The residents of Odisha’s mining villages battle multiple challenges every day — health hazards, poor access to healthcare, crop failure and poor procurement to name a few. But they are left with no choice but to keep living amid toxic volumes of coal dust.
On a recent field trip to Odisha, we noticed the feet of a group of women in Ratanpur, Ratansara, Shiarmal and Dulinga had turned completely black. These villages come under the Mahanadi Coalfield Ltd (MCL), Basundhara area of Sundargarh district.
They said they experience ‘burning sensation and cracks’ on their feet. Itching was a common problem for all, the women added.
The coal mines in Sundargarh district form a part of MCL, a subsidiary of Coal India Ltd. A sign board at the entrance of the MCL site in Basundhara ironically read: “MCL Bringing Smile in Every Hut.”
The villages lack proper medical facilities and the residents have to go to Jharsuguda district changing 2-3 buses to avail them. Each visit costs them Rs 15,000-20,000, including the doctor’s fee, transportation cost, food, stay and medicine.
Mining activities in the area also have grave impacts on agriculture, a resident of Ratnasara shared. Every grain of their main crop, paddy, turned black, rendering them unfit for selling, he said.
Moreover, farmers in the mining villages use more agricultural inputs than the rest and thus incur a relatively higher expenditure, the resident pointed out.
The leafy vegetables covered in black dust are neither edible nor marketable; the expenditure on domestic plantation is thus unproductive, he added.
Over the years, production has also declined from 20 bags per field earlier to not even 10 bags at present. The crop variety has also reduced drastically, another resident from the village shared. Earlier, they would need to buy only salt because they would produce everything else they consumed, she added.
They cultivated bitter gourd, drumstick, ivy gourd, all rich in vitamins, in addition to pulses like pigeon pea, black gram. Now, however, they are compelled to buy these food items.
The women in these villages also bemoaned the loss of precious livelihoods ever since mining began. Earlier, women were able to sustain their households for six months following harvest.
They used to collect mahua from 6 am to 2 pm and sell it daily. They also used to invest their time in plucking tendu leaves and other non-timber forest produce.
But because of the coal dust, the sources of income for women have dried up. “These days, no one purchases tendu leaves due to their blackness from the coal dust. Where shall we find clean leaves in this dusty area?” said a Ratnasara resident.
At the same time, the burden of work on women has increased. “Coal dust enters our house throughout the day, despite repeated sweeping. Our homes look pitch-black in the morning,” a woman from Ratanpur complained, adding:
Our children return from school all black, covered in coal dust. We are getting tired of cleaning their clothes every day. Same is the case with the utensils: Children do not realise and eat from the dusty plates in our absence.
Availability of water has also been hit by mining, a resident from Shiarmal mentioned. “Previously, the ponds would have plenty of water throughout the year. Now, with forests gone, rainfall has reduced, and because of mineral extraction, all the water sources have receded. A spring flowing from the forest side has dried up.”
The health of our livestock, cows and buffaloes has been affected due to grazing on coal dust-covered fodder and drinking polluted borewell and river water. One can easily spot the difference between cows from a mining village and those from a non-mining ones: Ours look very thin and sick, the resident added.
The polluted water is either red or black in colour, much like the rice we prepare. But we have no alternative; we have to eat the food, she added.
The resulting pollution has negative health externalities; all the villagers suffer from various kinds of diseases. The majority of the diseases are air-borne like eye allergy, while some are water-borne like skin diseases. Cases of eosinophilia have risen because of dust allergy, locals reported.
Source: Authors
Rash driving by truck drivers has further aggravated the coal dust menace. MCL has been talking about coal corridors, but the trucks remain operational on the common roads, leading to frequent accidents, dust-related issues and most importantly, social tension among the communities residing in the area.
Constraints on limited resources and weak bargaining power compel the villagers to continue to stay on in these villages, as summarised poignantly by a woman respondent: “We cannot cultivate our own land, live in our own environment, drink our own water, practise our own livelihood, walk on our own road, or have enough resources to migrate permanently from this place. We are here with absolutely no freedom. We are here to sacrifice our lives as well as our next generation for the development of the country.”
Prajna Paramita Mishra, assistant professor, School of Economics, University of Hyderabad
Ch Sravan, research assistant, School of Economics, University of Hyderabad
Sujit Kumar Mishra, professor, Council for Social development, Hyderabad
Views expressed are the authors’ own and don’t necessarily reflect those of Down To Earth.