The Hindu : Tamil Nadu News : Panchayatdars help them remain united

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Tuesday, Mar 22, 2005

Tamil Nadu

Tamil Nadu

Panchayatdars help them remain united

By A.V. Ragunathan

CUDDALORE, MARCH 20 . Panchayatdars have a strong hold on fishermen community and no social event can take place in coastal villages without their sanction. This is true even for fishing.

The solidarity among the community is such that post-tsunami, even those fishermen who have got replacements for their damaged boats are not venturing into the sea: on their own or the green signal is yet to come from panchayatdars.

They are averse to resuming fishing when the fellow fishermen languish for want of adequate assistance. Panchayatdars acted as agents for collecting and distributing relief materials supplied by private concerns and service organisations.

Village temples came in handy for stacking articles. The practice of collecting funds from each family ("thalai kattu", consisting of man and wife and minor children) for temple festivals thrice a year has been in vogue. It implies that all of them are partners in the happenings in the village.

For instance, whenever a death occurs, fishermen abstain from their work for three days. But during weddings, no such restrictions are imposed. All the families — both affected and unaffected — had a claim to the relief materials. Hence, the panchayatdars resorted to "fair and equitable distribution".

The same logic holds good now: for, they are determined not to resume fishing until all boats, including mechanised ones, are seaworthy.

The Villupuram Collector, Ka. Balachandran, at a public hearing of the Supreme Court Commission on Food Security here on Saturday, said though all affected fishermen were covered under the relief and rehabilitation programmes, they were yet to set sail. It was learnt that they would not do so until the Thevanampattinam fishermen were ready, he said. It looks as if the close-knit community was biding its time, because it has voiced its dissatisfaction with the kind of the rehabilitation package offered to it.

Fiercely independent, it does not want to get entangled in cumbersome procedures. Their representatives asserted recently that they were claiming their rights and were not seeking any doles. But how long they could hold on is still a surmise.

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