{"id":4170,"date":"2023-12-25T09:33:41","date_gmt":"2023-12-25T09:33:41","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/?page_id=4170"},"modified":"2024-01-02T09:51:40","modified_gmt":"2024-01-02T09:51:40","slug":"another-cyclone","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/another-cyclone\/","title":{"rendered":"Another Cyclone"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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ANOTHER CYCLONE<\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t
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WHERE\u2019S THE MONEY GOING in Nagapattinam.<\/p>

The managing director is nervous, shuffling papers in his chilly office. He has summoned a group of Madras (Chennai) NGO\u2019s to feed him good advice on tsunami projects. He is sitting on a few million Euros, waiting in the pipeline from his French business partner, and the donor wants to know how and where to spend this money. The MD wants the NGOs to tell him, so he can pass on their advice.\u00a0 But there are strings attached to such money. The money wants physical evidence \u2013 a building, bricks and mortar, and nothing less. No, not a boat which can be sold off, sink or sail way; no, not nets, they\u2019re not photogenic; no, not motors which break down, not this, not that.\u00a0 The money wants a monument, proof of its good intentions.\u00a0 The NGOs, already having their own funding, promise to send in such specifications, a building of some kind, and I wonder what they will come up with.<\/p>

The stocky man on the platform of Tambaram station, waiting for the Kumbun Express to take us to Nagapattinam, is full of enthusiasm.\u00a0 He has the money too to fund the tsunami survivors and is looking forward with his boundless energy to do his bit.\u00a0 It\u2019s Danish money, he says, and not for Nagapattinam but up the coast at Tranquebar. The Danes had their toe-hold there and that\u2019s where, from historical empathy, they want their Kroners (not Euros) spent. He isn\u2019t sure how or where the money will be spent; this is a reconnoitring trip to pinpoint the recipients. They too want proof, a snap shot they can show around, captioned too.<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I too am heading south to find out about salvation for the survivors. It seems that money is not the criteria; there is a flood of it washing around.\u00a0 Not just millions of rupees but many millions of dollars, Euros, Yen, Rials, Pounds, Pesos, name it and it\u2019s available, just waiting to cleanse away the pain and suffering left behind by the tsunami. The world and the Indian people have been generous in donations. I\u2019m travelling with Mr Kanniarm of the Indian Council of Child Welfare (ICCF) as a starting point.\u00a0 At least they\u2019re focused on their agenda- children.\u00a0 Mr Kanniarm is a quiet, dedicated man, having spent his life in government social services department and who took early retirement to work on his PhD on children in our judicial system. He\u2019s now a consultant and we\u2019re going to the tsunami hit villages to assess what has be done over the next three to four years. ICCF has already donated school bags, books, pens. He will also be setting up a counselling system for the children, apart from re-building schools. It\u2019s during our chat that he mentions an interesting term, \u2018letterhead NGOs\u2019 and it sticks in my mind. I think he means possible conmen or maybe just means temporary organisations with no qualifications wanting to help.<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Over morning coffee a hotel guest, dressed in shorts and wearing sturdy walking boots and thick socks joins me. He is from Bangalore and he’s raised, from private individuals he emphasises, 10 million rupees that are burning a hole in his pocket. He\u2019s a seasoned disaster man, which explains his attire, he was in Gujarat after the earthquake and had raised and spent money on that relief. He is here with a German friend and they are going to explore ways to spend their millions, beginning their search with a visit to the Collectorate.\u00a0 He\u2019s disappointed that I don\u2019t have a few million to donate too.<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Mr Kanniarm, the local ICCF social worker, Sumita, and I visit Kalar first, a village tucked away down the coast and we pass the wreckages of many boats, stacked like cords of wood by the tsunami. We also pass a grand flyover which is incomplete and looks abandoned as if someone changed their mind. In Kalar, they villagers are watching television in a thatched hall, a satellite dish is attached to a tree and a lone cop sits outside peering through a side opening at the screen.\u00a0 Sumita has been here already, handing out bags and schoolbooks. The men now drift out of the hall to talk about their needs. They, whichever village we visit, are all acutely aware of the money hovering just beyond the horizon \u2013 government grants and loans, NGOs yearning to spend money on them. It\u2019s human nature, I believe, to get as much as one can, disasters do bring some benefits in their wake.\u00a0 At dusk, in one village, an old woman, followed by a child, walks slowly towards the flattened, and cleared, remnants of homes.\u00a0 She sits on a patch of dirt, her old home, while the child sits on a stone some distance away, both silent. Watching her sad solitude as she stares out to the calm sea, I know her story \u2013 children lost, only she and the grandchild survived.\u00a0<\/p>

