CHAPTER III

THE STARVA'l'ION PROCESS: 'DEARTH' , 'FAMISHMENT' AND MORBILITX

.1__

bn order to study the starvation process we

would have to consider two elements: the imposition

of starvation by one section of the society - the

means and mechanisms - and the responses and the

counter-stratagems of the affected community~

Such a process seemingly has a commencement and

a phase of maturing and tnen its decline into morta­

l! ty. I use the \<lOrd 'seeming' if only to suggest

that it could be looked upon as a continuum and all

the three phases observed in relation to different

sections going through one phase or the other.

History marks the process only when it culminates

in mass mortality. But their successive stages can

at once be observed in relation not only to the

biological/nutritional status of the affected but in

the nature of the responses/ strategies and counter

strategies of the tw groups.

J I propose to study famine in three phases: The

first indicating the stage of commencement, the second

of the maturing of the process and the third marking

the oven~helming of the stricken.J

I propose to use the term • dearth' to describe

the first phase. The term 'dearth' in earlier usage

had precise economic connotations: dearness, costliness,

.J hi g h prices. "Dearth is that when all those things

dear to the life of man are rated at a high price."

(OED). To describe the second phase, I use the term

'famishment' • The term is useful because it indicates

the movement of famine "the process of being starved."

Famishment can be used in the transitive sense as well;

to reduce to the extremity of famine and hunger. To

kill with hunger. To starve to death; to deprive a

person of anything necessary to life. For the third

and final phase, which subsumes the physiological as

well as the social, I use the term 'morbility', a term

which means the "proportion of sickness in a given

locality". The term accounts for morbidity as well

as the din.ensions of the condition. It has a spatial

connotation as well.J.

"Famine or widespread scarcity of food, imposes

on the individual a nutritional stress situation in

which a series of physiological mechanisms must come

into play in order to prolong survival. 11 (Vi teri

and Pinoda: 1971: 25). Famine may be said to commence

when the first adaptative steps to cope witb. physio­

logical suffering are taken. But the measure of

adaptation cannot be understood without reference to

the social suffering imposed upon the affected commu­

nity. The absence of food, therefore, would affect

social relationships, alter ritual obligations and

cultural habits. Documenting the changes in the

mores associated with the consumption of food would,

I believe, be sufficient to record in detail what I

term 'the passage' of suffering. Such adaptation

would commence - initially of foods not preferred, ..

and as scarcity deepens, acceptance of foods that

have been held to be taboo descending slowly to non­

foods such as thorn or balk or shoe leather and, in

some rare cases, to the eating of human flesh.

The onset of famine: 'Deart4' ./

The impact of the shortage of foods would have

its immediate effect on the daily routine. If the

affected population had been eating twice a day they /

might cut it down to once. If they had been eating

every day they might eat once in two days. By 'eating'

I mean the main meal consumed either during mid-day

or at night, consisting always of some cooked cereal

with some condiment. An informal rationing is imposed.

In areas where wages are linked to output and the

work offered is 'task work', the person who has secured

work .gets a little more to eat than the others.

Physical activity begins to be curtailed. Star­

vation has set in but they are able to manage an

occasional meal. The sense of deprivation is also

sharp. "I have not eaten - I cannot dig or plough",

61

is a plaint I often heard. 11We are eating black

bread", the people on relief works mourned in

J ai salmer in Rajasthan1 They broke open the m:ti,

to show the black gatura seeds. That year the milo

imported from the United States of America and sold

through the ration shops was adulterated with datura,

and the bread had earned for itself the odious name

of kala roti.

During thi-s phase, .families often give up their

custom of cooking and eating separately. ln slums as

in ~he villages where there is a grievous shortage

of houses or nuts, families often share a common

dwelling, the household being differentiated by the

!act that they cook and eat separately. During a

famine, close as well as distantly related families

may give up the custom of cooking and eating separa­

tely. .both in the Panchmahalt as well as in the

.bulsar districts in Gujarat where the married sons

often build smaller huts near that of the head of

the family, the practice of .juda khavanu {eating

separately) is given up. Primarily food and fuel are

short. therefore, it is necessary that supplies of

1. My infcCzmants were workers on Government relief programmes in Rajasthan during the severe scarcity of 1972. They had carried their noon-day meal in a piece of cloth to the work site. Unwrapped, it had only one roti.

