The legacy of the Raj
Speaking generally
By Chanchal Sarkar

SOME said the house had been a forest bungalow. Now it stood in the middle of Ranchi’s Doranda suburb, the bungalow of an official. The garden was about three football-fields big with magnificent pine trees, deodars and all manner of other trees. It was a wonderful escape from damp, cold and fog-bound Delhi. We sat in the garden in the crystaline sunlight, with birds wheeling above and flowers lighting up the grass beside us. In fact we went beyond, we didn’t go inside for lunch but had it carried to us in trays and ate in the sunlight. They were days to remember, soon in Delhi they would be forgotten.

The house itself was very large with five bedrooms, a dining-room and an office and four bathrooms. The roof was all of tile and it must be a tough job to retile or repair it. All this was a part of the British heritage. They certainly knew how to live even though the building was functional and without any flourishes of luxury. A modern addition were two garages and a couple of guard rooms to check out people going in and coming out. Living in great enjoyment were two dogs. One an Alsatian about nine years old who was so faithful that she never left my friend’s side for a moment. The other was a young Dalmatian, utterly sweet and michievous.

* * *

While the controversy rages about the attacks on Christians and Vajpayee is ambiguous, I went to see a home of one of India’s finest exports — the Missionaries of Charity. This was a leper home called Radharani a little way from Ranchi amid rural surroundings. About 200 of leprosy are housed there in new buildings. Sister Ruben showed us around. She was from Kerala and had worked with Mother Teresa in Calcutta before. Apart from individual patients there were seven families where the children were not lepers. They went to school. The patients had been trained to keep the place clean, to cook, to make and put on dressings. Everything was free. The worst sufferers were those from the villages in the interior. They were very ignorant of the disease and its treatment. They did not know that most of the time leprosy is non-contagious. It is almost fully curable if diagnosed at in time and that international help made its treatment free. Quite a number had been thrown out of their villages and had somehow themselves in Radharani. The worse cases were of what is called reactive leprosy where the nerves were attacked. One man I saw had become blind and could not even shut his eyes.

The patients were eating when we visited. They were sitting in the sun with their plates and looked remarkably cheerful. Did the fact that there were statues of the Virgin Mary trouble me? Not at all.

There were seven nuns, Sisters, in Radharani. Four of them had been trained in the school of Tropical Medicine in Calcutta in taking care of leper patients. We had broken into Sister Ruben’s lunch time but she was not in the least put off. Few donations came from Ranchi, she said.

* * *

I shall never understand who and what the Naxalites are. Near the hill top bauxite mines of the Indian Aluminium Company the whole area has been declared Naxalite-infested. Are they people to be feared? Even some policemen say that they never trouble the villagers but are tough on businessmen and ask them for money. Some groups apparently, openly indulge in extortion and some are there to help villagers. Of course they also help themselves as they need money for living and for buying arms. The weakness of my visit was that I never met anyone who had talked to a Naxalite.

The only communication was through letters and there had been a few kidnappings of businessmen and transporters. They had not been harmed but had been made to walk up and down the hills till they were exhausted! Some corporations were apparently willing to pay protection money, while others were firm in wanting to resist.

Mining continued in full strength and was done by modern machinery which did not blast the earth and filled in the gouged portions simultaneously.

The machines we saw came from Japan. The area was supremely beautiful, but the effect of indiscriminate tree felling was beginning to tell. Once upon a time no ceiling fans were needed in summer and the temperature was about 22 degrees. Now it rises to 41. When I go next there will be even fewer trees, I fear.