Dec/26/2011

The sorrow of Majuli

River Brahmaputra has eaten more than half of Asia's largest riverine island Majuli over the last 60 years. With land disappearing, there is progressive loss of the traditional means of livelihood of its people, leading to their displacement. Some lately are migrating even as far away as Andhra Pradesh, finds out Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty after a visit.

Farmer Sridhar Bora stops mid-way as he brings down his axe on a tree log in his front yard and casts a curious glance at the stranger in his village. Walking up the dusty path, he asks me, “Have you come for the meeting?”

Well, no. I have come to see your village, I say. “Not much is left of our village,” he answers before ushering me in to his thatched roof house. In typical Assamese tradition of welcoming a guest, Bora offers me betel nut. I am curious to know the meeting that he thought I had come for. Biting a nut wrapped in betel leaves, he says, “The Sub Divisional Officer (SDO), the SDC and the SDO (Agriculture) are coming to our village for the first time to inspect the scale of erosion that happened five months ago.”

Bora's village Padumoni, in Assam's Majuli Island on River Brahmaputra, is barely a 30-minute car ride on a wobbly path from the sub-divisional headquarters, Garamur. Padumoni is in the island's Bhakat Sapori area, accessible in the monsoon months only by boat or a shaky bamboo bridge constructed by villagers. In good times, when this low lying land would be covered by the flood waters of the Brahmaputra beginning every May, it brought joy to the farmers because the waters would leave their land fertile to grow hectares of sugarcane, rice, mustard and black gram. Farmers like Bora have done good business in sugarcane production alone, providing it to huge parts of Assam. No longer. Now, Bora and other villagers of Padumani dread the monsoons. Since 2008, the floods have been bringing to them the Brahmaputra in the form of a killer red river whose fury has already gobbled up hectares of cultivable land, their only source of livelihood.

“In the first two weeks of May this year, 7 bighas of my sugarcane cultivation were taken away by Brahmaputra. Since 2008, I have lost about 20 bighas,” says Bora. With not much land left to cultivate, Bora let his two older sons accompany a village boy to Hyderabad in search of jobs a few months ago. “Both are graduates; with no land to till, they wanted to look for jobs there. So many boys from Majuli have already gone to Hyderabad for work. They are yet to send money home though,” he says.

Collecting some other farmers, he takes me to show the damage by the river side, barely 100 metres from his house. A few strands of his sugarcane are still hanging from the edges. Bora's neighbour Ganesh Saikia is carrying along a file fat with letters written to the SDO and the SDC pleading allotment of land to farmers of three villages of Padumoni, one already submerged in the Brahmaputra. “After my land was swept away, I began to grow sugarcane on 3 bighas of land owned by a satra (the Neo-Vaishnavaite monasteries founded by the 16th Century reformer Sankardeva in Majuli) nearby.” Pleas to the government for new land have not helped.

“The SDAO sent us to the SDC since he deals with land matters. The SDC shooed us away. Till now forget any State Minister, I have not seen even the local MLA visiting us. That MLA has become the State Water Resources Minister now. Sometimes, just before the monsoons we see some engineers here but whatever they do has not been able to stop erosion,” he says.

Villagers of Majuli are angry. From the file, Saikia pulls out a paper saying, “We have been paying land tax. Corruption is so rampant here that the clerk at the revenue office refused to take our tax this time unless we also pay for the land which we have lost to the river.”

Besides Bhakat Sapori in Lower Majuli, there are 20 saporis (alluvial sand banks created by the river over the years) across the riverine Island, Asia's largest. These sand banks are occupied by farmers who have lost their land to erosion in other parts of Majuli, some since the 70s. Bora and Saikia have been in Bhakat Sapori for over 35 years. Since the last land survey was conducted in Majuli about 40 years ago, Padumoni is still a non-cadastral village along with 32 others. The Government collects from the villagers a penalty tax for the crop grown on such land. Some sand banks have been occupied by the Vaishnava monasteries with the argument that those were their land lost to the river and now resurfaced. Monasteries like Auniati and Bor Alengi have lot of land in Bhakat Sapori, villagers cultivating on it pay them the tax.

