Selling wives for food

For people of the Elkela clan selling their wives to sustain themselves is no big deal, finds Bibhuti Mishra

The wives of the tribe can bid for someone who can support them. —  Photos by the writer

SASHI (27) had ‘married’ Panchu five years ago when Panchu paid Rs 250 for her. Recently, she became Shankar’s ‘wife’ when he paid Rs 800 for her. Meet the Elkela clan for whom buying and selling of wives is nothing unusual. The wives could also be given away to the highest bidder so that there would be two square meals a day for oneself and the children. Kunti was given away for Rs.500 to the highest bidder since it was becoming increasingly difficult for her husband and two kids to get food.

It can either be the husband or the wife who initiates the sale. A woman does not mind at all and can opt for another husband if he is able to pay more for her. The tribals, it is said, resort to the practice of selling wives in a bid to fight against their abject poverty. Initially, husbands used to sell their wives but now even the wives sell themselves in village fairs. These tribals are popularly known as Mundapota and are a nomadic tribe in South Orissa.

The word Mundapota means those who bury their heads. They earn money by enacting how a son buries his head in the ground while the father accompanies the show beating his drum. They perform this act every day to earn their bread. The Mundapota nomads of Orissa lead a marginalized existence. The son puts his head inside a pit for several minutes as “entertainment” for poor villagers who shell out a few coins at the end of the “show” They at times paint their body with ashes and lie buried with heads down to attract more crowd and are thus given the name Mundapota (those who bury their heads) . According to the locals, Elkelas had migrated to Ganjam and Koraput districts from neighbouring Andhra Pradesh. Many of them speak a queer Telugu-mixed-Oriya. When they could not continue to sustain themselves with their traditional practice of collecting honey and trapping mouse and snakes, they started entertaining the villagers through acrobatics. The issue of Elkelas selling their wives was brought up in the Assembly during the 90s. About 5,000, they are pariahs and wander from one place to another like nomads. Government officials deny the practice of selling and sometimes even the existence of Elkelas. The district administration reveals that they had conducted enquiries and although they are aware of the presence of some nomadic tribes, the practice of bidding for wives could not be established. Various leaders at various times have talked of rehabilitating them under the bonded labour scheme, even settling these nomads on government land and enlisting them in the voters’ list so that they could be eligible for government facilities. But precious little has come out of these talks.

Says Aruna Nayak a former student leader and native of south Orissa, “For them selling wives is a logical offshoot of their poverty-stricken existence. There is no point blaming them. Bubhukshita kim na karoti papam. (A hungry person would commit any crime to fill his belly), he says quoting the scriptures and goes on to say that it is better than the so-called civilised society where grooms are sold.

Whether it is better or worse, as long as the Elkela tribe remains on the fringes of poverty and hunger, selling of wives would remain a common practice.

With love from Japan

Madhu Jain is perhaps the only artist in India to practice the Japanese Nihonga form of painting. Vibha Sharma reports

Practice of using rock pigments for paintings had originated in India.

MADHU Jain says she is the only artist in the country who is creating Indian imagery using Nihonga, a Japanese style of painting. “If there are any more Nihonga artists like me in India, I would love to meet them,” says the artist. She has been practising this form for 10 years.

It was the eco-friendly nature of the medium used in this unique art form that attracted Madhu to it. Earlier, she used to paint with synthetic medium of oils, acrylics, etc, which involved the use of turpentine oil, linseed oil and pigments made of chemicles. “Not only did they emit a strong odour, they also hurt my eyes if the studio had not been properly aired.”

It was when she went to Japan with her husband, who was posted there, that she discovered the wonderful world of eco-friendly colours of rock and mineral pigments. The pigments, derived from natural minerals, shells, corals, semi-precious stones, gold and silver, are applied with a brush with glue and water substrate on a handmade paper, called washi.

The gold and silver pigments, says Madhu, are either in the powder form or thin leaf or flakes, which are applied on the paper and pigments layered over them. Semi-precious stones are also used in the powder form and emit a shine when light is focussed on the painting.