2. My informants from the Panchmahals district in Gujarat were from the .bhil tribe who live in dispersed villages. I met them during field visits during the scarcity of 1973.

fuel be conserved; food supplies have to be pooled

so that those that go out to work may be fed. Further,

everyone except the aged has to go out all day to

work or scour the nearby Vt'Oods for subsistence.

Raymond Firth has pointed out that in Tikopia

two or more families gave up the practice of cooking

food in separate ovens. They would cook in one oven

whatever food they had obtained. He noticed that

closely related families would come together in this

fashion. "We have linked ovens11 (~ Ja!!!.l!); "we have

joined" , "We have one oven; there i sn • t any food n -

these were the expressions that were used to indicate

the pooling of food resources. (Firth: 1959: 84).

It must be noted here that in Tikopia cooking

demanded physical strength for chores such as the

crushing of coconut for obtaining cream etc. During

the famine there was a shortage of men in Tikopia.

Whether this was an attempt on the part of closely

related families to overcome the labour shortage as

well as of food, Firth does not explain. What he does

state, however, is that such joining of ovens or

sharing a common oven was accepted, even if it involved

a shift in residence. But he stresses that this was

only in the 11ini tial stages" of famine.

Famine Foods v Every community appears to have collected, over

a long period, the names of i foods' that could be

procured from the environment within which they live.

The Oxford English Dictionary notes that lichen or

moss has always been referred to as 'famine bread'.

I have found three criteria in the use of what might

be termed 'famine foods': (1) Availability in the

neighbourhood (where they generally grow wild),

(2) availability in bulk form so that they might be

converted into meal or porridge; an d ( 3) capability

for stor.age so that these might perhaps be collected

even during seasons of plenty and stored, to be used

in the event of an emergency. The Savaras of

Srikakulam, for example, store the mango kernels even

in seasons of plenty - to fall back upon in the event

of distress setting in.v

Outstanding examples of conversion into food

sources in India are the seeds of the tamarind tree

and the kernel of the mango. Seeds of the tamarind

normally used as fuel are diligently collected and

dried, then hand pounded, sieved and cooked, w1 th

water for bulk, into a kind of porridge. ·rhese, it

The Savara tribe of Parvathipuram in Srikakulam district in Andhra Pradesh were facing famine conditions. llhen I met them in 1973 and again in 1974~ "'r.heir famine was due to the re-settle ment programme undertaken by the Government as a means of keeping the prices under surveillance after the Naxalite disturbances. The Government had shifted them from their villages on the hills. As a consequence, cultivation had suffered. The tribals mutely held out mango seed meal to indicate their famine condition.

has been noted, have harm:t'ul. effects upon tne body.

"As they contain a large proportion of tannin, they

are unhealthy and resorted to only in times of scar­

city". (Government of Madras !n, Digby: 1878: 478) ••

Malinowski has noted that during a period of

scarcity (Molu), the Trobrianders had often to fall

back upon foods that were non-edible.

When there has been a drought, the natives begin to feel the pinch about the fourth moon of their year which begins the moons of scar­city. Then women would be seen scouring the jungle for wild fruits, leaves and roots with which to supply their households. If any of the desirab le fruits such as mango, malay apple, bread fruit had survived the drought they would gather these. If not, they would have to fall back upon the despised Noku which is hardly edible but never fails. {Malinowski: 1965: 160).

Firth notes the consumption in Tikopia of

cordyline or bark.

This was the period when people began to cull their orchards for secondary foods such as serial yam, taro leaves, and fukau berries used as a funeral food because of its poor quality, and pandanus seeds which though standard articles of diet in the Gilbert Islands were a token of severe shortage when eaten in Tikopia. Some people foraged for a hard root known as 1 Aka • which looked like wood even when cooked. A friend commented: "It is the famine, they cut and gnaw. When the land is secure again in food they reject it. n As the famine developed there was great resort to sago pith and cordy­line. At such times the sago palms are felled, chopped up into bulks and cooked in huge earth ovens. (Firth: 1959: 61).

Two questions are relevant here. Did famine

force people to give up taboos of religion or caste

on food? Did famine :force people into cannibalism'!

