One death and a dozen mouths to feed

Prithvijit Mitra & Subhro Maitra | TNN



Karandighi (North Dinajpur): Her head covered with a veil, she treads gingerly through the ruins of her hut, guiding her siblings — a dozen of them — like a protective mother hen. Even as they run around, tugging at the bamboo poles of the hut felled by the tornado on Tuesday night, 16-year-old Mamera Khatun huddles them together and leads them to her grandfather’s house at the other end of Haldibari village. Their mother Rabeya Khatun was buried under the hut with their youngest sister Arifa, who was just-one-and-half.
Theirs is just one of the 400 huts flattened by the killer tornado in Haldibari of Karandighi block. It has left nearly 1,000 homeless in this North Dinajpur village, inhabited largely by Muslims. But none faces as uncertain a future as Mamera and her siblings. Deserted by their father Ismail Sheikh, the family made ends meet by tying bidis. Rabeya was assisted by Mamera and younger sister Nadira. The three made around Rs 80 a day, hardly enough to feed the 15-member family. Neighbours and grandparents helped. Often they had to skip meals.
On Tuesday night, the children had taken shelter in the village mosque while Rabeya hid under the bed with little Arifa in her lap. The roof collapsed on them, killing both on the spot. Rabeya was pregnant. With Rabeya dead, the family income is set to drop further. This is nothing short of a calamity for Mamera who now has to fend for her minor siblings.
It’s a daunting task that would unsettle most teenagers, but Mamera displays a maturity far beyond her age. She has already been talking to village elders, seeking information on how to augment income by working with self-help groups. “I am not going to let my brothers and sisters grow up on charity. They are not old enough to earn, so I have to work hard. I don’t even expect my grandfather to help us. And I am certainly not going to let my father take charge,” Mamera declared proudly.
While 15-year-old Nadira nods her head in agreement, the rest are still too young to gauge the seriousness of the situation. Villagers fear they might take to the wrong path, lured by the prospect of easy money.
“Rabeya had suffered all her life and we can only hope that Mamera manages to pull through the crisis. There is little else that we can do for the family,” said Harej Ali, a village elder.
Till Thursday evening, no relief had reached Haldibari. The only primary school in the vicinity was too small to accommodate the 1,000-odd, who have been left without a roof. With the land not fertile enough, people depend on tying bidi or work as labourers in cities. A thousand bidis earn them Rs 65 a day, but contractors claim a substantial chunk. “This tornado can’t leave us poorer and more miserable than we already were. It has just made us homeless now. But if you don’t have enough to eat, what difference does a roof or its absence makes?” asked Barjahan Sheik, Mamera’s grandfather.
But Mamera isn’t ready to give up yet. Like her siblings she has never been to a school in her life. “But if studying helps, I am ready to start learning. I know I can do it,” she said, gathering the pieces of bamboo poles and straws that have been left strewn all over the place where her hut stood till a night ago....published in TOI on 16.04.2010