Chapter Eleven, Section ***III
As our program developed, with the number of FFW schemes increasing daily and no stopping of our vehicles at the border, CFRA increased the size of the consignments from Calcutta Port. To help still further in overcoming our transportation problem, CFRA gave us a new 35 hp. Massey Ferguson tractor with an attached three-ton trailer, because there were no rules against the movement of "agricultural vehicles" over state borders. Keith trained a local chap to drive and to keep the food rolling in almost 24 hours a day, apart from his rest periods. Even so, we could not move in all the food we needed.
However, this arrangement was not satisfactory because of having to unload, store and reload grains at Bhavnagar. Our British colleagues at Bhavnagar also were finding it difficult to store the hundreds of bags of wheat for their own program in Palamghat District, so having to find space for our stocks too, made it quite a burden for them When the police seemed to be allowing us to operate Tilamai's ten-ton CFRA truck over the border, we kept that vehicle rolling for as long as the driver had strength to remain at the wheel.
Tilamai was a Christian and a very dedicated person. He loved his truck; he loved driving and he loved the Uraon people, particularly those of Surgapam Lovingly and willingly, he worked like a slave. As the weather warmed up, he preferred to travel in the cooler hours of the night and this also made it easier on his beloved truck, especially the tires. This made it very difficult for us in having to lose many hours of sleep to receive and weigh in the food consignments at any hour of the night. Keith cautioned Tilamai to rest up but his reply was, "Sahib, another one thousand bags of wheat (100 Kg’s. each) have arrived at Daulatapur and Miss Shantibe Dube told me she has received the freight documents from the railways covering a further five thousand of your bags which are on the way!”.
There was just no way that we could have had a successful program without the gracious help of Shantibe ("Moussi"). She kindly offered to become CFRA "Contact Person" in Daulatapur and to take delivery not only of our own consignments of wheat, "Bulgur", milk powder and edible oil, but also those of our colleagues, the Burtons and Saunders, at Bhavnagar. As if this wasn't enough, she also took on the responsibility for receiving and storing railway consignments for John Barlow's Latimur-based American Mennonite Mission program midway between Daulatipur and Ranitola. At the peak of the combined Surgapam-Palamghat relief programs, Shantibe Dube took delivery of her largest consignment - twenty-five rail wagons full!
With Tilamai and his ten-tonner out of commission, following an accident when he fell asleep at the wheel, who would do all the extra driving needed? Who me? "Yes You!" The answer came back every time. Yes, I drove that CFRA FC-150 Jeep in places, which many would think impossible, even for such a four-wheel drive vehicle. I drove it over ploughed fields, improvised bridges, through overgrown jungle tracks and along sandy riverbeds. At times, I drove precariously along the top of embankments, balancing with only inches to spare on both sides.
I drove up and down, in bottom gear and "special-case", in places that seemed almost vertical. With an all-metal cab and the engine placed between the two front Seats, temperatures, while driving in the summer sun, would reach as high as 125 degrees F. But even with this Jeep and the tractor-trailer working constantly, with two drivers, we were unable to haul in all our wheat now being off-loaded at Bhavnagar. Much of this food was being utilized also, in the free kitchen for indigents - those with no strength to work on the relief schemes. We were getting desperate and starting to feel the strain, emotionally and physically. Unless the Government soon took action to help, we would crack under the pressure.
Just as depression was about to overwhelm us, we were informed of the arrival of a new District Magistrate or "Collector", at Aranchalganj. It was reported that he was a good man, with a real desire to do something about the desperate situation. We were packing our bags to drive to Aranchalganj, to meet this top official, when our faithful "mail-runner" friend, Sobram, arrived with a sack of letters from Lionel. In the post was an important looking Government document that, at first, struck terror at the heart.
It was a message from Kevin Marlin, Director of the GRACE program and had been sent through Government channels by Police Radio from Bhopal to Aranchalganj and from there, by the regular "bus" service, the seventy miles to Ramanupuri. From there, it was sent by special Government "runner" to Bhavnagar, where the Burtons sent it on to us through Sobram.
We received Kevin's appeal at 2 am on Sunday the 10th. April, requesting us to be in Bhopal for a Summit Meeting with M.P. Govt. officials at 11 am on the following Tuesday. Over five hundred miles separated us from the provincial capital and, in places, the "road" is unimaginable by Western standards. We figured that it would be utterly impossible to make the whole trip by Jeep, so decided to drive to Jabalpur and, from there, take the train. En route, we stopped at Aranchalganj and met the new Collector, along with the Deputy Director of Tribal Welfare. These officials were shocked to get our report, confirming what they had heard of the situation.
They could hardly believe what the people were suffering, when all official government reports were to the contrary. This concerned Collector immediately planned to leave on a three-day tour of the affected area, that he might assess the situation personally. "If what I am hearing is true," he said, "I shall need thirteen thousand tons of grain to keep the people of Surgapam alive - six thousand tons immediately, if it is to be moved into the remote areas before the monsoon sets in and seven thousand tons as soon as possible after that." And what was there for him to draw on from provincial government food stocks? - - - Nothing!