Again taboos may be considered in two ways. First,

there are the taboos on accepting food from lower

castes. Second, there are the taboos against certain

:foods, sucla. as beef for Hindus, pork for Muslims,

and so on. It is believed that the Hindu shastras

do not forbid the breaking of taboos in times of

great distress. But during my travels across the A

country, in famine si tuati ons I did not find Hindus '-../

eating beef. But it is important to remember that the

price of a cow can buy cereal food for over a month

or more for a destitute family. Although as meat,

beef is the cheapest meat in the country, it is a

luxury that destitute families will not dream of

availing of. In two districts the cattle given as

Government loan { taccavi) bad been, on the quiet,

slaughtered and eaten. The Collector of the district

was infonned that the cattle had died of disease.

But both these were in tribal areas - the first near

Udaipur in the Aravali Hills, the second in Srikakulam

in Andhra Pradesh.

Malinowski found evidence to the contrary among

the Trobrianders. "At time of real famirie 11 , he wrote,

11 the chiefs, surreptitiously at least, forego their

taboos and ate bush pig and wallaby and the despised

fruit of the Noku and other abominations."

{Malinowski: 1965: 165).

.I The taboos against commensual eating were

perhaps more strictly observed during the .famine o.f the

nineteenth century than in our times. In the nine­

teenth century, .Brabmins preferred to die quietly

in their homes rather than eat at the .famine relief

camps. There is evidence of deaths occuring in one

relief camp because the food had been cooked by low

caste people. Such caste barriers do not obtain now.

The packed food sold in Junagarh in Gujarat by chari t­

ab).e orgariisations are purchased by everyone. In

the appointment of water-carriers at relief works,

I did not find any caste restrictions. In Gujarat,

on relief wrks everyone drank water provided, for

instance, by the Kolis.v

'Dearth' has been depicted in the literature as

a period o.f deprivation o.f food but the lddespread

protest against such deprivation. 'Dearth' is per­

ceived as imposed by the society.

The process begins with the increase in demands

imposed by the society and an assertion of the right

to a disproportionate share in the food produced by

the society together with an assertion over labour.

The victims respond by a questioning the right to levy

taxes or demand services. The society in turn punishes

the poor for asserting themselves. Repression, protest

and the acceleration of starvation as a measure o:f

repression mark the responses and the counter-responses

o:f the phase.

,/ The rise in prices of grain, is also accompanied

by the exercise of the squeeze - the use of threat

to survival, the contraction of credit pressures to

mortgage land or other assets, limiting access to

other food sources, all of these imposing considerable

hardships on the poor • ../

v It is important to note that periods of public

disorder as well as social protest are identified

with dearth, the first phase. The victims questi. on

the right of the State - the society to impose hunger.

The principal fo:rm of protest through the Ages -

un1 versally known as "bread riots" - is a means of

questioning the limiting of the access to food:'

l3oth the imposition of starvation and the protest

against it can only partly be attributed to the resent­

ment against 'high prices o:f food •. The high prices

of food are seen as posing a threat to the 'autonomy

of poverty' - the right of the poor to live and work

as free men - and a mechanism of reducing them to

dependence • ...!

During the first phase, the poor are still living

in their original places of habitation and are able to

combine with others. The sense of shared injustice

enables them to rise against the oppressors. It can

take the fonn of violating the title to ownership of

the food res~rcesof the society. It can take the

form of assertion of ownership over their ow.n labour.

Jo

The leaders are drawn from three ranks - from

amongst the poor themselves, from the church, from

those saintly persons who protest against the church

but are later canonised as well as 'false' prophets

and charlatans who seek to make a living out of the

ferment in society. (Mollat: 1986: 70-86).

Scholars have been divided in the interpreta­

tion o:f social behaviour. Some have been unable to

reconcile themselves to 11 the break-down" o:f social

mores.

During a :famine, in the society as a w.hole, the pattern o~ family breakdown is seen in magnified fozm, with 'anti-social' activities to obtain food, such as theft and grain riots, only held in check by existing law enforcement (if such exists), and ultimately constrained by lethargy and weakness, by enfeeblement and death due to starvation and infection. (Jelliffe: 1971: 59).

'Srini vas has noted that the violation of norms

has the social sanction of the affected community.