The gold leaf made in Japan is said to be the thinnest in the world at just about 1/10,000 mm in thickness. Rocks are crushed into very fine, sand-grain textures, and present different hues to the colours. Even the paper, washi, is a handmade paper made from flax fibre. Even resin, or Nikawa as it is called, is a special tree resin, that needs to be made fresh, every three days. Brushes too are made of special hair and can hold lot of water.

A receipient of the Indira Gandhi Priyadarshini Award, 1999, for her contribution and achievements in the field, she studied the Japanese language for seven years for guidance by senior Japanese artists at the Aoyama Bunka Centre, Tokyo. “I was told in Japan that the art of using rock pigments for paintings had originated in India, centuries ago. Which is quite possible since mineral pigments and vegetable dyes were used for paintings in Ellora, Ajanta and miniature paintings. There is a temple near Kyoto in Japan, Horyuji temple of Nara, that has wall frescos similar to those in Ajanta and Ellora caves that are said to be made around the same period.”

MAKING WAVES
Ebadi takes on US

IRANIAN human rights advocate and Nobel Peace Prize winner Shirin Ebadi has filed a lawsuit against the US Treasury Department for preventing her from publishing a book in the United States. According to a rerport by the American Center, PEN, Ebadi wants to publish her memoirs in the United States because of severe restrictions on freedom of expression in Iran, where she has been jailed in the past. However, the Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) forbids citizens of Cuba, Iran and Sudan from publishing books in the United States without a licence because of trade sanctions imposed on those countries. Ebadi has finished a draft of the book but is seeking an agent and editor in the US to translate and re-write the book for international readers. Regulations prevent her from signing a contract with the Strothman Agency, which wants to work with her and negotiate with publishers on her behalf. “The regulations seem to defy the values the United States promotes throughout the world, which always include free expression and the free exchange of ideas,” Ebadi says. Ebadi’s lawsuit joins a legal challenge launched in September, 2004, by several groups. The groups want to expose the inconsistencies in the OFAC regulations, arguing that they violate the constitutional right to free speech and ignore Congressional amendments exempting “information and informational materials” from trade embargoes. Meanwhile, in Iran, authorities are intensifying their crackdown on human rights activists and journalists.

Carrying forward the legacy

London-born 23-year-old Anoushka Shankar, daughter of legendary sitar virtuoso and composer Ravi Shankar, is among the 20 personalities who have been recognised as Asia's heroes by Time. The only artist in the world to be trained completely by her father, Anoushka made the sitar an instrument of cultural revival. While carrying forward her father's legacy, she injected freshness and energy into the art form and broadened its appeal for the younger generation. She has brought Indian classical music back home. With many honours to her credit, including being the first female recipient of the House of Commons Shield in 1998, she is, according to Amjad Ali Khan, “The future of Indian classical music.” Among others recognised as heroes by the magazine is Patna District Magistrate Gautam Goswami, who stopped an election rally of the then Deputy Prime Minister LK Advani earlier this year when it went beyond 10 pm, the limit prescribed by the Election Commission for poll campaigning.

Heaping Lajja on violence

Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasrin has been awarded the UNESCO Madanjeet Singh Prize for the Promotion of Tolerance and Non-Violence. Nasrin, who has written more than 20 books in Bengali, became known in the mid 1990s for receiving death threats because of her writings criticising Islam’s treatment of women. Several of her books are banned in Bangladesh. She is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Sakharov Prize for Freedom of Thought and Swedish PEN’s Kurt Tucholsky Award. Named after the Indian writer and diplomat, the US $100,000 UNESCO Madanjeet Singh Prize is awarded every two years to an individual or organisation for “exceptional contributions in the field of tolerance promotion.” Previous winners include Burmese dissident Aung San Suu Kyi and Indian anti-nuclear campaigner Narayan Desai. 

Saying no to cosmetic surgery

Kate Winslet is one actress who believes in natural beauty and finds Hollywood's obsession with cosmetic surgery totally disgusting. "I suppose Hollywood's the face-lift capital of the world. But I can always tell. I remember my first Oscar ceremony, spotting all the surgery on some famous faces," Femalefirst quoted her as saying. "I'm not going to name names, but it's just odd that people have so much done to themselves - the men as much as the women. They don't even look like themselves anymore," she added. ANI