There were no food grain reserves anywhere in Madhya Pradesh and, because that province had not voiced its needs to Central Government and the world, there was nothing on the way from outside, such as was now pouring into Bihar, UP and other states. In Aranchalganj, we stayed with Indian Lutheran friends who fed us at midnight and sent us off at 3.30 a.m. to begin one of the most harrowing travel experiences of our lives. Like crazy safari stunt drivers, we hurtled that FC- 150 over stony and unrepaired "roads" that don't appear on any maps. Winding up and down, through dense jungle passes, we smashed our way to Pendra Road where kindly Disciples folk replenished our earthen "surahis" with boiled drinking water.
Amazingly, without any broken springs, axles or transmission, we reached Jabalpur at six o'clock in the evening and were certainly glad to meet our Canadian friends, Rex & Doris Bickford, working with the Disciples. They kindly gave us bath water, a place to rest a brief while, a lovely meal and secured berths for us on the night train to Bhopal. They also sent off an express telegram to Kevin Marlin, assuring him that we would arrive in time for the special meeting the next day. Our train reached Bhopal at eleven next morning, just one hour before the important meeting was scheduled to start.
Kevin met us at the station, while Mavis prepared a wonderful breakfast, over which we discussed the tragic conditions throughout much of M.P.. Yes, it was not just Surgapam that was affected, although we learned that our eastern part of the province was the hardest hit. Kevin was a well-known personality in Bhopal. He was deeply respected by leaders of all sections of society. What surprised us most of all about him was the position of "un-official" authority he held in government circles. Relationships between India and the US were none too cordial in those days and yet, here was this American Director of the GRACE Program, as it were, "lording it over" even the highest Indian provincial officials.
He did this in a most amiable way, with not a trace of the paternalism, arrogance or ostentation, so characteristic of some Westerners who ruled India in the past and who have given the white-man such a bad name. I think he was able to get away with his brusque behaviour because he was identified with India. He loved the Indian people, their nation, their culture, their aspirations, their food, their customs and he loved the work he was doing. It did not surprise us, therefore, to discover that it was largely due to the influence of Kevin, that Surgapam received its new, energetic Collector who was better able to cope with an emergency situation. It was due directly to Kevin's appeal that the Emergency Drought Relief Committee was formed under the capable Chairmanship of the M.P. Chief Secretary.
Furthermore, it was directly due to Kevin's insistence that Keith, another foreigner, was invited to be a member of the Committee. Kevin wanted Keith, as one outside the government, and as one in close touch with the famine conditions in the worst affected area of M.P., to prove that what he and Mavis had seen on their tour of Surgapam, was true.
Many of the state's top officials were included in that Committee. There was the Secretary of Revenue, the Director of Tribal Welfare, Secretaries of all the following departments - Relief, Development, Forests, Health, Agriculture, Irrigation and, of course, the Chief Secretary himself.
Keith had a plan for M.P. and Surgapam, in particular and Kevin made sure that it was presented before this august assembly. There were those who thought his plan was an impossible dream. Most of the donor agencies had some stocks in reserve, with some consignments en route, on the high seas. Keith wanted these shipments diverted from other ports to Calcutta. What a crazy idea! He further proposed that priority be given to those areas, including Surgapam, which would be cut of within weeks by the approaching monsoon. Kevin thought Keith's scheme was so feasible that he arranged for it to be placed well up on the agenda.
The Meeting got under way with an impassioned speech by the Chief Secretary. This devout South Indian Christian obviously was overcome with emotion. Standing with outstretched arms in a gesture of appeal, with hands shaking and voice faltering, he cried out, "Gentlemen, gentlemen, my godarms are empty - empty - EMPTY!"
It was clear from the outset that, without massive imports of food grains, this distinguished group of concerned people could do absolutely nothing to alleviate the starving conditions now manifest in many parts of the province.
The Chief Secretary and the former Maharajah of Surgapam, Maharajah Singh Das Gupta, now the Secretary of Revenue, whom Keith knew personally, were most impressed by Keith's plan.
To Keith, there seemed to be no reason why those areas with transport facilities during the monsoon season, could not forego their food reserves in favour of other less advantaged areas, such as Surgapam and other isolated parts of M.P.. Their shortfall could be made up later, once emergency food had reached the remote places soon to be cut off by unbridged, swollen rivers.
Such recommended transfer of American food shipments
could only be made in consultation with donor agencies, being beneficiaries
under the Indo-US Agreement of 1951 covering "PL-480"
commodities.(PL-480 stands for US Public Law Clause 480). US Aid, based in New
Delhi, was the Department of US Government Administration responsible for the
allocation ofPL-480 shipments to agencies such as Christian Food & Relief
Agency (CFRA), Lutheran World Relief,
Amazingly, Keith's plan was unanimously accepted by the Committee, drafted in a legalized form and addressed to US Aid in New Delhi. Also, it was proposed that all the donor agencies able to cooperate in an Emergency M.P. relief program, should endeavour to be represented in three weeks' time at the second meeting of the Committee, to be held in Bhopal. Because of the urgency of the situation, with thousands of people facing death by starvation, Kevin proposed that the appeal to Central Government, US Aid and the Donor Agencies, be delivered personally rather than lose a week of time in the post.