(Srinivas: 1960) Srini vas relates that in

Rampura during the depression "raiding paddy carts

was a popular pastime for young bloods." Theft

against an 'outsider• - usually a grain merchant

meets w:i th approval.J

Again consider the 'theft' of forest resources

by tribals during a period of distress. This theft

is of two kinds. For instance, they might gather

food, such as dates etc. from date-palms, which

government has leased out to contractors. Similarly

there would be a questioning of the limits Government

might have imposed upon subsistence through forest

laws. For instance in Danta taluka in Banaskantha

district in Gujarat, forest laws permitted the tribals

to collect only one head load of bamboo per day that

they might sell in the bazaar. In 1978, when prices

of grain rose, the tribals were forced to "steal"

another headload in order to be able to earn their

bread. Forest regulations can hardly ever keep pace

with changes in prices. The people, therefore,

consider it legitimate, and perhaps government also

is not strict during the period of distress, in

enforcing regulations. But the attitude, as in

Rampura, is that the natural resources belong to them,

not to government.

'l'he incidence of theft tends to rise sharply

during the early phase of famine. In a sense grain

theft marks the attempt of the stricken to draw the

attention of the society to their plight. Adminis­

trators have in fact collected statistics of rise in

crime when famine threatens, and have noted this as

one of the "premonitory signs of famine" (Govern ment

of ~ombay: 1961: 11)1 • Even grain riots, according to

them, do not indicate "moral or social breakdown. tt

1. See Government of ~ombay: 1961, S~ Manual, Dra.tt.

\}..-

As Baird Smith, in his report on the famine in

North West Provinces noted, the social breakdown is

the rather desperate response of the heads of families

to the suffering of their loved ones:

No sooner had the serious pressure of famine begun to be felt ••• the ordinary bonds of society seemed to be broken by it. jjeginning in Hohillakhand, the population gathered into bands for plunder, and driven desperate by starvation, they everywhere attacked the grain stores in the larger villages and towns and carried off their contents. Spreading rapidly, the disorganisation soon reached the districts of Lower Doab and deplorable confusion is des­cribed as having prevailed from Hareilly in Allahabad. Troops had to be moved out on some occasions and during the whole course of famine a largely augmented Police Force, both horse and foot, had to be brought to maintain the peace, a duty which, however, was very diffi­cult to perform against large bodies of men whose natural instinct for fight or plunder was quickened by their own sense of suffering and the plight of those of their wives and children. (jjaird Smith: 1861: 30).

Where 1 bread riots' have taken the form of mass

movements, its nexus with famine has been noted, only

as a coincidence. "The coincidence of popular move-

ments with famine in 1140, 1180 and 1190 shows that

these movements were not unrelated to economic

difficulty. tt (Mollat: 1986: 82).

Mollat looks upon it as a coincidence although

there is a monotony about its recurrence. Other

writers, Schweinitz and Piven and Cloward have

established the nexus between public disorder and

periods of starvation. \Schweini tz: 1943; Piven and

Cloward: 1972).

The early twelfth century in Europe saw the beginning of sharp uprisings. In 1110, peasants uprisings were reported from several parts of' Europe. For instance, peasants burned the forests of the Bishop Beauvais in Galicia. The Bishop had to face the uprisings of' the 11li ttle peopleu and field 'WOrkers. {Mollat: 1986: 82).

Rioting was reported in 1140, 1180 and 1190. In

1529, in Lyons food riots erupted, the townsmen them­

selves looting the granaries and the homes of the

weal thy. In 15 30, artisans and journeymen armed them­

selves and marched through the streets. In 1531 mobs

of peasants literally overrun the town.

The eruptions persisted through the Middle Ages.

Take 1529 for example, there were protests both in

England and in France. In England, at the same time,

rioting broke out. During the reign of Henry VIII

there was such a shortage of food :and public anger

erupted. The bread carts coming from Stratford met

at mile's end 11 by a great number of' citizens, so that

the Sheriffs were forced to go and rescue them."

(Penkethman in Walford: 1878: 440). Protest took

the form of questioning the rise in prices. The

protest is met with repression. Exemplary punish­

ment was meted out to the rioters. In 1595, during

the time of Queen Elizabeth, some apprentices and

young people of the city were punished- by whipping,

setting on the pillory and by imprisonment for having

the temerity to take butter .from the market at 3d a

pound when it was selling at 5d. {Penkethman !g

Walford: 1878: 441).

