Kaluwala village caught in Indo-Pak conflict, cries for attention in Punjab

A boat across the river is the only access to the nearest town, which however is closed by the BSF from 7 pm to 8 am given the village's sensitive location. And people feel cut off from India at that time.

Firozpur (Punjab): Last week, Darshan Singh, a middle-aged man from Kaluwala village nestled on the Indo-Pak border in Punjab's Ferozepur district was faced with a trying situation after his daughter fell ill around dusk. While the illness and the timing were not rare, the extraordinary challenges the village of seventy-odd families is facing have put the inhabitants in a predicament.

Surrounded by the Sutlej river on three sides and by the Pakistan border on the fourth, the village has been sandwiched in the unending India-Pakistan conflict like anything. A boat across the river is the only access to the nearest city, which however is closed by the BSF from 7 pm to 8 am given the village's sensitive location. And people feel cut off from India at that time.

Darshan was lucky enough to have gotten timely permission from the BSF officers to take his ailing daughter to the nearest city. However, navigating the difficult waters of Sutlej on a regular basis is a daily toil for the hapless villagers. While the campaigning for the upcoming assembly polls in Punjab is in full swing with political parties promising different perks to woo the voters, the unfortunate Kaluwala village is being consistently neglected somewhere in between.

As the ETV Bharat team visited the village, it found that a mere bridge could not be built across the Sutlej to give permanent access to the village with the nearest town in more than seventy decades since Independence due to which the residents of these villages are facing hundreds of problems. Besides the indispensable bridge, the village also does not have a hospital to cater to basic healthcare of the population of over 400 dispensaries even as the lone government school was built last year, has no teacher. Understandably, a mere five people in the entire village have qualified Class 12.

Locals told ETV Bharat that in order to cross the river late at night for an emergency, people have to get special clearance from the BSF. Paramjit Singh, a resident said that he had to write several letters to the government to open the lone school in the village last year. “The water here is dirty and due to the poor people in the village, they can't even get big bore wells.

Water is available only at 20 to 25 feet depth, which poses the fear of diseases,” Paramjit said. He said that the dispensary is 10 km away from the village, which adds to their woes. Although private doctors make periodical visits to the village, the poor villagers have to shell out huge amounts of money as fees, he added.

“If someone gets sick at night then this road passes through the border. Being a border area this road is closed at 7 o'clock. We feel like we are sitting in Pakistan," Paramjit said.

Darshan Singh, another resident echoed Paramjit while blaming leaders he said, “politicians come only during elections, and leave after making big promises”. He said that when the water level in the river rises, the connection with the city is severed leading to a lot of problems in commuting especially for the sick. Darshan further complained that they also have to shell out around Rs. 200-300 for the boats to transport their crops to the nearby market.

“And if the crop does not sell for 10 days then you have to sit in the market. Due to the high poverty in the village, there is no shop, not even a bank”. Villagers also complained of an inadequate electricity supply to the village and complained of frequent power cuts much to their inconvenience.

Joginder Singh, a local Panchayat member from Kaluwala said that the local MLA Parminder Singh Pinki had recently visited the village and they asked him to build a bridge to connect it with Ferozepur. “MLAs have come to the village only 2 or 3 times in 5 years. He (MLA Parminder Singh Pinki) left with an election promise that a bridge would be built.

But after the election, no promises are fulfilled. And after 5 years they come again to ask for votes,” Joginder said. Another villager Fauja Singh also made mention of the times when there is cross-border firing between the two neighboring countries leaving them panic-stricken.

Gurdayal Kaur, an elderly woman of the village, said that they have been living in the village for the last 20 to 25 years, but to date, “not even a single rupee has been given to us from the government for building a house in the village”. Kaur also complained about the lack of toilets in the village. She also said that there was no Gurdwara Sahib in the village until recently.

As for the political leaders currently campaigning in the Punjab assembly polls, Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD)-BSP joint candidate Rohit Montu Vohra when asked about the development work in village Kaluwala, alleged that “no development work has been done by Congress MLA Parminder Singh Pinki in the recent past”. Aam Aadmi Party candidate Ranbir Singh Bhullar also accused the Congress MLA saying he has “only developed his relatives or his own house. No money has been invested in the constituency to provide any facility to the public”.

ETV Bharat contacted the sitting Congress MLA to get his version for 3 consecutive days. On Tuesday, when he was asked about the bad condition of the village and the villagers, he laughed saying he “will do, will do” (the development).