Villages near India's nuclear tests site have no reason to celebrate
[Today 10 year after India's Nuclear tests in Pokharan in Rajasthan, there is no reason for the ordinary people to celebrate. The villagers near the test site who have lived with radioactivity in the desert air and environment hardly matter to the powers that be. After the first nuclear test explosion at Pokhran in 1974, some of the wells in the area were sealed by the DAE. Water samples are reported to have been collected at regular intervals, by the offcials, but villagers have been prevented from using these wells, but without being given any reason. After the second series of experiments in 1998, water from a tube well in a village 7 km south of Pokhran, became jet black. Reduction in yield and fat content of milk was reported from the neighbouring villages. Radioactivity would have certainly penetrated the underground water and ground beneath. The gases and particles vented out during blasts would have been carried away by the desert wind. Not much written that is easily available. In 1999, Kalpana Sharma a well known journalist had written an interesting article - "Khetolai: The forgotten village", The Hindu Survey of Environment 1999. (pp.17-19) . See also Gadekar, S. 2000. The Smile that makes Generations Sick, in Lokayan Bulletin (Exploding Peace: Peaceful Nuclear Tests. 15.1/6 – July-June 1999-2000), New Delhi. (Pg. 91-93); Makhijani, A. 1999. Making the Bomb – Without Consent, With Injury. The Hindu Survey of the Environment 1999. (Pg 21-27)
Posted below are two news reports from today's papers in India -SAPW]
Nuclear history lost on local village
by Siddhartha S. Bose, Hindustan Times
Khetolai (Pokhran), May 11, 2008
Pokhran’s historic moment is lost on the people of Khetolai, the last human habitation near the nuclear blast site of 11 May, 1998. The young in this village vaguely recall the day when the blasts catapulted India into the orbit of countries with nuclear capabilities. The elderly take it with a pinch of salt.
“It took place on our land and made history. But what did it give us?” asks Ramlal, a schoolteacher in the local senior secondary school. Pokhran is 26 km from Khetolai; the 1998 blasts took place just 3 km from the village. A vast stretch of forbidden desert expanse separates the village from the heavily guarded blast site on the other end.
The villagers have lived on promises made to them by the Centre and the state government after the blasts.
Ten years have gone by and the promises still remain unfulfilled! And yet, the 250 odd families that live with a high literacy rate of 80 per cent and have a third of their adult population serving as government teachers, rarely discuss the atomic blasts with their children.
“Our livestock suffered from the radiation during initial days, fissures opened up in every single house in the village after the tremors that followed the blasts. The government made almost a tourist place out of Pokhran but locals suffered,” Ramesh Chand who grew up in Khetolai said. He has moved out of the village to work in nearby Phalodi.
Lt Colonel NN Joshi, army spokesperson based in Jodhpur, said the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) were going to celebrate the occasion as National Technology Day. “We have received a recent communication which holds up the day as a symbol of technological empowerment,” he said.
Ramlal says people take pride in the event but are disconnected from it. How would the younger generation relate to the incident, he ponders, adding: “If only the government would have given us a desperately needed hospital in Pokhran and named it Shakti Sthal (name given to the blast site), the children would have known.” Khetolai has a primary health centre but doctors come there rarely, allege villagers. Army doctors don’t cater to the local population.
Far from being obsessed with Pokhran, people here have learnt to live with the army watching over them on three sides. The sandy stretch separates the village from the watchtowers guarding the ’98 blast sites. People are forbidden from wandering into the area. Visitors are allowed till only a km ahead of Shakti Sthal.
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10 yrs on, Pokhran to have a war museum
by Vimal Bhatia & Prakash Bhandari (Times of India, 11 May 2008)
POKHRAN: Ten years ago, on May 11, 1998, the Buddha smiled once again in the deserts of Rajasthan as the country undertook a series of nuclear tests in the Pokhran field range. The first-ever nuclear test by the country, code named ‘Smiling Buddha’, was also conducted in the same place on May 19, 1974.
The area of the tests is still kept under tight security. There are four gates spread over a 3.5 sq km area. The first is known as Kohinoor Gate and the last, Bhoochal Gate. But soon, footfalls in the sands which saw India’s strategic coming of age could increase as the government goes ahead with plans to set up a war museum in the Pokhran range.
"We are trying to set up a model of the Khetolai village in Pokhran where the blasts took place. A war museum would be set up here and the help of the Army and BSF has been sought to set up the museum," said Ambarish Kumar, district collector, Jaisalmer.
[...].
Posted below are two news reports from today's papers in India -SAPW]
Nuclear history lost on local village
by Siddhartha S. Bose, Hindustan Times
Khetolai (Pokhran), May 11, 2008
Pokhran’s historic moment is lost on the people of Khetolai, the last human habitation near the nuclear blast site of 11 May, 1998. The young in this village vaguely recall the day when the blasts catapulted India into the orbit of countries with nuclear capabilities. The elderly take it with a pinch of salt.
“It took place on our land and made history. But what did it give us?” asks Ramlal, a schoolteacher in the local senior secondary school. Pokhran is 26 km from Khetolai; the 1998 blasts took place just 3 km from the village. A vast stretch of forbidden desert expanse separates the village from the heavily guarded blast site on the other end.
The villagers have lived on promises made to them by the Centre and the state government after the blasts.
Ten years have gone by and the promises still remain unfulfilled! And yet, the 250 odd families that live with a high literacy rate of 80 per cent and have a third of their adult population serving as government teachers, rarely discuss the atomic blasts with their children.
“Our livestock suffered from the radiation during initial days, fissures opened up in every single house in the village after the tremors that followed the blasts. The government made almost a tourist place out of Pokhran but locals suffered,” Ramesh Chand who grew up in Khetolai said. He has moved out of the village to work in nearby Phalodi.
Lt Colonel NN Joshi, army spokesperson based in Jodhpur, said the Defence Research and Development Organisation (DRDO) were going to celebrate the occasion as National Technology Day. “We have received a recent communication which holds up the day as a symbol of technological empowerment,” he said.
Ramlal says people take pride in the event but are disconnected from it. How would the younger generation relate to the incident, he ponders, adding: “If only the government would have given us a desperately needed hospital in Pokhran and named it Shakti Sthal (name given to the blast site), the children would have known.” Khetolai has a primary health centre but doctors come there rarely, allege villagers. Army doctors don’t cater to the local population.
Far from being obsessed with Pokhran, people here have learnt to live with the army watching over them on three sides. The sandy stretch separates the village from the watchtowers guarding the ’98 blast sites. People are forbidden from wandering into the area. Visitors are allowed till only a km ahead of Shakti Sthal.
----
10 yrs on, Pokhran to have a war museum
by Vimal Bhatia & Prakash Bhandari (Times of India, 11 May 2008)
POKHRAN: Ten years ago, on May 11, 1998, the Buddha smiled once again in the deserts of Rajasthan as the country undertook a series of nuclear tests in the Pokhran field range. The first-ever nuclear test by the country, code named ‘Smiling Buddha’, was also conducted in the same place on May 19, 1974.
The area of the tests is still kept under tight security. There are four gates spread over a 3.5 sq km area. The first is known as Kohinoor Gate and the last, Bhoochal Gate. But soon, footfalls in the sands which saw India’s strategic coming of age could increase as the government goes ahead with plans to set up a war museum in the Pokhran range.
"We are trying to set up a model of the Khetolai village in Pokhran where the blasts took place. A war museum would be set up here and the help of the Army and BSF has been sought to set up the museum," said Ambarish Kumar, district collector, Jaisalmer.
[...].
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