7~

It should also be noted that the protest within

the church and against the church during the middle

ages also manifested itsel~ in expressions against

starvation and criticism of the church ~or being

unable to provide food for the dying. Famine's onset

was noted with precision by an unknown author who noted

that, "tlhen the predator swoops down upon the poor

man, we refuse to lend that man aid ••••• Christ is on

the cross and we remain silent."

Processions were organised by prelates of the

church. For instance, the Bishop of Piacenza organised

an appeal to christians liHelp us cruel Christians.

We are dying of hunger while you are living in

plenty." (Ivlollat: 1978: 85).

We should make a distinction between the protests

from saintly persons who were later canoni sed by the

church and the rumblings from within the church itself.

Bishops were reprimanded for speculating like any grain

merchant on hunger.

Even the Chancellor to the King of England was

not above reproof. "Already thousands of paupers are

dead and you are yet to touch them with the hand of

mercy. You are thinking, of opening your storehouses

not to alleviate the sufferings of the poor but to

sell more dear. (Mollat: 1986: 108)1 •

1 See Mollat, M., 1986, The Poor in the Middle Ages, The fragment is from a letter addressed by Archdeacon, Peter of Blois to the Bishop of Lisieux, Raoul of Wanneville, chancellor to the king of England.

Such. reprimands of the church could come even

from the State. On the one hand it articulates public

indignation against usurers and speculators. On the

other, it cautions~ence. The hermit Fulk, pleaded

that protest should not be harmed by violence. Hut

his orations were punctuated by the cry: "feed that

mann who is dying." (Mollat: 1986: 84).

Bishops plead that the powerful should refrain

from abusing their power over the poor. "Do not

condemn them on some unjust pretext, do not oppress

them, do not deprive them unjustly of their small

belongings and do not cruelly and pitilessly demand

your due." (Mollat: 1986: 43).

' FAMISHMENT'

./ The study of the second phase of famine begins

by noting the absence of protest. The victim perceives

a threat to life, the beneficiary, the weakening

of the victim in the unequal battle. The repression

unleashed to curb the protest now takes othe:r forms.

Political and military repression is now reinforced

by a repression that is economic. The victim can

avert starvation but at a price. He has to accept the

conditions whereby subsistence can be afforded. This

can imply fonns of bondage: for instance the pledging

of those assets of land and labour as a condition that

would enable him to procure subsistence. The phase

ends with the loss of land and home and the eviction

from the village. It is followed by an "inexorable

decline into misery that is marked by exclusion from J

society." (Mollat: 1986: 68).

Moral Eqonomy

Under the pressureo.f 1 .famishment• the victim

community is known to have entered into arrangements

that were perhaps institutionalised. What were the

.forces in Europe in the middle of the eighth century

that drove paupers to place themselves, by perpetual

contract, under the protection of power.t'ul patrons to

whom they surrendered their land, assured their services

as their allegiance? R~e against starvation was

provided, but the litany that the victim was called

upon to chant, is illuminating.

Since it is well known to all that I have nothing with which to feed or clothe myself, I have begged of your pity and by your will you have granted to me, permi..ssion to deliver mysel.! untR :£QY and to entrust myself to your protection which I have done under the following conditions: You must help me and sustain me with both food and clothing so long as I am able to serve you and deserve your benefaction. So long as I shall live, I shall owe you service and obedience, compatible with liberty and shall have no rights to remove myself from your power and protection. (Mollat: 1986: 31).

How far can the arrangement be described as a

mechanism of social insurance? Its basis in legal or

moral law was questioned, even at the time. The

critique comes from the luminaries of the period, from

Gregory Nazianzen and Hasil of Caesarea. They atta­

cked the patronage system "as a uruxpation of poverty

disguised as fair exchange of land and service for

protection." (Mollat: 1986: 30).

It is important to emphasise that the poor

peasant was pushed into seeking protection. The State

enforced it. Mollat reports that the kings gradually

came to impose upon all of their subjects the obliga­

tion to place themselves under the protection of a

patron. The patron now had a means of annexing

the property of the pe asant when he so desired.