Farmers of Bhakat Sapori are non-tribal Assamese. The dominant tribal community in Majuli, the Mishings, are also badly affected by erosion. Rows of Chang Ghars (traditional Mishing dwellings on stilts) on road sides across Majuli announce their plight. Without land, their mainstays — agriculture and pig rearing, are not there. In Sumoimari area in upper Majuli, I see Mishings living by the embankment. “We came here in 2007. Our village was about 6 km away. There are people from 14 villages here,” says Arun Payeng. Payeng studied till Class XII before joining his father in agriculture. “We used to grow mustard, peas and bau dhan (a rice variety that can survive in water, typical to Majuli) in 7 bighas. With no land, now I till someone else's land in a nearby village and give half the harvest to the owner,” he says. Payeng gets an annual share of about three and a half quintals of rice which translates to Rs. 5000 a year. With a family of four to look after, he often takes loan from the local money lender. His wife accompanies village women going to parts of Assam during the harvest season to work as a labourer. His brother's two sons have left for Hyderabad to become security guards.

The government is well aware of the problems. “As of July this year, an estimated 2009 hectares have been affected by erosion belonging to 7,965 families,” says SDAO S.N. Sonar. As per a scheme of the Assam Disaster Management Authority, Sonar will distribute seeds of peas, mustard, potato, and summer paddy to the affected farmers. “Only the pea seeds have arrived so far. If the rest don't come soon, the pea seeds will be of no use,” he says.

Not just agriculture, other traditional means of livelihood of the people are also affected by Majuli's shrinking land mass and its uncertain future. Samaguri, the centre for the centuries-old practice of mask and boat making, has been badly affected. So also Salmora, where potters still make wares without the wheel and sell them through the ancient barter system. Well known mask maker Hemchandra Goswami of Samaguri monastery shows pictures of his masks flowing away in the river. “I have been trying to keep the tradition of our monastery alive by teaching a few students but it is an individual effort. Already many have quit because it can't run their kitchen. With Majuli's future bleak, I worry about the survival of this art,” he says. Jaya Kakati of Salmora recalls seeing 55 families leaving for Satai in Jorhat district on one single day in 2008. “Last year, there was no erosion here, so we are keeping our fingers crossed,” she says.

Unmindful of the river flowing barely 50 metres from her house, she is busy making pots which her husband will take on a boat on the Brahmaputra across Assam to sell. “He will be out for three months and return with rice,” she says.

Mishings are also losing their traditional skills like weaving jim (a ribbed quilt), rearing pigs and goats. “With no land to cultivate, we have nothing to feed our animals, so many have sold them. Our boys are now labourers and carpenters. Only one young girl in my area knows how to weave a jim,” says Rita Gam. Quite a few houses still have weaving looms but the cost of thread is prohibitive. “We used to have cotton plants at home to make thread. In the whole of Sumoimari now, you will not find more than 10 plants. The river took away everything. We have started buying clothes,” says Rita Pegu, a housewife.

Displacement due to erosion is not new to Majuli. A big earthquake in the 1950s led the Brahmaputra to change its course leading to annual erosion thus shrinking Majuli from 1250 sq km then to 514 sq km now. Of its three tehsils in the 50s, one, Ahataguri is lost to the river and yet another, Salmora, is badly affected. The Government helped migrate some people to Jorhat and Golaghat districts in the 60s and the 70s. Lately, the influential monasteries have been the only beneficiary of government land. Individuals who could afford it, have bought land in Jorhat, Golaghat and Lakhimpur districts and those who can't, have been either on sand banks or living like refugees on the bunds and roadsides with no sanitation facilities.