Keith was deputized to go to New Delhi with all the precious documents. A hasty reservation on the 4 p.m. Indian Airlines flight was made and within two hours, Keith was in the capital.
His first call was at the CFRA Head Office where appointments were made for him to meet top Indian officials, in particular, "The Officer on Special Duty for Relief'. Also, arrangements were made for him to meet US Aid authorities. The contact with the Central Govt. Relief Officer was an interesting, if not tragic experience, for it revealed that there were stocks of Central Govt. wheat in M.P., but most of it was only on paper!
Fortunately, Keith was able to take back to Bhopal the assurance that one thousand tons of wheat could be utilized from those Central Govt. buffer reserves. This was far short of the thirteen thousand needed by the Surgapam District Collector. Actually, those one thousand tons turned out to be only five hundred tons, which was the first large amount to be received by the Collector, since the beginning of the crisis.
After Keith left for the Bhopal Emergency Relief Meeting on that eventful Tuesday, I did not see him again until he returned from New Delhi, four days later. Meanwhile, Kevin and Mavis treated me royally with air-conditioned accommodation, parties, movies and visits to the homes of very distinguished Indian friends. Up in New Delhi, Keith also, was "living it high". At the Bhopal Committee Meeting he had felt like Moses in the Courts of Pharaoh and in the capital, as well, he felt humbled in the presence of so many elite Indian Officials and high-ranking executives of the American Embassy.
It was to the basement of the palatial US Embassy, that US-Aid Officials took Keith to have all the relevant documents mimeographed for dispatch to the various concerned Donor Agencies. Also, telex messages were radioed around the world to have reserve stocks, still on the high seas, diverted to more convenient ports, particularly Calcutta, thus saving valuable time. It was all so exciting and unreal- a 20th. Cent. re-enactment of the "Loaves & Fishes" incident of so long ago.
Almost as soon as Keith returned to Bhopal, preparations were under way for the Committee's second emergency meeting. The Chief Secretary seemed to think Keith's visit to Delhi had been worthwhile. "And what can we do to help you with your own program, Mr. Skillicorn?", the Chief Secretary inquired. Keith was quick off the mark in explaining the problem he had of moving into Surgapam, five thousand bags of wheat, piled up like a mountain in front of Shantibe "Moussie's" house, with no tarpaulins to protect it from the impending pre-monsoon showers.
With no trucks of his own, since the accident to Tilamai's Mercedes, Keith requested a border permit to ply privately contracted trucks, including Premchand's, (Shantibe Dube's nephew), between Daulatapur and Nawapara, Surguja. He had hoped that the Chief Secretary at least would offer him that much concession, which in itself, would be a Miracle, if granted.
"How many bags of wheat do you have to move before the monsoon?" the Chief Secretary asked a second time. When Keith quoted the figure of five thousand, this sympathetic official said, "Why, you'll need a FLEET of trucks to move that amount! Let me see on the map just where you are located. Yes, Raipur seems to be the nearest place where sufficient trucks will be available. Picking up one of the four 'phones on his large polished table, the Chief Secretary issued a fusillade of orders that really impressed Keith. "Put me on to the Divisional Officer PWD. (Public Works Dept.)."
Inquiries were made of this Bhopal-based top official whether six 10-ton trucks could be made available from the Raipur fleet. When the answer was in the affirmative, a different 'phone was picked up. "Give me Police Radio... Put me on to the Sub-Divisional Officer PWD., Raipur I have been in touch with your Chief in Bhopal about the need for six of your ten-tonners to be sent to Daulatapur, Bihar, as soon as possible. The drivers will report, en route, to the District Collector, Aranchalganj, the S.D.O. Ramanupuri, the Deputy Commissioner, Daulatapur and Miss Shantibe Dube, Daulatapur."
All this took place in a matter of minutes. Again, the phone was lifted. "Give me Police Radio Put me on to the Superintendent of Police, Aranchalganj Six PWD. trucks will be passing through to pick up emergency wheat from Daulatapur. I want the drivers issued with all the necessary border permits... Please put me on to the District Collector ... I am dispatching six PWD. trucks from Raipur depot to Daulatapur and would like you to issue the drivers with all the necessary food and fuel vouchers for the return trip and at least a week's "living away from home" allowance .
Never before, had Keith experienced such a desire on the part of an Indian official to go out of his way to be helpful. It was more than unreal.
We returned home by the same route - train etc, Jabalpur and from there by CFRA Jeep, via Aranchalganj. On the train from Bhopal, we took with us, in the baggage car, sixteen packages of eighty pound each of Heinz, strained baby chicken food in small glass jars, being a gift from GRACE. Allowing for the personal bags we had, this required eighteen porters, who, carrying all these goods and baggage on their heads, followed us to the rail platform as though we were a couple of explorers or big-game hunters on safari in the heart of darkest Africa.
