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RIGHTS-INDIA: ‘Human Horses’ Fade Into History

Sujoy Dhar

KOLKATA, Aug 19 2005 (IPS) - Hand-pulled rickshaws, one of the more abiding symbols of colonialism in Asia, are finally on their way out of this city where a feudal past struggles with communist rule and modern values.

The ubiquity of the rickshaw, despite a quarter century of uninterrupted rule in West Bengal state led by the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), is testimony to the fact that pulling better-off fellow humans through crowded streets has continued to be an important means of employment.

West Bengal’s Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee was careful to cushion his ban on rickshaws, announced last week, by saying that it will happen in a phased manner over the next five months while alternate livelihoods are found for the city’s estimated 25,000 ‘human horses’.

That is a kindness coming too late for Ganesh Shaw, 72, who has survived a lifetime of carting human cargo, competing with buses, taxis, underground railways and electric trams and coping with the noise and pollution of a city of 14 million people.

When asked what he thought about the ban announced on Aug. 15 to coincide with India’s 58th anniversary of independence from British colonial rule, the furrows on Shaw’s weathered brow deepened.

”It is our fate that we are poor rickshaw pullers. If they take away our livelihoods without an alternative,how will we survive?” Shaw demanded to know, articulating a question uppermost in the minds of his unfortunate fellow workers.

Ganesh may be the subject of endless debate by environmentalists, human rights activists and economists, but what matters to him is that the drudgery fetches him two dollars on a good day – enough to keep body and soul together.

Too many rickshaw pullers have died of hunger and tuberculosis like ‘Hasari Pal’, the main character in the bestseller ‘City of Joy’ by French author Dominic Lapierre, which planted the term ‘human horse’ in popular literature.

Lapierre’s novel was later turned into a successful motion picture by Roland Joffe (starring Patrick Swayze) which depicted the sad plight of rickshaw pullers, who eke out a living in Kolkata’s decrepit streets – many of them refugees from failed farming in the hinterland.

Bhattacharjee said he thought rickshaws environment-friendly and a provider of employment, but he sounded a tad ashamed when he said he didn’t think rickshaws were a ”part of the tradition of this city”.

Rickshaws were introduced by Chinese traders in the early part of the 19th century but were quickly adopted by British colonials, who made Kolkata their capital from 1772 until 1912 when Delhi became imperial headquarters for the entire sub-continent.

In China itself, more dedicated communists banned the contraption half-a-century ago. But rickshaws have survived as a curiosity in places like Hong Kong and in Japan where it originated – the word rickshaw being an anglicised corruption of the Japanese ‘jin-riki-sha’.

In India itself, rickshaws have long been banned in every other city except Kolkata and replaced by cycle-rickshaws (pedicabs) and motorised three-wheeler auto-rickshaws (or baby taxis).

”We want to replace hand-pulled rickshaws with either three-wheeler cycle rickshaws or auto- rickshaws,” said Bhattacharjee, but conceded that the switch ”cannot be done overnight”.

After decades of dealing with exploitative public attitudes rickshaw pullers are sceptical. ”We are not sure of the government’s policy and the absence of clear communication has made is worrying,” said Mukhtar Ali, vice-president of the All Bengal Rickshaw Union (ABRU).

”There are about 100,000 people who depend on the rickshaw trade for a living,” said Ali. ”They are not stealing, but slogging for an honest living”.

In many parts of the city, especially in the less- developed north, rickshaws are the only available means of short-distance, public transport.

Ali said the government’s plan to bring in cycle-rickshaws and motorised three-wheelers as alternatives did not sound practicable. The ABRU has threatened to begin an agitation unless plans for alternate employment are not spelt out more clearly.

 
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