing children,’’ a volunteer said.At 222, the village has an unusually large number of children below five years of age. ‘‘Death does not mean much to them because they have many children,’’ says Hiriya Salame, a member of Janpath, which represents two gram panchyats.When a goat was stolen early this month, more than 200 villagers gathered to find out who was the culprit, but were not concerned when the children died. ‘‘We will have to run a campaign in their own language. We will soon convene a gathering of bhagats and tell them not to prevent tribals from seeking medical help,’’ says the in-charge of Integrated Child Development Scheme, Rani Batad.‘‘The children could not walk, had become weak and stopped eating,’’ said Saddulal, admitting that the bhagat had asked villagers to keep mum. ‘‘He believes children are not dying anymore because mataji’s spell is over,’’ he said.