At Jabalpur, our Disciples friends promised us ten thousand rupees worth (approx. $1,000) of high protein "Multi-Purpose Food", which reached us later, from Madras. At Pendra Road, other US friends donated powdered milk so that our truck was overloaded.
We stayed several days in Aranchalganj, meeting with Govt. officials, shopping and even being entertained by the District Collector and his beautiful young wife in the cool of their private garden. The Tribal Welfare Officer also received us at an official party in our honour. It was all like a dream.
As we were about to leave for home, some unknown persons ran towards us shouting, "Sahib, Sahib, your six trucks have arrived". We couldn't think for the life of us, what trucks? And then we saw them as we called at a garage to fill our Jeep tank. They looked so impressive - brand new Mercedes ten-tonners, in bright canary yellow!
It was obvious to us, that the driver-in-charge had told all and sundry the purpose of this special mission, to move in five thousand bags of relief wheat for the Nawapara Sahib. At Baliganj, Ramanupuri and Daulatapur, the trucks made a big impression upon the locals who had never before seen such a convoy, which served to advertise our program and generate hope.
At this crucial "eleventh hour", for the thousands now facing imminent starvation, hope was so essential and could mean the difference between life and death.
At the various bus terminals and junctions where the fleet drivers stopped for tea along the way, passengers conveyed that hope to all parts of the district. It was a Miracle.
On arrival home, we were shocked to learn of starvation deaths near Ramchandratoli, eighty miles from Nawapara, beyond Ramanupuri. Somehow, we just had to get food into that remote area, near the UP border, even if only to maintain hope.
Tilamai's CFRA Mercedes had been patched up at least enough to make it mobile, so Keith, once again committed the necessary hi-jacking and loaded it up with one hundred bags of wheat, to race through to Ramchandratoli before the Kanahari River blocked off all vehicular communications with that part of the district. Unfortunately, the truck was never the same, following the accident. It lacked power and Keith bogged down heavily in the deepest channel of the river. We suspected that the mechanic who did the truck repairs, pilfered some of the injector pump parts - a common practice in India - replacing them with worn out or non-genuine parts.
Happily, there was more than enough manpower available to unload the truck, dig it out of the sand and carry its precious one hundred bags to the opposite side of the river. After this three-hour job, Keith informed the coolies that he did not have money to pay them but, if they could appoint a representative, he would take him to Nawapara where cash was available. "Sahib, we don't want money", they said. "We cannot eat money but would like some of your wheat". Later, it was revealed that, in the whole town of Ramanupuri, no food of any sort was available for purchase by folk in their economic range.
The further sixty miles stretch of rough track was a nightmare for Keith who, three times more, had to unload and re-load the truck and have it pushed up difficult slopes. Each such delay meant calling local villagers to help keep the truck moving and enable Keith to deliver a somewhat depleted load.
With ninety-six bags of wheat left, Keith set about implementing a "percolating tank" relief scheme, under the supervision of one of the local school teachers, who set aside a class-room for wheat storage space. Next day, one hundred of the most needy persons able to do physical work and who represented the most desperate families, were enlisted and paid one kilo of wheat for every one hundred cubic feet of earth they dug and carried.
Although this was one of our smallest schemes, it later came to be highly commended by the Prime Minister, Mrs. Indira Gandhi, who flew to Aranchalganj and on to the site by helicopter. On the day she visited Ramchandratoli to investigate the reported famine deaths, one prominent landlord informed her that - "a foreign missionary is doing relief work and trying to gain favour with the people!"
When the Prime Minister inspected our highly successful scheme, she was infuriated, and turning to the big, fat complainant said, in no uncertain terms --"Tum waisa hi karo …You go and do like wise!"
Chapter Eleven, Section ***IV
Back in Australia, Dr. Rae W. Dunhill was spreading news abroad of the famine conditions he had seen with his own eyes. This resulted in a magnificent response by the Australian churches who sent us one hundred and ten tons of wheat and one hundred and fifty-seven cases of lovely, full- cream powdered milk. Some of this we shared with our British colleagues, the Burtons and Saunders, for, although we expatriates were handling huge shipments ofPL-480 commodities, we didn't qualify to dip into these personally. Also, there were the many volunteers to feed, both Indians and foreigners. In this fine Australian shipment, were some sophisticated and easily digested foods such as "Enertone", "Pro-Vita Breakfast Food", "Weet Harts", "Glaxo Baby Food" and various tonics, all of which helped us in treating special nutritional problem cases.
From Holland, we received multi-vitamin tablets by the hundreds of thousands and New Zealand friends poured in clothing while the British churches sent us funds. All this was unsolicited. However, what touched our hearts, perhaps more than all these outside shipments put together, were the precious personal supplies of rice, flour and sugar that our dear friend, Shantibe "Moussie" Dube, sent us from Daulatapur, out of her own family ration.
