(With Ravi Varma at Port Blair Airport
It was nine in the
morning when we reached Port Blair. The rain had washed the city. Trees and
bushes were on both sides of the road. We were heading towards our hotel from
the airport. The city looked fresh and lovely. I asked the driver his name.
“Ravi Verma,” he said
“Ravi Verma is a famous
name. There was a great painter by the name Ravi Verma; the hero of the film,
‘Karz’ is also Ravi Verma.”.
“I am also no less,” he
said, quoting a popular dialogue of a Hindi film, and smiled at us.
Ravi Verma is a
mechanical engineer. He has a manufacturing unit that produces ceramic,
porcelain and steel teeth. He has employed three technicians. Besides, he works
as a coordinator in a travel agency. He has his own car; if required, he drives
the tourists from the airport to the hotel, or from the hotel to any
destination.
Ravi Varma’s grandfather
had come to Andaman. The friend of his grandfather was a prisoner in the
Cellular jail. His friend, a freedom
fighter, had participated in the non-cooperation movement. In 1922, the freedom
fighters set ablaze to the police station in Chouruchoura, that killed
twenty-two police. In that case, his friend was awarded life imprisonment, and
sent to the Cellular jail of Andaman. India got independence in 1947. The
prisoners of Cellular jail were set free. No one of his friend’s family members
were alive; his parents, brothers and sisters were all dead by the time he came
out of the jail. The government had given him a piece of land in Andaman. He
was farming and doing business. In 1970, he brought his friend, Ravi Verma’s
grandfather to Andaman.
(At Cellular Jail)
The criminals or the
mutineers were imprisoned in Andaman after sepoy mutiny in 1857. There no scope
to escape from there. The sea surrounded the Andaman Islands, if someone
escaped from the jail, he could not cross the sea water to reach the mainland.
The Britishers built the Cellular Jail between 1896-1906. The Cellular jail had
697 cells. The criminals and the political prisoners were put up there. The
cells were small, there was one skylight high above on the back wall. There was
no window. The door was locked with an iron gate. The jail authorities tortured
the political prisoners. They gave water only twice in a day. The prisoners
were forced to stay in their cells after six in the evening. They were provided
with earthen pots to store urine or excreta, if they had to attend call of
nature in the night. The prisoners had to put up with the stinks of their own human
waste stored in the room. They were given adulterated food. They had to press
the coconuts or mustard to produce oil. They were given targets for the day, to
produce oil as much as one bullock could do. Besides, they were given other
physical work.
The criminals who
completed ten or twelve years in the jail were given the charge of administering
political prisoners. The political prisoners were tortured more than the murder
convicts. The Britishers tormented them like the Nazis did to the Jews in
concentration camps. The cellular jails were constructed in such a way; the
front of one row of cells confronted the back of another row of cells. There
was little chance of the prisoners knowing each other, if they were in the
cells of different rows. Vir Savarkar and his elder brother, Ganesh Savarkar
were suffering jail terms at the same time, but they did not know for two
years. They were so cruel and the torture was so severe, the prisoners could
not endure. Indubhusan Roy, a freedom fighter committed suicide, Ullashkar
Dutta turned mad. Many political prisoners died of torture.
(Moving to another island by a cruise )
The political prisoners
were set free after India got independence. The near and dear ones of many
prisoners were dead by the time they were free, like that of Ravi Verma’s
grandfather’s friend. The government gave them land in Andaman. They settled
there. The people of other states had gone there for business.
The original inhabitants
of Andaman and Nicobar Islands are Jarwas, Onges, Sentinelese, Shompens, etc.
but they are far way from modernity and civilization; they still reside in the
jungles, and cannot be brought to the mainstream.
The government of India
changed the name of Port Blair to Srvijaypuram. In past, during the NDA rule of
prime minister, Narendra Modi, the government had also changed the names of
Havelock islands and Neil islands to Swaraj Deep and Saheed Deep,
respectively.
I asked Manjit, the coordinator of the Travel
Agency in Swaraj Deep, “The government have recently changed the name of Port
Blair to Srvijaypuram. What’s your opinion?” He said, “What will we get in the change
of name? We need good roads, other facilities, development so that we can live
happily and more tourists would come.” Asked him, “What freebies do you get
from the government?” He said, “Rice and wheat. But there is much corruption,
the freebies do not reach the needy. But who has time to keep account of that?”
Andaman and Nicobar
Islands are union territories, administered by the central government. They get
benefit of the central government schemes. They do not have the schemes like mamata
yojana a woman gets when she is conceived to the schemes like Harischandra
yojana the family gets when a person dies, like in Odisha.
(Published in an Odia Daily, The Prameya on 15.12. 24)
I hired an uber
taxi after I landed in Bhubaneswar airport to come home. I was chitchatting
with the driver, The driver told he was doing job outside the state. He had to
return to the state as his father fell ill. He was getting around thirty
thousand after meeting all the incidental expenses. He had already got a job in
the state. He would no longer drive an uber vehicle.
“What will be your salary
in the new job?” I asked.
“Twenty-thousand,” he
said.
“You are now earing
thirty thousand per month. There is scope in a business to rise up; in future,
you can expand your business. What’s your future, if you do a job in the
private sector?”
He said, “Driving a
vehicle is a tough business. My waist aches.”
The per capita income of
Andaman & Nicobar Islands is two lakh and fifty-eight thousand rupees, more
than the national per capita income of rupees two lakh twelve thousand. The per
capita income of Odisha stands at rupees one lakh and sixty-one thousand, much
less than national per capita income.
Manjit does not have time
for free rice and wheat. Ravi Verma says his profit from the dental
manufacturing unit is around three to four lakhs per month. His net income per
month, after payment of salary to his three employees and other incidental
charges would be not less than rupees one lakh. Besides, he works for a travel
agency.
Ravi had come to drop us
in the airport. He said, “Sir, keep my phone number. You can ring me up
anytime, in the day or in the night. Give me prior information, if you again
visit Andaman.”
******
