March 30, 1998

Backed by the Women's Commission, Wayyanad's unwed tribal mothers may finally get their due.

By M G Radhakrishnan

It's been over a decade now but Kali, 27, can never forget that fateful night; the familiar police constable had forced himself into her little hut -- and on her -- leaving her completely wrecked. Her life's never been the same again. The psychological trauma apart, raising an illegitimate daughter hasn't been easy, especially since the father claims he has nothing to do with either of them.

Kali is not alone in her agony. The village in which she lives, Tirunelli in Wayanad district of Kerala, is home to over a hundred such unwed tribal mothers; Wayanad and neighbouring Palakkad district together have about 400 of them; all victims of sexual exploitation -- some of them as young as 11 -- struggling to survive along with their fatherless children. And over the years, as thousands have converged on Tirunelli hoping to cleanse themselves of their sins with a dip in the adjoining holy Papanasini river, these women have simply watched, wondering what justice is all about.

Finally, it seems, there's hope for them. The Kerala Women's Commission, which has been tracking down unwed mothers over the past year and fighting for their cause, has made some headway. The commission, which has received 103 complaints -- 85 from tribals and the rest from Dalit women -- is now getting DNA tests done to establish the paternity of the children. Of the eight cases it has taken up, three of the alleged fathers who were summoned for blood tests have owned up their paternity even without going in for the tests. Of them, two have agreed to marry the victims while the third, who is already married, is willing to pay a monthly allowance. In four of the cases, however, those summoned have gone to court against the commission.

Interestingly, one of the cases before the commission is a request from a 26-year-old Dalit woman seeking help to find her father. According to the complainant, her mother was allegedly raped by a schoolteacher as a student. While the teacher has been disclaiming paternity, the mother is married to another man, from whom she has two other children. The complainant, who is getting married now, has been refused help by both the schoolteacher and the step-father. Desperate to prove her paternity and get her father to help her, she has moved the commission, which in turn has summoned the schoolteacher for a blood test.

"Those who refuse to own up paternity in spite of the DNA tests being positive will face prosecution," says Alexander Jacob, dig and director of the commission. The problem, however, arises when the father of the child cannot be identified. For instance, the commission can do little to help 25 unwed tribal mothers in Pulpalli village of Wayanad district as they cannot identify the accused who, it is believed, were members of a temporary crpf camp set up in the '70s to contain Naxalite violence in the area. Most of these men were from outside and had left the camp for postings elsewhere.

Says commission Chairperson B. Sugathakumari: "Ironically, a good number of the culprits are petty government officials sent to these areas to work for the welfare of the tribals." Besides police and other government officials, the commission has also received complaints against landlords, contractors, farmers and other settlers in the area. In almost all the cases, the accused have been non-tribals.

The large-scale immigration of non-tribals to Wayanad is seen as the root cause for the tribals' woes, which are invariably linked to their economic deprivation. At least 50 per cent of the 6.72 lakh population of Wayanad, traditionally a tribal pocket, comprises non-tribal immigrants. "The steady decline in forest area and the encroachment of non-tribal settlers into tribal areas have reduced the tribals' lives to sheer misery," says M. Kunhaman, a Kerala University reader and an authority on tribals. "No political party seems to be bothered as their eyes are only on the votebank which is made up of non-tribal sections."

According to Kunhaman, the controversial Tribal Bill, passed by the state Assembly in 1997, effectively legalised the encroachment. Much of the transfer is believed to have been done by duping the tribals by offering them a pittance or by sheer force. "Equally abominable," says activist C.K. Janu, "is the tendency to view the sexually exploited tribal women as morally loose and attaching a stigma to those babies born out of wedlock."

To make matters worse, past experience in rehabilitating the tribal women has largely been a failure. Following an uproar by women's organisations, officials of the Commissionerate of Scheduled Castes and Tribes Development, under the Central Social Welfare Ministry, visited Wayanad in 1991 and prepared a list of 160 unwed mothers. The Kerala Government then launched a Rs 37 lakh rehabilitation package, under which tribal women could avail financial assistance to build houses and undertake farming.

The scheme, as a report of the local tribal development officer admits, was fraught with problems. Hardly a handful of the beneficiaries identified actually availed of the assistance and as Tirunelli Panchayat President Ammalu points out, the lure of financial assistance even encouraged some of the poor, illiterate tribal women to sleep with officials. "Providing financial assistance is hardly the answer to the issue," feels Ammalu. "The DNA tests are the real solution."

The Women's Commission is also confident that the tests will act as effective deterrents if they lead to arrests. But here again there are constraints. Apart from the problem of dealing with only those cases where the culprits can be identified, there is also the lack of resources. With a meagre grant of Rs 5 lakh from the state Scheduled Caste and Tribe Welfare Department to get the tests done, the commission is finding it difficult to take up more cases. Till recently, the DNA tests had to be conducted in Hyderabad but now a facility has been provided at the Rajiv Gandhi Centre for Biotechnology in Thiruvananthapuram. This has considerably brought down the cost of conducting the tests, but says Jacob: "To be admitted as evidence of paternity in a court of law, five major tests have to be done which are very expensive." Scheduled Caste and Tribe Welfare Minister K. Radhakrishnan is more direct. He says the Rs 5 lakh sanctioned now would suffice for about 15 cases and other agencies, both public and private, will have to chip in to help the commission.

While the tests may instill fear among the government officers and settlers of Wayanad, it is only one step towards solving the problem. Equally important are serious rehabilitation measures, empowering the tribal women to stand on their own feet. As T. Devi, state committee member of the All-India Democratic Women's Association, admits, "It took years for these women to speak up against their tormentors and against official apathy." The only way this confidence can be nurtured is by making them self-reliant.

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