In Korotipara area of lower Majuli, many families have made the local veterinary hospital and the community centre their home. The local post office is barely 50 metres from the river. “Post a letter from here, next year this post office will be gone,” the postman tells me. The distance from his house to his high school was 10 kms. It is now in the middle of Brahmaputra. His daughter is a nurse in the local health centre. “If the river takes away both the post office and the health centre, we will have no means of livelihood,” he says. Last year, Korotipara lost its library and the local club. The river stops metres away from its primary school set up in 1913. Resident Bharat Bora says, “With the community centre and its auditorium filled with displaced people, we could not do raas this year.” Being the centre for Vaishnava monasteries which prays to Lord Krishna, raas is the main festival in Majuli.

SDO Krishna Barua claims about 5,000 people have been given land by the government so far. But local resident Manoj Bora shows an RTI report which mentions only 500 families of the 9,566 families displaced by erosion since the 1960s have been settled by the government elsewhere.” The Assam Government, in 2003, had handed down the responsibility of arresting erosion of Majuli to the Brahmaputra Board set up by the Centre to look into the perennial floods in the North East. Work began in 2005 and since then more than Rs 56 crore has been spent with no concrete result on ground. Red tape, unaccountability and a lackadaisical attitude has only increased misery in Majuli. An example of money being spent without thought by the Board are the porcupines and spurs erected to arrest erosion. They are now in the middle of the river! Unable to meet its deadline, the Board's term has now been extended to 2014.

After years of neglect, the Assam Government is blaming the Board for not doing enough. It has recently applied to the UNESCO to grant heritage status to Majuli. It also ratified the Majuli Cultural Landscape Region Act some time ago to preserve the Island but not much ‘preservation' is seen there apart from cosmetic changes like constructing museums and guest houses funded by the ASI and erecting a tourist accommodation. Determined to put both the State Government and the Board on the mat, Manoj Bora has filed a PIL in the Gauhati High Court.

Number of competent mathematicians inadequate: Manmohan

Declaring 2012 as the ‘National Mathematical year’ as a tribute to maths wizard Srinivasa Ramanujan, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh on Monday voiced concern over the “badly inadequate” number of competent mathematicians in the country.

He also said that the perception that pursuit of mathematics does not lead to attractive career possibilities “must change.”

“It is a matter of concern that for a country of our size, the number of competent mathematicians that we have is badly inadequate”, he said at a function to here mark the 125th birth anniversary of Ramanujan.

Dr. Singh also declared December 22, the birthday of Ramanujan, as ‘National Mathematics Day.’ Students have not pursued mathematics at advanced levels over more than three decades, which has resulted in a decline in quality of mathematics teachers at schools and colleges, Dr. Singh who is on a two-day visit to the state, told a galaxy of academics at Madras University.

“There is a general perception in our society that the pursuit of mathematics does not lead to attractive career possibilities. This perception must change. This perception may have been valid some years ago, but today there are many new career opportunities available to mathematics and the teaching perception itself has become much more attractive in recent years”, Dr. Singh said.

The Prime Minister said the mathematical community has a duty to find out “ways and means” to address the shortage of top quality mathematicians and reach out to the public, especially in the modern context, where mathematics has tremendous influence on every kind of human endeavour.

Noting that the Central government has pursued a policy of encouraging scientific activities of diverse kinds, the Prime Minister said, “Given our traditions, we naturally attach special importance to mathematics...in many ways, mathematics can be regarded as the mother science“.

He said Ramanujan overcame formidable difficulties to reach the pinnacle of greatness, illustrating the inadequacy of University evaluation system in the early decades of the last century, while at the same time showing the system displayed enough flexibility to take care of mavericks like him.

“There have been many reforms since those days but there would still be talent which would elude proper evaluation. Our institutions of higher learning must be sensitive to this problem.”

“A genius like Ramanujan would shine bright even in the most adverse of circumstances, but we should be geared to encourage and nurture good talent which may not be of the same calibre as that of Ramanujan”, Dr. Singh said.

Honouring Professor Robert Kanigel, who has written a biography of Ramanujan, Dr. Singh said this book has made Ramanujan well known to the public at large all over the world.

He said the country was proud of Ramanujan and Tamil Nadu has a special claim on him for he was a Tamilian.