The fishing villagers\u2019 immediate needs have been met by the government \u2013 cash, food, clothing, shelter. Christian Aid, in some villages, have built row upon row of temporary huts, all joined together, out of a fire resistant material which feels like fibrous tarpaulin. In other villages, the government has erected similar temporary shelters.\u00a0 The village women are industriously washing, cutting vegetable, cooking. Boys play cricket or marbles, the men sit around, some waiting to return to the sea. But not all. Later, when I meet Ephrem, of the South India Federation of Fishermen\u2019s Society, he tells me that some fishermen want to give up the sea, they no longer trust it. But they have every right to be compensated for their boats and how they spend the money is their business, not the government\u2019s or a NGOs.\u00a0<\/p>

The statistics are depressing.\u00a0 Across the five taluks (districts) 6065 died (Adult males 1883, females 2406, children male 887, female 889) while there are still 2188 (adult males 676, females 756, children males 352, female 408) listed as missing. As a counter statistics so far the government has distributed 854,650,000 rupees to the survivors, and this includes cash for loss of life, house damages, loss wages, loss of limbs, net damages and repairs to boats. In kind it has given out tons of rice, 269,000 litres of kerosene, thousands of dhotis, sarees and bed sheets. Eight hundred and fifty four million rupees sounds impressive, yet from what I\u2019ve read in the newspapers, there are many, many more millions still awaiting distribution.\u00a0 They are in the government\u2019s coffers and I wonder when (or whether) they\u2019ll see daylight.\u00a0 India\u2019s politicians and bureaucrats do have a flawed reputation.<\/p>

However, despite this seeming largess, I have come across pockets of coastal villages, in Cuddalore and here, which were overlooked by the state. I don\u2019t know whether it\u2019s deliberate or by design, as these aren\u2019t \u2018fishing\u2019 villages though also hit by the tsunami.\u00a0<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0 The next morning, the Bangalore gentleman and his old school friend still haven\u2019t figured how to spend their money. The German (Indian) wants to set up a school and link it to the school in his German home town where those children had donated money for the relief. But they\u2019ve turned a bit cynical in the last 24 hours, having visited a village. Do the people really need their help?\u00a0 He also tells me that in some villages he visited the people resent only the fishing villagers being helped.<\/p>

Their money has to be spent so I accompany them to the Collectorate. It\u2019s an impressive building \u2013 a five floor V-shaped structure- for such a nondescript town with nothing memorable about it. There\u2019s a shamiyana on the lawn for the NGOs to register and it\u2019s run by volunteers, one of them a Canadian lady, Achama, returning to India after many years away. Just as I\u2019m about to ask the question, a messenger from the Collector appears, wanting a list of the NGOs and I have my answer. She has 468 NGOs registered with only 20 per cent \u2018active\u2019. I presume \u2018active\u2019 meaning they\u2019re still on the ground and haven\u2019t flown away.\u00a0 Achama fills me in. The Collector, L. Radkhakrishnan, was quick off the mark to set up this NGO centre and set up their landline. On a board behind her is a list of the conferences and meetings for NGOs over the week. NGOs wander in and out. One lot arrive in a Tata Sumo, having flown in from Delhi, and the shamiyana is full of the bonhomie of old friends meeting at yet another disaster. The Tata ones are American Aid workers, all carrying black laptop bags, reminding me of executives about to attend a board meeting. They seem to reek money.<\/p>

I ask Achama about \u2018letterhead NGOs\u2019, and she thinks they could be commercial organisations who come in to get contracts for materials. She hasn\u2019t yet come across a fake organisation, yet.<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 The eye of the tsunami rescue, relief and rehabilitation of the survivors is the Collector. Of course, I had read about his huge effort to battle the tsunami, so went in search of him. The morning wasn\u2019t a good time as representatives from all the affected villages were meeting him. In the beginning the meetings had been daily but as the weeks passed they had dropped to thrice a week and were now weekly. They had their grievances and to report on the successes of the state\u2019s efforts to help them. Just as I drift by his office, the door opens a young man dressed in slacks, a checked shirt and sneakers hurries out to enter a cabin and sit at a computer. He\u2019s followed by a torrent of people. I\u2019d not expected L. Radhakrishnan to look so young, he seem no older than a college graduate with all that boundless energy and optimism in his appearance.\u00a0<\/p>

