(“The commissioning of India’s largest blast furnace at Kalinganagar (on September 20, 2024) is a momentous occasion for the steel industry.” – T.V. Narendran, Tata Steel CEO & MD)
jal-jangal-jameen
the diku’s
for the taking
muscleright
in adivasi country
disciplined by
threats and bulldozers
audacity of
Ho mother’s prayer
for a toehold
on ancestral land
didn’t go unnoticed
toehold on
earth she said
her forefathers tilled
fished bathed
rummaged
for nature’s bounties
bullets flew
knives glistened
Ho mother returned home
breasts wrists missing
gone for forensic tests
police calmly said
where Ho mother fell
blazes a guffawing giant
pouring silken steel into
moulds of progress
a once-reborn king
is once more reborn
to weep in the wings
for corpses strewn across
new battlefields
(jal-jangal-jameen translates as water-forest-land; diku is the adivasi’s pejorative term for the outsider, the grabber by force; Hos are a tribe to be found in Odisha, Jharkhand and other parts of eastern India.)
Vidyarthy Chatterjee spent almost his entire life in Jamshedpur and now lives in Calcutta.
