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When 48-year-old Savitri Devi, a resident of Giridih district in Jharkhand, allegedly died of hunger on 6 November 2019, it had been almost 15 months since she had sent an application for a ration card.
Her daughter-in-law, Rinki Devi, recalls, “There was no rice in the house and the stove was not lit for two days.”
As part of an age-old tradition, Rinki’s mother sent some food grains after Savitri’s death, and that’s when the family’s meal was cooked after a gap of days.
Savitri Devi’s death has been reduced to a mere statistic in a state where 22 deaths have been reported between 2016 and 2019.
Savitri’s sudden demise was the 23rd hunger-related death yet the district administration refused to consider hunger as the cause behind her death.
Earnings Exhausted in Monthly Installment of Rs 1,470
Savitri’s husband, Rameshwar Turi, works as a daily wage labourer in Giridih’s Chirudih village. He told local activists that in 2018 they had taken a loan of Rs 25,000 from a private microfinance institution.
This meant that the couple had to pay a monthly installment of Rs 1,470 to repay the loan till May 2020.
Whatever Rameshwar used to earn daily, by offloading sacks at a nearby market, was exhausted in these EMIs (Each Monthly Installments).
Savitri and Rameshwar had no choice but to depend on a private money lender as a slew of government schemes meant to aid the BPL families failed to deliver in their case.
The MIS (Management Information System) of rural employment programme, NREGA, suggests that Savitri had worked till November 2017 and Rameshwar had received wages till 2011.
In reality, they never got the mandatory NREGA job card, so there’s no question of working on a project and receiving wages for the same.
Failure of PDS Scheme Along With Other BPL Programmes
Activist Ramdev Vishwabandhu explains how the delay in ration card deprived this couple of 35 kg of ration every month for more than a year, something that could have saved Savitri’s life:
“They didn’t have a ration card, moreover they were asked to pay Rs 2,000 for the ration card. However, Rameshwar Turi didn’t pay the bribe. Application was sent on 20 July 2018. Even after 15 months if the ration card was not issued then it amounts to violation of the Right to Service Act 2011 and Right to Food Act 2013.”Ramdev Vishwabandhu, Activist
Another local activist, Vishwanath Singh, who is associated with the Right to Food campaign, explained how other schemes launched by the Centre too failed to reach the end beneficiary:
“Despite the fact that they are landless and he works as a labourer in nearby market, they don’t have job card. They don’t have a card under the Ayushman Bharat scheme even though he fell ill. There is no benefit from the government scheme and on top of that a private company is preying on them to take away their earnings.”Vishwanath Singh, Right to Food Activist
District Administration Refuses to Admit That Hunger Caused Death
Though Rameshwar and his family members kept on insisting that Savitri had died of starvation, local administration refused to admit another hunger-related death.
Her body was not sent for post mortem before cremation so the exact cause of Savitri’s death could not be known.
According to Siraj Dutta, a Jharkhand-based Right to Food activist, there is a pattern in starvation deaths across the state and this time it was the callous attitude of officials that pushed Savitri to death:
“Definitely the responsibility lies with the state government. In all the incidents of deaths there are similarities such as persistent hunger and malnutrition and the families being denied benefit of welfare schemes as well as healthcare schemes.”Siraj Dutta, Right to Food Activist
As Jharkhand goes to polls, activists who have been tracking hunger-related deaths have been demanding that the new government should try to plug loopholes in the state’s ailing food distribution chain.
Rameshwar’s second daughter-in-law, Kunti Devi, in the meantime has procured a ration card after paying a bribe of Rs 2,000 to the dealer. Unlike her mother-in-law, Kunti chose to borrow money and paid the bribe amount just so that she isn’t reduced to a mere starvation statistic.
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