:: Opinion

Sivakasi & the White House

Kancha Ilaiah

Oct.31 : Dear Mr President,Let me first express my warm but belated congratulations to you for getting the Nobel Peace Prize. While many think that you do not deserve it, I think that you deserve it more than several others who got it earlier. I also thank you for celebrating the Indian festival Diwali in the White House as it boosts the morale of many Indian-Hindus living in the United States and other Euro-American countries.

However, I would have liked it if you had sought the presence of a Dalit Shaivite priest along with a Brahmin Vaishnavaite priest (who was present with three Vaishnava namams on his forehead, a clean shaven head and pattu vastram) to promote race and caste equality.

But I will discuss that issue elsewhere. Here I want to share other serious concerns about our environment, about which you and your government too are worried.

Diwali is celebrated in south India as a festival of lamps because a so-called rakshasa, Narakasura, was killed by Krishna’s wife Satyabhama on that day. The Hindus believe that Narakasura represents darkness (even the blacks of America and Dalit-Bahujans of India were believed to have represented darkness historically), his death gets celebrated by lighting lamps.

We have no problem with lighting of lamps though too many of them can lead to wastage of electricity which we need for our agriculture. And traditional lamps take up too much oil. However, that in itself is not a major environmental hazard.

The real problem in Diwali is the lighting of firecrackers and that too on a very large scale. The amount of firecrackers burnt on that day and the subsequent week is mind-boggling.

I live in Hyderabad, the fifth biggest city in the country, and the media says that this city alone burnt firecrackers worth Rs 100 crores on Diwali night.

The lighting of firecrackers continued on the second day, and two subsequent days, though the numbers were slightly less than what was burnt on Diwali day. In Hyderabad alone people must have burnt crackers worth Rs 200 crores. It can be safely said that firecrackers worth Rs 4,000 crores may have been lit in the whole of India during Diwali.

I do not know whether you have ever inhaled air polluted by the burning of firecrackers. I am not sure if anyone burnt firecrackers when you won the presidential poll, as is done in India after poll victories. If you had allowed a few NRIs to burn few firecrackers during the celebration of Diwali in the White House, you would have known what I am talking about.

And if a handful of American environmentalists were present while Indian firecrackers were being burnt, they would have asked for banning of Diwali celebrations in the US forever.

However, Indian environmentalists, many of whom acquired their scientific degrees from the best universities of your country, do not want to study the consequences of Diwali celebrations and firecracker on the health, environment and infrastructure of the nation. They all seem to think that all these firecrackers are meant to destroy Narakasura who, incidentally, happens to be dark-skinned, like you and me.

Even the best of our environmental and health protection activists, such as Dr Sunitha Narayan, do not seem bothered about it because not much foreign investment is involved in Indian firecracker industry. But the fact remains that thousands of children who are employed in India’s firecracker units are facing health hazards of various kinds.

If you ever visit Sivakasi, a small town in Tamil Nadu where many firecracker units are run, you will understand what it actually does to people in the town and those who work there, particularly the children. One does not know whether they too are considered to be the children of Narakasura, but they are forced to do such hard labour in an environment that is full of unhealthy gases and toxic dust. Many of them die young.

Historically, there has been a karma theory in India which is supposed to determine how long one lives. As the first Black President of America, I am sure you do not believe in the karma theory. As global citizens of the modern world governed by the United Nations Charter of Human Rights, these children must have the right to health, education and the "hope" that you constantly keep talking about.

Just one English-medium school started by the Dalit Education Centre, funded, of course, by philanthropic civilians of your own country, has shown that these children are capable of learning.

This academic year the first batch of students passed out of their 10th class (19 of them) and all of them not only got first division but the best among them got 96 per cent marks. These students, fed and clothed by the school management, were liberated from the firecracker industry work. They are healthier than the average children of Sivakasi and hope to become doctors, engineers, scientists.

Do the NRIs who celebrate Diwali with gusto in the US contribute even a mite to help the children working in these factories?

Mr President, I suggest that you get a team of environmentalists and health scientists to study the impact of Diwali crackers on environment and health before you celebrate it next year.

I don’t want to abolish Diwali or prevent its internationalisation. But I would like to see the light of lamps glow in the lives of Sivakasi children too.