With no "Fair-Price-Shops" and food-rationing cards available to us in our remote area of Surgapam, feeding ourselves was one of our biggest problems. Without some of the special refined foods mentioned above, we would have found it most difficult, if not impossible, to save some of the really emaciated cases.
People were coming to us with no gastric juices. Whatever we gave them orally, even a spoonful of skim milk, would be thrown up. In such cases, the only way to even hope of saving them was by giving intravenous dextrose, but there were times when Keith and I could not get sufficient stocks of IV dextrose and some of our patients had to die. Severe cases of malnutrition sometimes died by gormandising, having neither the ability to digest, nor the strength to vomit.
They would actually die of food poisoning. For this reason, extremely emaciated people had to start their treatment and rehabilitation first with a IV "drip", then skim milk from an eye-dropper or tea-spoon, progressing to full-cream powdered milk, then "Enertone" or the like and finally on to "Bulgur" or par-boiled wheat. For the children, we had the refined baby food mentioned, along with the strained chicken we brought from Bhopal. Many children were saved through my "Chicken Club".
People were not fed indefinitely in our indigents' "free kitchens". As soon as they had the physical strength to swing a "kudali" (something like a mattock) or lift a basket of dug earth, they were drafted to the FFW projects. We found that most people preferred to work on the projects, rather than be 'spoon-fed'. It was, therefore, a time of real joy when folk "graduated" from a free kitchen to a percolating tank, well, road or canal projects etc..
We even had healthy blind people working on the projects, digging and throwing the earth back to be gathered in baskets. They often told us of the sense of dignity and self-esteem they developed through manual work and how much happier they were to be earning the food they ate.
It upset us very much to hear reports, in Western circles, that the food being sent to alleviate famine conditions, was finding its way onto the open market. It should be remembered that, once a person has worked for that food - only a starvation ration at that - the beneficiary is entitled to do with that food whatever he or she wants. With no monetary income, it might be necessary to sell a little wheat or other grains earned, to purchase a piece of soap, a few spices, cooking oil, clothes or even to pay off a loan.
Another wonderful blessing we received was in the form of about two hundred food parcels, some of which we were able to share with colleagues Burtons and Saunders. In fact, Anthea Saunders had real problem feeding her daughter, Heather, a little toddler at the time. With the help of these parcels from the Australian churches, the women of the Christian Temperance Union and certain individuals, she was able to get a balanced diet.
My sister, Mirrie, at my request, arranged for some Australian food parcels to be sent directly to our British colleagues. Without these food parcels, we would have found life most difficult, for we did not qualify to share in the huge quantities of PL-480 wheat, "Bulgur", rice, maize, powdered milk, sorghum and multi-purpose food that flowed into the area like a mighty river.
Also, we had a steady stream of volunteers to feed. They came from all over India, the US, Australia, Britain and Denmark. During the hot weather vacation, also we had a local volunteer, Kalemari Kharna1, from Yoetmal Theological Seminary, where he was training to be the first graduate (BA) leader of our Indian churches. The British Gospel Mission had great hopes that this fine young Uraon tribal, the first university graduate in the area, would take considerable responsibility for the church oversight when the Mission finally decided to withdraw from the Indian field. For this reason, the Mission had invested heavily in Kalemari's training. It was hoped that he would gain a Bachelor of Divinity degree.
We had taken a particular interest in this dedicated young man and had done everything possible to make him feel at home in an English-medium college. He had gained a BA in Hindi-medium and really, should have taken his theological studies in Hindi. At Yoetmal, which was a rather sophisticated college by Indian standards and more so by tribal standards, Kalemari found it most difficult to keep pace and, sadly, failed in English.
Keith wrote to the college Principal, a personal friend, to try to find a way of making life for Kalemari more endurable on the Yoetmal campus. He even sent funds to the Principal out of our own salary, in a frantic effort to encourage Kalemari to stay at College by supplying him with extra books, clothes and equipment which he could not afford himself. But all of Keith's endeavours were to no avail. When Kalemari returned home on vacation, it was for good. In spite of long sessions of counselling, Keith could not persuade him to return to Yoetmal. Instead, he wanted to join the staff of six volunteers who were receiving from CFRA a subsistence wage of only thirty rupees a month. In the hope that Kalemari would change his mind and return to college to complete his ministerial training, Keith refused to enlist him as a volunteer. Nevertheless, Kalemari remained unofficially as a volunteer, based at Karanja, though without any remuneration and did a splendid job, especially when Keith had to return to Bhopal for the second meeting of the Emergency Drought Relief Committee. Kalemari has continued to serve his Uraon people and the wider community, to the time of writing this book, but that's another story.
His personal decision to give up training for the ministry in favour of a more socially orientated work among his own tribal people, was to have very serious repercussions for Keith, in his own ministry. Rumours later spread within the Gospel Mission churches in Britain, that Keith had enticed Kalemari to give up his theological studies for "more lucrative possibilities nearer home", to use their own words!.
