Worker dies in bid to sell sons

FROM THE TELEGRAPH

BY SUBHASH CHANDRA BOSE

Manthi with her two sons in Mujnai. Picture by Subhash Chandra Bose

Jaigaon, Aug. 28: A worker of a closed tea garden was allegedly beaten to death on Saturday after people suspected him to be a child trafficker when he went to the local weekly market to sell his two sons for Rs 500 each.

Five days after the incident, Ganesh Ganju’s widow, Manthi, is at a loss, scared that her two sons, Sanjoy (5) and Sanjib (3), may starve to death.

Sitting in front of a rickety shack in Mujnai, 50km from here, the 24-year-old said: “We had decided to sell the children since we could not afford to feed them. We thought that, wherever they be, at least they would not die for want of food.”

She said her 26-year-old husband had taken their two sons to the market in Sishubari, 10km from the garden. “It was Saturday. He came back home bleeding and bruised and said he had been beaten up. The people thought that he was a child trafficker, although our sons had tried to convince the mob otherwise,” Manthi said. She said her husband had told her that he had almost sold their sons for Rs 1,000.

“I don’t know how he made it back home on foot with the children. But later in the evening he died,” she said.

Ashis Biswas, a health worker of the closed garden located in Alipurduar subdivision with 962 workers on its rolls, said he had gone to see Ganesh when he heard that he had returned home badly hurt. “He possibly died of internal injuries. I had informed the panchayat member about his death,” Biswas said. Manthi did not lodge any police complaint and had cremated her husband’s body according to tribal rites.

The block development officer of Madarihat, Topden Lama, said he heard about the incident when he went to Mujnai today to distribute ration tokens. Workers of closed gardens are entitled to a monthly ration of 12kg of wheat each. However, those at Mujnai claimed that in the past nine months they received the relief only five times.

“I have heard about the incident and are I am making inquiries. Police are going to probe the case,” said Lama, who has met Manthi and her sons and has assured them help. He said he would visit Sisubari on Saturday again.

The RSP gram panchayat member from the area, Kali Lohar, said Ganesh, like many other workers of closed gardens, was very poor and did not know whom to turn to during times of crisis. “If the district administration is not vigilant, more such incidents will take place. Three persons have already died of malnutrition since Mujnai closed down in November last year,” he said.