After having completed a MBA in May, 2005 and gained lawful employment, I settled in an one room apartment in Northern Virginia. In December, 2005 I took a leave for four weeks to visit my parents and loved ones in Nepal. Although my parents left their homes in the highway corridor of Jhapa district a long time back and settled in Kathmandu, this winter they decided to take a month’s break and accompany me to Jhapa and also to Biratnagar which happens to be where my maternal uncles and aunts live.
When in Biratnagar I accompanied my maiju (maternal aunt) to the little village of Bahuni, a VDC which is split in the center (north-south) by the Chatara Canal and lies in north central part of Morang district. It was a pleasant December morning when we boarded the rickety Tata bus near Pani Tanki of Biratnagar and made the approximately one hour journey through Jhoda Haat, Ghina Haat and Neta Chowk and took the graveled road built on the levee of the Chatara Canal to Bahuni. On the way my maiju mentioned to me that we were there to collect rice paddy from the share croppers. In these parts of the eastern Terai, most fields are cultivated by the share croppers and the crop is split 50/50 though there are other arrangements as well. The costs of ploughing the fields by tractor, fertilizer, pesticides and threshing the rice by a diesel fueled mechanical monster is split 50/50. The share cropper puts in the labor where as the land owner gets his/her share of the crop for the fact that he is the legal owner of the land.
This year change has come to Bahuni. Although for the past four to five years most land owners that use share croppers to till their land have been forced to pay chanda or donations to the Maoists, this year the Maoists have decided for the first time to split the rice in three equal parts: one third each to the land owner, share croppers and the local Maoist karyakartas. A few minutes after we arrive in the fields where the rice has been stored (khamar) several young men arrive on motorbikes and I am told that these are the Maoists who have made their way to Bahuni further north where they hide in the forested areas of Morang district. Although the only VHF telephone line in the VDC has been banned by the Royal Nepal Army we find that someone from the village informed our presence in the village to the Maoist karyakartas by mobile phone. There are many things that don’t make sense in rural Nepal but this made absolute no sense to me. VHF phone lines for villagers are banned where as the Maoists have unlimited access to mobile phones!
Despite the protests from my maiju (the landowner) and the share croppers, the Maoists order the share croppers to store the share of rice now belonging to the Maoists in their bhakaris. The share croppers further protested as I come to find out that this means preparing the food for the Maoist karyakartas for the rest of the year. Maoists frequent the households where they store their share of the rice. Also, Nepali meals consists of lentils and at least one other vegetable which the household has to make available while preparing the meal for the Maoist karyakartas. I must note here that in the future these share croppers could be the target of the RNA just for the fact that they have stored the Maoists rice and prepared and served food to them – something that these share croppers do not want to do but were forced to do by the Maoists.
This monsoon season as in most of Nepal the monsoon rains have failed miserably in the eastern Morang and Jhapa districts. Rice output is below normal levels by 20-60 percent depending upon the availability of irrigation facilities. Now in many parts of rural Morang district, which also happens to be one of the top rice producing districts in the nation, a large quantity of rice is not coming out into the market for sale as it is being hoarded in rural hamlets for the use of Maoist karyakartas.
The next day I travel on the northern outskirts of Biratnagar Municipality to see the implication of these actions of the Maoists. Just five minutes walk north of the Biratnagar Sub Municipality Gate lies a mega iron rolling mill. Behind this industrial complex lies over 500 bighas of land that have not been planted for the past three seasons. I meet several land owning families here and try to find out the reason as to why this very productive land has remained barren for the past three seasons. All the people I spoke to mentioned the fact that with the Maoists demanding one third of the rice harvested, it was no longer economical for either the land owners or the share croppers to plant rice anymore. There was very little incentive to invest labor and resources to plant these fields. Both the land owners and share croppers admit that the previous system was not the best, but it did allow both parties to share what the land offered. Moreover, it is the sharecroppers who refuse to work on the land despite their low socio-economic conditions for the fear of having to store the Maoists share of rice and feed the Maoists from time to time for the rest of the year.
More later……But would love to hear your comments!!!
Pragati Sijapati
Fairfax, VA
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