A FACT-FINDING team of the United Nations Children's Fund (Unicef) which visited the Kishangaj and Shahbad blocks of Baran district concluded that the deaths of the Sahariyas were not due to starvation. The team comprised State Unicef representatives and Baran District Collector Rajendra Bhanawat. The team said that child malnutrition was widely prevalent in the two blocks; 11 of the 15 who died were below five years of age, five of them within 30 days of the neonatal period, and the other four were over 20 years of age. The causes of the neonatal deaths were septicemia and birth asphyxia.
According to the Chief Medical and Health Officer, the children had died of cerebral malaria, meningitis, bronchopneumonia, measles, encephalopathy and diarrhoeal dehydration. The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) report also stated that the villages where the deaths were reported were far-flung with limited coverage of services.
However, Brahmapura is not all that far flung; both Maytha and Brahmapura are accessible by pucca roads. According to the government, the maximum number of deaths occurred in Brahmapura.
The UNICEF report observed that in the district a large number of posts of medical officers were vacant; the Sahariyas were dependent on local private practitioners for medical care services; the government health centres were not utilised and the district hospital did not have an anaesthetist and a radiologist.
Another team, led by Harsh Mander, senior adviser to the Commissioners appointed by the Supreme Court in a case of the People's Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) on right to food, found extreme protein deficiency among 63 per cent of the households surveyed in five villages. More damaging were its findings regarding the low calorie intake (much below the World Health Organisation guidelines), indicating that the Sahariyas were "living in a situation of hunger and starvation".
The survey measured the nutritional status and the morbidity rates and found that a large proportion of the population was at risk of mortality because of chronic malnutrition and hunger. Using the Body Mass Index, which is the ratio of the weight in kilograms and the square of the height in metres, to measure the nutritional status and chronic energy deficiency, it was found that 100 per cent boys and 93 per cent girls fell in the Grade III category, which suggested a very low nutrition status.
The ghooghri - wheat soaked in hot water - served under the mid-day meal scheme was found to be neither wholesome nor complete, in contravention of the food schemes laid down by the apex court. More shockingly, the team found that the Sahariya households surveyed had APL (Above Poverty Line) cards instead of the Anytodaya cards. This was in direct violation of the Supreme Court order of May 2, 2003, that all primitive tribal families should be given Antyodaya cards, which would entitle them to buy wheat at Rs.2 a kg.
The report is comprehensive and has many recommendations, including full compliance of the Supreme Court order that every Sahariya family should be covered under the Antyodaya Anna Yojana.
There are other reports, too, compiled by local non-governmental organisations, which confirm the theory of malnourishment. Significantly, none of the reports mentions anything about liquor consumption or superstition among the Sahariyas. The more important question is the link between poverty, hunger and disease, which others seem to understand, but the State government is reluctant to admit.
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