Millions of hungry Indians to go on hunger strike demanding food

Wednesday, 23 December 2009 00:34

Written by oniouttapam news

Over a million hungry people from all over India will go on a hunger strike of indefinite length demanding regular food to eat. The mass hunger strike has been organized by newly-formed group "We Want Food" (WWF) and will be held at various grounds in several cities and state capitals all over the country. In New Delhi, over 2 lac hungry men, women and children will converge at August Kranti Maidan while in Mumbai another 2 lacs are expected to reach at Azad Maidan to participate in the hunger strike. Many more lacs will participate in the hunger strike at Chennai, Kolkotta, Bangalore, Hyderabad, Patna, Kanpur, Lukhnow, Jaipur and Bhopal.

Chairman of WWF, the newly formed front formed to fight hunger, Mr. Bhookhnath Khare, speaking to reporters at August Kranti Maidan, said that it was ironic that while India tops world hunger chart and also tops the chart for highest number of hunger strikes every year, the hungry have never participated in hunger strikes. "We have been going hungry for free for several decades never demanding anything in return from the government. It is time we make good use of our hunger and like the regular hunger-strikers, we too make demands from the government."

"But while we may be hungry we are not greedy. We don't want a separate state for ourselves. All we want is food." said Khare.

Nearly 230 million people, almost 1/5th of the total population of India, is undernourished - the highest for any country in the world. At least 1000 t0 1200 people die from starvation every year due to lack of adequate purchasing power and steep rise in food prices.

Rookha B Sookha, who is one of the organizers of the hunger-strike, said that he was inspired to come up with this innovative way of fighting hunger and malnutrition after learning about the cases of three people who have been beneficiaries of government largess - Ms Irom Sharmila, KC Rao and Aruna Shaunbag . "I never know what is happening in the country. I don't even have enough money to feed my family, leave alone money to buy a television set to keep abreast of current affairs. When I learnt about these three people from a visiting social worker, it made me realize that our government is not as heartless and uncaring as I had imagined."

"I was surprised to learn that our government has been feeding the lady named Irom Sharmila for almost ten years to stop her from dying by fasting. I was shocked when the social worker told me that this gentleman KCR demanded an entire state for his people by going on a hunger strike and actually got it. But what astonished me the most was learning that a rape victim, Aruna Shanbag, has been kept alive for 36 years despite being brain-dead. When I asked the social worker, why was she not allowed to die, he told me that under the law of the country, no person can be allowed to die."

"I never knew we are not allowed to die. But thousands of us die every year from starvation. Why does the government not follow the law of the land and stop us from dying, I asked him. He replied to me that we die quietly in the interiors of the country without any fan fare and without making any public announcement of our impending deaths. I learned that our government learns about starvation deaths only after the deaths occur."

When R Sookha met Khare, a distant relative, the two decided to form a united front of hungry people to formulate effective ways of communicating to the government that there are millions of hungry people in the country who are malnourished and at severe risk from dying by starvation.

"We realized that our government is very compassionate and willing to go to extraordinary lengths to prevent any citizen of the country from dying from hunger once he or she announces his plans to die from hunger. But how will the government help us if it is not even aware that millions of us are suffering from malnutrition and thousands of us die from hunger every year? We came to the conclusion that if we have to fight hunger and starvation deaths, we will need to make a public announcement of going hungry." said Khare.

And thus was the idea born to go on mass hunger-strike to draw attention of the Indian government towards the problem of starvation deaths.

"Its a win-win situation for us. Once we go on a bhookh hadtal, the government has no option but to keep us alive. In order to keep us alive, it has only two choices, either to provide us with regular rations free of charge or to force-feed us to prevent us from dying. In both the cases, we get to eat food." said Khare.

But what if the government ignores the hunger strikes and doesn't come to the rescue of the striking millions, one reporter asked.

"If the government doesn't do anything, we will die from hunger. But thousands of us are dying anyway. So it makes no difference. At least for few weeks, you media people will take a break from reporting on mandir-masjid disputes and other useless issues and focus your attention on the single biggest problem the country is facing."

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sbvikas007 RT @onionuttapam: Millions of hungry Indians to go on hunger strike demanding food http://bit.ly/6popg3
krpradeep RT @onionuttapam: #crackingnews Millions of hungry Indians go on hunger strike demanding food http://bit.ly/6popg3
aagan21 RT @onionuttapam: #crackingnews Millions of hungry Indians to go on hunger strike

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December 24, 2009

Shishir: ... http://dincoherentmynd.blogspot.com

The Govt. has granted the state of denial to hungry people

2

December 25, 2009

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