Chambal

This is interesting and darkly funny. The short article below is about the most heavily bandit-occupied area we passed through on the padyatra. It's called "Chambal" after the river of that name, which runs through it. The Chambal was the biggest river we crossed on the whole march, and it was stunningly beautiful. I would definitely go back there with friends and family if I could, but it's pretty much off limits, I think. We were accompanied on and off by jeeps of armed local police goons when we crossed through. I'm including some photos I took there so you can see what the landscape looks like. So yeah, I had never heard about this, but I guess they put a bunch of lions in there so they would could maybe eat the bandits. It certainly makes for a raw criminal justice system. So here is the article, and below it are photos I took there.

Lions to be set free to deal with bandits by Shaikh Azizur Rahman

THE WASHINGTON TIMES, August 27, 2005

CALCUTTA -- The government of a state in India has come up with a wild idea to control the menace of bandits who are becoming active again in the country's heartland. The government of Uttar Pradesh plans to unleash dozens of lions in the forested ravines to flush out the bandits from their hide-outs.

The 14,400 square-mile Chambal Valley region -- with its maze of undulating ravines and dense forests, spread across the states of Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh -- has been controlled by ruthless forest brigands, locally known as "dacoits," for decades. The gangs these days mostly abduct people for ransom and have been charged in more than 4,000 kidnappings and 180 killings in the two states in the last five years. The government of Uttar Pradesh plans to let loose 25 lions in the valley, to entertain wildlife lovers as well as to scare away the dacoits. The lions, from a national park in the western state of Gujarat, will be released in the forests of Etawah in northern Chambal Valley. "Apparently, the animals are meant for a lion safari park in the forest. But the presence of such large carnivores in the vicinity will be frightening for the dacoits," a forest ranger in Etawah said. "They were never afraid of hyenas and wolves of the Chambal ravines. But lions will scare them away this time, we are sure."

The project has been welcomed by Uttar Pradesh police. If it succeeds in Uttar Pradesh, the state will press Madhya Pradesh to extend the lion safari into that state as well, said S.K. Chaudhary, the top police officer in Etawah. "If no technical hurdle crops up suddenly, by the middle of next year Chambal ravines will see the lions," Mohammad Ahsan, the wildlife chief of Uttar Pradesh said in a television interview. Guddu Khan, a 32-year-old Etawah businessman who was kidnapped by a Chambal gang for three months five years ago and was released after paying a ransom of $16,250, doubts the lions would be able to deter the dacoits. "[The dacoits] are very good hunters as well. They will shoot down the lions the way they killed many leopards, wolves and other wild animals in the area," he said.

Most of Chambal Valley is inaccessible by police cars and jeeps. About 25 gangs with more than 300 members still operate in the two states and, in spite of chasing them regularly, police have failed to kill or capture most of them. Chambal ravines were the haunt of famous "Bandit Queen" Phoolan Devi, whose story of rape and revenge was made into a film in the 1990s. After spending 11 years in jail, she joined politics and became a member of Parliament -- before being killed in 2001. Nirbhay Singh Gujjar, 55, who controls a large part of the ravines, is now considered the Bandit King of Chambal. Gujjar, wanted in more than 50 killings and 280 kidnappings, has a reward of $5,750 on his head. Seema Parihar, another female bandit, portrayed herself in a recent Bollywood film on her life. The Indian government refused her application for a passport to attend a premiere of the film in Britain this week.

Note from Michael: Nirbhay Singh Gujjar has since been killed in a gun battle with police, not too long ago. Here are a couple of photos (*not* my photos - top is AP, bottom is Telegraph of India) of Gujjar from when he was still alive and afterwards:

Below is Phoolan Devi, who developed quite a cult following all over the world for what is at least the legend -- that as a very poor girl she was raped by upper caste members (very common and unpunished crime) and after some time returned to that town as the head of a dacoit gang to successfully massacre the upper caste men there. She later ended up becoming a local politician, but was assassinated a few years ago.

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Here are a few photos I took in the area:

Sathyu (in purple kurta, of course) talks to a roadside well-wisher just a few kilometers from the Chambal River.

This is the way the land is in the Chambal area. You can see immediately why it is inconquerable by any other than those who spend their whole lives winding through its ravines, learning every detail of its contours. Law enforcement or any other other structured organization has no chance in navigating this kind of a playing field. You could be literally 30 feet from the people you were looking for and be unable to see them over the narrow ridges and humps of land that formed an uninterrupted labyrinth for far as I could see.

As we approached the region, the highway that had become very wide and modernized after we passed through Gwalior in northern Madhya Pradesh, suddenly tapered and in no more than 50 feet went from being a divided, smoothly paved, railed highway to being just a notch above a dirt road. The change was so abrupt I felt compelled to turn around and take a photo (immediately below). We were in.

We passed through a small village very close to the Chambal River. A few padyatris to the opportunity to go ask the people in the above photo for some water.

Nafeesa, Jagarnath Das, and Ramkishin stride confidently across the dilapidated bridge that stretches high above the Chambal.

Stopping to watch us pass.

Some ancient fort that has virtually zero hope of being visited any time soon. Lonely Planet certainly makes no mention of this part of India. This is a little tongue of Rajasthan that is wedged between Madhya Pradesh and Uttar Pradesh.
The padyatra is temporarily mixed in with a long string of women and children carrying head loads down the road.

Chambal