On hearing these accusations, we were stunned. No attempt had been made to investigate the matter impartially. Had Principal Kenton Bateman been contacted, easily he could have testified that Keith did all within his power to help Kalemari adjust to a different environment and bear the "stigma" of being a "tribal".
This was to be the first of a long series of rumours, misunderstandings, innuendoes, allegations and accusations that, but for the miraculous Grace of Jesus Christ, would have tom us apart. How we responded to those fiery darts - certainly not in our own strength - is the making of another miracle.
Three weeks had elapsed since our return from Bhopal and the time had come for Keith to attend the second meeting of the Special Famine Emergency Committee. As the monsoon rains had already started, there was no way of making an overland journey, as before and yet it was of fundamental importance that Keith be present in that meeting.
In those days, Indian Airlines operated a DC-3 "Dakota" flight - only one a day - between Ranitola and Bhopal, via Rourkela (Orissa), Raipur and Nagpur. Later, when this service was phased out, Keith had to travel to Bhopal, during the monsoon season, from Ranitola, via Lucknow, Delhi and Gwalior. In all, before the situation returned to normal, Keith was called to make five such long, circuitous flights to Bhopal, costing us a small fortune. Near the end of the famine, we had not a cent left of our personal money and had to request Stanton Massey, Secretary of the British Gospel Mission's Social Questions Committee, if he would kindly permit us to use some of the Committee's grant to cover such emergency travel. Stanton could see the point and kindly agreed; but this proved to be Keith's undoing! From then on, we were in real trouble!
The second meeting of the Emergency Committee was a dismal failure, with only a few Donor Agencies present, probably because of travel difficulties during the monsoon. It was not until the third meeting, by which time Famine had been officially declared in M.P., that the vast majority of those Agencies using PL-480 commodities, launched a concerted effort against the conditions that had taken many lives. As soon as Keith was sure that the situation was under control, with organized FFW projects, free kitchens for indigents and a "Seed Loan" program under way, he withdrew from the Committee. It was far too distant and Keith could not afford to be away from the field for such long periods.
On the occasion of attending those Bhopal meetings, while passing through New Delhi, Keith was able to confer with CFRA officials and gain some extra facility that made the trip so much more worthwhile. One of those bonus packages was to secure a small amount of rice seed, which was distributed, especially to farmers who had shared in the "percolating tank" FFW schemes. In the winter months, wheat seed was distributed to those who had sunk wells or constructed dams, providing irrigation potential during the coming dry months. Beneficiaries of the seed distribution project were encouraged to repay that seed from the harvest that was now assured and this would be further invested in the next year's crop. The whole seed program was a great success.
Everything looked good until word spread of the outbreak of both Cholera and Smallpox. Suresh Khamal had contacts in Daulatapur and returned from there with enough vaccine to inoculate every person in the whole Champapur area. That program was spectacular, resulting in no loss of life in our part of Surgapam, either from Cholera or Smallpox.
Once the government supplies of grain started to flow into Surgapam from the western side, via Raigarh rail station, the situation rapidly changed for the better, especially after the District Collector was able to initiate his own M.P. Govt. schemes. These programs were a direct result of Keith's participation in the Bhopal Emergency Famine Relief Meeting so all his travel had not been in vain.
The Collector, too, had his transportation problems in some areas out of Aranchalganj. He brought into service, trucks, tractors, coolies, bullock carts and even elephants belonging to the former Maharajah Singh Das Gupta. Unfortunately, the elephants were not a great help, having been trained specifically for tiger hunting and could only travel ten miles a day during the hot season. Moreover, to work really efficiently, they required, each day, almost the amount of food they could carry on their backs. Except for the GRACE School Feeding Program in our area, the Collector's relief did not touch our Champapur valley. The M.P. Govt. considered our program quite adequate to meet all the needs of the people and that was a honour we appreciated.
While food relief for the population was now quite adequate, just prior to the break of the monsoon, there was a real scarcity of drinking water, both for humans and animals. In one of the Bhopal Committee Meetings, Keith had successfully proposed that a fleet of tankers be prepared to meet such an emergency in the months of May through July. Others had the same idea because in Bihar, through the Bihar Relief Committee, hundreds of such road and rail vehicles were pressed into service.
The Government of Bihar even had to provide for the wild animals in the forest where watering holes had dried up. We did not have quite the water problem of Bihar where several thousand tube wells were sunk, nevertheless, about forty wells were constructed as part of our Surgapam program, some being five feet in diameter, for drinking purposes and for watering small vegetable gardens and the larger twenty feet diameter irrigation wells, all being at least thirty feet deep and lined with stone or brick.
About ten miles to the west of us, there were reports of the death of several animals owing to water scarcity. Keith went over to investigate and appealed to the local people to donate their lands where there was a good source of underground water. It was quite obvious that, in certain spots, there were subterranean streams, which could be detected by climbing to the top of a hill or higher ground and observing the greener areas in the jungle.
One such promising source was on the lands owned by Rhaguni Salur "Sufi" Daroga, a retired police officer who had served under the former Maharajah Singh Das Gupta, prior to Independence. He very kindly offered eight thousand square yards of land over an underground stream for the construction of a dam.