As I retreat from the torrent I notice there\u2019s a lecture hall with the topic on \u2018Stress Management for government officials\u2019 going on.\u00a0 Inside, there\u2019s a lecture hall silence with around 100 people, mostly neatly dressed men, with a few women scattered around, listening to the speaker on the dais.\u00a0 The flyer outlines the symptoms of stress. The list ranges from sleeplessness, fatigue, irritable behaviour to impotence. Then the Collector himself hurries in to give them a talk on how to take care of themselves.\u00a0 These are the Collector\u2019s troops, the State\u2019s direct contact with ordinary people and he wants them all to be mentally fit to deal with the citizens.\u00a0 The cure for stress isn\u2019t just taking leave but taking up hobbies, playing sports, reading books, listening to music, yoga.<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u2018I enjoy meeting people, so I don\u2019t suffer from stress\u2019 L. Radhakrishnan tells me and then smiles. \u2018In fact if I didn\u2019t meet people I\u2019d probably be stressed out.\u2019 He\u2019s given me some time, clearing his office of everyone. I notice his stillness when he\u2019s talking, no finger tapping, leg shakes, very calm.\u00a0 When I mention that some non-fishing villagers on the coast may have fallen out of the donation net, he says, \u2018My door is always open, I will see anyone who wishes to see me to redress their grievances. I\u2019ve instructed my department to help everyone affected by the tsunami.\u2019<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u2018Those are, what I\u2019d call, the fortunate ones because of the tsunami. What about all other poor who weren\u2019t affected? They remain in poverty.\u2019<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u2018I know what you mean. But the State does have its poverty alleviation programme which is reaching out to as many of the poor as it can.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 Prior to Nagapattinam, he had been the Collector of Madras and then the Collector of Thanjavur. He was there for the Kumbakonam fire tragedy (over a 100 children died in a school fire) where he had hands-on experience of dealing with such heart-breaking disasters.<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u2018The other day the Kumbakonam women whose children died in that tragedy came to me with the one lakh they had collected for the tsunami orphans. It brought tears to my eyes.\u00a0 Here they were women who had lost their children giving money for children who had lost their parents.\u2019<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 After our chat, a man comes in holding out a cheque for five hundred thousand rupees and hands it over to the Collector.\u00a0 It\u2019s also a photo opportunity.\u00a0 Now everyone crowds in, including an old woman tagging along a small boy, both barefoot, certainly from a village. He listens to her story, reads her letter and quickly signs it to ensure she\u2019s helped. The boy is her grandson, both his parents died in the tsunami. And she\u2019s not the one I saw the previous night either.\u00a0 The Collector patiently listens to everyone, sometimes all talking at once. He\u2019s good at crowd control and, even as one leaves, two others take his place.<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 As I walk out of the building a tempo van pulls up to park some distance down the drive. A dozen Europeans, all blonde and young, wearing bright yellow t-shirts, spill out of it and hang around the van. They look like honey bees and certainly draw me over. On the front of their t-shorts is written \u2018Scientologists\u2019 and behind \u2018Apprentice Preachers\u2019.\u00a0 I\u2019m no fan of scientology, founded by L. Ron Hubbard in 1955, and its self cleansing theories, so I\u2019m surprised to see them here.<\/p>

I chatted to one of them, a young Brit with a goatee, who tells me they\u2019ve been visiting the tsunami hit villages. He\u2019s a bit inarticulate in explaining his beliefs.<\/p>

\u2018What do you do in the villages?\u2019<\/p>

\u2018We help them.\u2019<\/p>

\u2018With donations?\u2019<\/p>

\u2018Oh no. By touching them we can spiritually heal them.\u2019<\/p>

\u2018You speak Tamil then?\u2019<\/p>

\u2018No we use interpreters to communicate with them.\u2019<\/p>

\u2018And this touching really helps them?\u2019<\/p>

\u2018Yes, they feel better. There are only a few of us here now but soon another thousand will be arriving by next week.\u2019<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I return to the NGO office on the lawn. \u2018What are the scientologists doing here?\u2019 I ask Achama.<\/p>

\u2018I\u2019m surprised they\u2019re back,\u2019 she says. \u2018They were thrown out a week ago.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 As I leave, I meet the Bangalore men coming out of the Collectorate and ask what they\u2019re going to spend their money on.<\/p>

\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u2018Bicycles,\u2019 they answer. \u2018We found out that many of the girls from the villages have to catch busses to attend schools and colleges. So we\u2019re going to buy bicycles for them and thought it would be the best way to spend some of the money. We saw the Collector and he agreed.\u2019 Then they add as an after thought. \u2018And we can also send the photographs of the girls with their cycles to all the donors.\u2019<\/p>\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ANOTHER CYCLONE \u00a0 WHERE\u2019S THE MONEY GOING in Nagapattinam. The managing director is nervous, shuffling papers in his chilly office. He has summoned a group of Madras (Chennai) NGO\u2019s to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-4170","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4170","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4170"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4170\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4896,"href":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/4170\/revisions\/4896"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/websprintersdemo.in\/blogs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4170"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}