Elections 2019: The Plight of Varanasi’s Boatmen Continues to be Ignored

They help the police in tracing missing boats, in fishing out drowned bodies and also in cleaning the river Ganga, yet they are among the sections of the population that never seem to matter to any politician.

The boatmen, known as the Mallah community, of Varanasi are not happy with their representative in Parliament, Narendra Modi, as they claim to have remained the most neglected community in Varanasi.

Mukesh Kumar, 33, a boatman sitting on the steps of the iconic Assi Ghat, was seen bargaining the rate with customers for a boat ride from Assi Ghat to the Manikarnika Ghat. The deal was finally settled at Rs 1,200 for two hours, including the Dashasvmedh Ghat’s famous Ganga Aarti.

Speaking to Newsclick, Mukesh said he had been working under a boat contractor. The contractor has five boats that are run on oars and two big motorised boats, but he is reeling under losses as he is unable to repay the loans.

Mukesh further tells this reporter that he gets paid on a per ride basis and graded according to the deal that is fixed.

“If the deal is above Rs 1,000 for a two-hour ride, then we get money at a fixed rate of Rs 400, but if it is below then we get Rs 300. I am a very poor man and I cannot afford buying a boat at Rs 500 per square feet. My community and I were hopeful of getting job in Jal police and also of getting subsidy for buying boats, but Modi ji has only brought losses for us,” he said.

Mukesh, the father of two girl children, elaborated on the hardships faced by boatman: “The Jal police use us for cleaning the Ganga river each time that Prime Minister Narendra Modi visits his parliamentary constituency, and we do not get paid even a penny for this work. Instead, we get canes, slaps, abuses for refusing to do this work. I am from a community which serves the river and it is our only source of income, so we obviously do not have any problem doing the cleaning work, but we also expect at least some returns from the government. Last time, one of the local leaders promised us that he would take up the matter of recruiting us in the Jal police, but nothing has happened so far.”

“We help the people who fall into the river as well as take out the bodies of those who drown. We help the police in tracing missing boats and yet we are treated as criminals. We trusted in Modi ji as our caretaker and we sent him to Parliament, in return he gave a cruise boat to the city which is costing us our livelihood. People who come here now prefer the cruise boats,” the boatman said.

Another boatman Ashwini Kumar, who two months ago bought a motorised boat worth Rs 8 lakh, says, “Let Benaras be Benaras and do not kill the heritage, tradition and culture of the city by trying to turn it into Kyoto.”

Also read: Elections 2019: Development Still a Distant Dream in Varanasi

“They say they want to make it like the city Kyoto of Japan, I want to know when you brag so much about this being the city of Lord Shiva (a Hindu mythological deity), then why do you want to make it Kyoto? Is Kyoto culturally richer than our Benaras or have people in Kyoto also stopped their boatmen from earning their livelihoods?”

Kumar added that “the boatmen are asked to shut their operations for several days altogether whenever the Prime Minister visits and we suffer a huge loss, as we have no other means of earning a livelihood.”

Sonu, the leader of a collective of 44 boatmen called Mallah Adhikaar Sangh, said instead of doing anything for the community’s betterment, Modi ji was killing the Mallahs in various ways.

“Two years ago, Modi brought in 12-battery operated speed boats, but thankfully not even one of them is in working condition as of now otherwise it would have taken away our business. This is a small river, a holy one, and not the sea, so how can imagine speed boats running here? Is it not a way to kill our business?” he said.