“Along with C V Raman and Subramanyam Chandrashekhar (both Nobel laureates), he is among the three great men of science and mathematics that Tamil Nadu and India have given to the world of modern times”, he said.

Dr. P. K. Iyengar — probing atoms with a Nobel laureate

In October 1994, following announcement of the Nobel Prize in physics, there was celebration at the Babha Atomic Research Centre at Trombay.

The scientists had gathered to cherish their long association with Prof. Bertram N. Brockhouse of McMaster University of Canada — who shared Nobel Prize with Prof. Clifford Shull of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA, that year, and to felicitate the Professor.

When Prof. Brockhouse began his experiments which eventually led to his winning the Nobel Prize, there was an Indian scientist beside him -- Dr. P. K. Iyengar. (Mr. Iyengar died on Wednesday.)

They soon co-authored a paper on the phonon spectrum of germanium. It was an extensive work on the quanta of lattice vibrations in Germanium. The paper became an instant hit as the as germanium was then the backbone of the transistor industry.

Dr. Iyengar left for India a few years later. But for several years since then, scientists from India's fledgling atomic establishment used to visit Dr. Brockhouse and the Chalk River nuclear reactor facility of the Atomic Energy of Canada Limited where he worked.

Between 1957 and 1959, Dr. Brockhouse and Dr. Iyengar published five papers on the neutron spectrum of germanium and manganese compounds.

They had looked into almost every aspect of the phonon spectrum of germanium.

Until Dr. Brockhouse and Dr. Iyengar did their pioneering work in neutron spectrometry, the main tool used by scientists to probe the structure of materials was x-ray. Several Nobel prizes had been awarded for contributions in this area. [It was C. V. Raman, who discovered the scattering of light by liquids and crystals. This phenomenon, which later came to be known as the Raman Effect, could provide insights into the atomic structure of materials. When visible light or x-ray is scattered by liquids and solids, its frequency (energy) changes and scientists could deduce much about the structure of materials from these energy changes].

But x-ray has its limitations. The slow moving neutrons, on the other hand, has an advantage over x-ray in that the energy change they undergo on scattering was easy to measure. They were also sensitive to magnetic properties of atoms and neutron spectrometry was the only method by which one could look at the magnetism at the microscopic level. Dr. Shull made his mark in one area of neutron spectrometry dealing with neutron diffraction and Dr. Brockhouse in neutron inelastic scattering. Dr. Brockhouse studied the interaction of atoms in liquids and the lattice structure of crystals. Soon, he unravelled the secrets of spin dynamics, atomic motions in liquids and much more.

The studies by Brockhouse and Iyengar settled a virtual conflict in the theories propounded by Max Born and C. V. Raman regarding motion of atoms. Born held that there is a continuous distribution in frequencies of vibration of atoms while Raman postulated discreet frequencies. It was finally established through neutron spectrometry that the frequency distribution was continuous. Raman was looking at only a part of the spectrum.

Recalling his association with Dr. Brockhouse, Dr. Iyengar remembered that Dr. Brockhouse alone was working in the area of neutron inelastic diffraction at the time he joined him. They together did path breaking work in lattice dynamics of atoms. By trying to unravel the mysteries of atom using neutron as the probe, he attempted something that even Americans (with their penchant for risk taking) thought difficult.

Dr. Iyengar told this reporter back in 1994 that Brockhouse was an influence on him which orchestrated his Indian mind to assimilate the western research outlook. "I learned to how to look at physics which is to discover the laws of nature."

The important thing was that a person who would not take a risk in attempting to make an innovation won't do an innovation. "I could see how a Nobel Prize worthy experiment was being done."

On his return to India, Dr. Iyengar took the lead for neutron spectrometric studies in India. "We had a fairly good group working on it at BARC and BARC hosted an international conference on neutron scattering in 1964. Dr. Brockhouse was also the inspiration behind the setting up of the research reactor Dhurva (in 1985)," Dr. Iyengar reminisced.