In a public meeting, called by Keith, "Sufi" Daroga signed papers allowing all members of the community to water their cattle at the dam and avail of the overflow water for irrigating their own fields. This was one of our most successful schemes, which has changed the face of the area. In the course of construction, the dam provided manual work for three hundred people for a month, with a total of fifteen hundred beneficiaries and saved several thousand head of cattle from thirst. The whole region around our part of Surgapam suffered from over-acidic soil and, eventually, in order to correct the ph. factor, we had to import into the area many tons of lime.
The subterranean stream that fed the Sufi fields and filled our new dam, flowed over limestone in the nearby hills. The beautiful rice, wheat, corn and sugar cane crops that were, and still are harvested from fields irrigated from this dam, proved that the limestone provides just that right amount of alkali to neutralize the acidity.
Sufi Daroga and many of his neighbouring cultivators, who invested in diesel lift pumps, were in business in a big way and his raw sugar cane "Sufi Somph Gur", delicately flavoured with aniseed. (somph), became famous in markets for up to a hundred miles away. Fortunately, there was a favourable water table in most of our project areas where we sank our wells and constructed dams, but there were several places where water was desperately needed, yet beyond our reach because of a layer of granite at fifteen feet.
The only way to get water was to blast out that rock, but Keith had had no previous experience with explosives. However, if we were not to lose some people through thirst, he had to learn. In Daulatapur he picked up a few tips on how to drill the holes in rock, all by hand. We had no fancy compressors in those days. At first, until he was able to teach the locals, he did it all himself, sharpening and tempering the many chisels which he made from crowbars and swinging the heavy sledgehammer. After a full hard day of sweat and toil, the hole would reach a depth of two feet, making it ready to be plugged with gelignite. Eventually, several teams were trained for this dangerous task and it was at this point that our youngest son, Bruce, made his most splendid contribution by sometimes holding the chisel and at other times swinging the hammer, teaching all the while just how to do the drilling properly.
Those skills we taught have benefited the area to this day. But for Keith, securing that gelignite proved to be quite a problem! There was just no way that we could secure a permit in a legal manner. In M.P., Raigarh was the nearest town where explosives could be bought, but it was too far away and it took many months for a permit to be secured and we could not wait that long, if people were to be saved.
Besides, we heard that foreigners could not make a purchase, even legally. Supplies were available in Daulatapur but that was in another province and very stiff penalties, including imprisonment, applied to the movement of explosives across state borders, even with a permit.
The desperate plight of people threatened with death by thirst, motivated Keith to do it his way! He had already committed numerous "hijackings" and what's a little explosive to a hijacker? He decided, therefore, to take the risk of getting gelignite on the Bihar "black-market". Now you, dear reader, may be raising your eyebrows, but for Keith, this was another occasion when "situational ethics" had to be applied so he simply smuggled it across the border!
One of the most risky aspects of this work was the actual lighting of the fuse. To begin with, Keith would light the fuse of sufficient length and, in the traditional way, climb out of the well by a rickety, springy bamboo ladder that blasting contractors used to send their little boy "lighters" up and down, reminiscent of the child "chimney-sweeps" of medieval Britain.
The question arose, "What if he should slip while climbing and perhaps fall, breaking a leg or whatever? How would he escape in time?" But Keith learned the secret and introduced this modern innovation to the area: simply attach a long, thin wire to the fuse and, from the top, slide down the wire a kerosene-soaked ring of burning cloth. No problems!
Before the day of the "big bang", we thought it wise to send out scout runners to ascertain if police were in the area for up to ten miles radius in the Champapur valley. We got away with it every time and oh, what a thrill it was, sometimes after weeks of hard work, to see life-giving water seeping up through the cracks in the blasted granite.
We had two drinking wells in our Nawapara compound which also served to keep us supplied with fresh vegetables. Our wells contained water right through the hottest months because we kept them clean. Other wells, due to negligence, were allowed to silt up and those that could produce a few vegetables, benefited the dying animals more than the humans.
The poor, starving cows - often just skin and bone - could jump a four feet high fence or smash their way through in a desperate bid to find a morsel. I shall never forget one such wretched beast, which, in leaping a fence, died halfway over, probably of a heart attack. We treasured our little garden and took every precaution to close the gates into the compound. Others were not so careful; in fact, the people coming to the well from outside, would deliberately prop the gate open because they resented having to take their water pots down from their heads or hips, to unbolt the gates. This sometimes resulted in my whole garden being filled and destroyed by emaciated cows.
On one occasion, when we suffered such an invasion of our garden, I was driven to exasperation and tough action that had a rather dramatic outcome.
Reg and Eva Bellingham, missionary friends in Ranitola, had been invited to manage "Brookfields Guest House" in Coonoor, South India. Eva's sister, Patsy, also planned to go, but that meant leaving behind her pet Dachshund dog, "Mitzie". Animals were not allowed in the "Brookfields" compound. Patsy was terribly upset about parting with her constant companion but was thrilled when we offered to provide her with another home.
With "Mitzie", we took delivery of all the necessary canine accoutrements, including rug, cushion, feeding and water bowls, comb and brush, flea powder, biscuits, leash and whip!. The latter was not to discipline "Mitzie" but to preserve her virtue, especially when out taking her morning walk. "Mitzie" had the misfortune of always being "on heat", making her a great attraction to the packs of stray mongrels that roamed the town. These delinquent male dogs understood one language - the crack of Patsy's whip!.
The cows in my garden also understood the same language, even though I was not in the habit of herding cattle in this way. It was while I was rounding up these emaciated beasts, to drive them from the compound, that I noticed the hundreds of relief workers also behaving in the most boisterous manner.
Our CFRA staff were writing up their records, prior to distributing wheat for work done on the FFW schemes, when the milling, hungry crowds, desperately impatient to claim their rations, almost threatened to engulf them. All this was delaying the distribution and creating such bedlam that I just had to take some action.
"Just control yourselves; go away." I screamed. "You won't get your grain any quicker by pressing in this way. Stand back." There were those who imagined themselves to be important people, deserving of some extra privilege, and they failed to budge. Racing over to them, with arms flailing, I shouted, "And this means YOU too; get moving; wait until your name is called." To my utter surprise, I noticed a response to my orders that I had never experienced before. The whole crowd suddenly dispersed and became orderly and quite composed. It was not until I was halfway home that I realized why peace had been restored so promptly. I had never before seen so many people move so quickly as I advanced toward them. I was most amazed until I discovered why the crowd had become obedient ... I still had the whip in my hand!
In order to prevent such problems that we were having on food distribution days, it was decided to build a mud wall with holes large enough to take the chutes through which the measured amount of grain was poured. Groups of workers would appoint their representatives who came alone into the compound with the relevant records of the total cubic feet of earth dug and carried by the group. The records had to be certified by one of our CFRA staff or volunteers. In this way, distribution times became a little more tranquil.
Five days in the week we distributed to labourers on the FFW schemes and on Saturdays, we provided rations for those indigents who qualified to take food home, rather than eat daily in the free-kitchen. These were the physically, mentally and visually handicapped, those with Leprosy, TB or other debilitating diseases, nursing mothers, pregnant women and those with any other incapacity that prevented them doing manual work. However, to qualify for free food and help as indigents, they had to produce a letter of certification from their local "Panchayat" or village Council.
Unfortunately, some of the local councils were corrupt, and would "certify" that a healthy person was an indigent, just to gain food for themselves. It is probably true to say that there was not a relief project anywhere in the country not tainted by some measure of corruption. CFRA inspectors visiting our projects encouraged us by reporting that, in spite of some dishonesty, ours was one of the most efficient programs in all the famine-affected areas throughout the whole of India.
Keith and our CFRA team were constantly alert to detect any irregularity. They found some of the overseers on the FFW schemes, listing workers as having dug more earth than they really had and then, later, visiting the workers at their homes, to collect for themselves, the extra rations they received. Instant dismissal was the order of the day whenever such misconduct was uncovered. Overseers would sometimes shorten the ten-foot long bamboo poles used to measure the ten-feet by ten-feet by one-foot deep excavations at the site of the percolating tanks. For the favour of having to dig a little less, the labourers gladly rewarded their foremen with "commission" from their ration of wheat.
To prevent this cheating, we painted two inches of both ends of the ten feet long measuring poles, to be sure they remained the right length. Another old trick, at the tank site, was to dig the required one hundred cubic feet of earth where a ditch already existed. To overcome this problem, we insisted that a small cone-shaped mound of earth be left undug in the centre to be sure the depth was a full one-foot.
There were some labourers who were not physically strong enough to dig a full one hundred cubic feet of earth a day. They may have been graduates from the free kitchens for indigents, leprosy / TB sufferers or those with other health problems. In the early days of the program, Keith personally had to assess the strength of each such weak person and determine whether he was a full "ten foot wala" (able to dig a full 100 cubic feet) or a " nine foot wala" (81 cubic feet) etc.. They still received the full ration, even though their workload was reduced.
There were times when Keith had to reduce the workload from one hundred cubic feet a day because the ground may have been very hard or included gravel. Suresh and the others progressively took over these responsibilities from Keith and became very efficient in maintaining a high standard in the construction of dams, wells, canals and roads etc.
Everything had to be done in a neat and straight way. Suresh made one group of a hundred workers completely demolish a dam embankment which already was nearly completed, being two hundred feet long, thirty feet wide at the base, fifteen feet high and five feet wide at the top. The dam was crooked and the workers had cribbed ten feet to avoid having to carry the earth the full distance.
At the time, I thought Suresh was cruel to insist that all this work be undone and then redone in the proper manner, and all with no extra rations. However, it proved to be the right decision for it checked, once and for all, the corruption that was costing us many bags of wheat each week. In spite of Suresh's tough action, he was deeply respected by the community as one with real moral integrity.