76 ./

A study of these insti. tutions in my view offers

important clues to the study of famine process. They

need to be looked at as a phase of the process through

which large masses of the peasantry pass through,

never to return to freedom or to t1 tle ownership of

land. They are now dependents of the society seemingly

protected by the aura of power shed by their patron;"

These institutions appear to have their counter­

parts in other parts of the world in other societies

as well as in other periods of history. Jackson

reporting upon the famines in the nineteenth century

among the Akamba of Kenya describes, 11 The way a range

of family entities were compelled toward transformation

under the exigencies of frequently severe and always

constraining environmental crisis; ~ecifically

recurring society-wide famine and localised drought."

(Jackson: 1976: 193). He takes up for consideration,

11insti tutional manoeuvre, re-adaptations, shifting

alliances of per so nnel, and structural innovations

within the framework of the famine-besieged family."

(Jackson: 1976: 194). Jackson analyses, nthe procedures

of enlargement in the membership of households; and

with a resolution of socio-economic pressures that this

drafting of all personnel reflects. n Jackson observes,

"the emergence of a new institution which he labels

the 'famine family'."

Within the conditions of famine, the history of power relations and of control over resources within a community, and the past axes of economic hegemony, might be altered,

77

as a sector of well-protected family units further their economic and political aspirations by capitalising on the depletion of resources. (Jackson: 1976: 195).

Jackson notes, "that what, therefore, seems an

incoherent pattern - frightened, spasmodic movements

by families - had a remarkable degree of purposive

choice behind it." (Jackson: 1976: 200). The famine­

stricken sought temporary refuge with other kinsmen.

Jackson cites an example where "the units brought

into alliance were a desperate extended family and

a better situated maximal lineage. In payment for

welcoming and maintaining his destitute family, Love

and his three sons aided kinsmen in rebuffing raids

from surrounding villages. 11 (Jackson: 1976: 201).

Jackson also cites the case of two brothers who become

itinerant wanderers exchanging their expertise to kin

families in return for sustenance for their own

families who accompanied them on their "dizzying

journeysn. Legend say t.na't lor a long time beyond

the famines, people talk of this peripatetic band:

"they were archetypal waifs of their day. n

(Jackson: 1976: 202).

While accepting Jackson's brilliant observations

on the innovations and structural manoeuvres of the

famine-besieged family, I have to make one caveat.

To Jackson, these changes are responses primarily to

an environmental crisis. They can perhaps with equal

validity be considered not as responses to an exter­

nal environmental crisis but as responses to an

endogenous socio-economic one. That is, the "frigh­

tened yet spasmodic movements" might be triggered by

manoeuvres by those who benefited and these very

mnoeuvres and innovations might be identified with

the famine by both victim and beneficiary. As I shall

demonstrate in the next chapter, my infomants indi­

cated their acceptance of the manoeuvres thus:

"We were enslaved by the famine. 11

The movement of labour from India to Fiji,

Mauritius, Singapore and Ceylon and to the tea plan­

tations of Assam within India is closely associated

with famine. The available material - both historical

records and research studies - point to one central

fact, the total antipathy of Indian labour towards

migration in normal times and their overcoming of

this dislike in years of famine. (Crooke: 1897: 326;

Government of Central Provinces: 1896) • There are

tw opinions regarding their dislike of migration in

normal years. Official British attitudes put it down

to the prejudices of the Indians - their religions and

caste. "To travel was to lose caste. There was an

interdict on foreign travel by Hindus. The dislike of

emigration was a Hindu prejudice, which the Government

felt it was its duty to counteract." (Gillion: 1962: 23).

It was their duty, because emigration could, as Lord

Salisbury had pointed out, be an outlet for the

unfortunate country.

However, the evidence unearthed by research

scholars, missionaries an d political worlters offers

a somewhat different picture. It indicates that

migration took place under famine pressure. In the

first place, the migration took place under an agree­

ment entered into by th e East India Company and the

French Government, for the e~ort of coolies from

India. In East India Company ships the supply of

labour to the sugar plantations became imperative after

the abolition of slavery in 1834. Known as the

indentured labour system, it demanded that the worker

remain on the plantation for a period of ten years

before the could be paid his passage for his return

home. Work was exacted by a system of penal sanctions -

punishments included flogging, fining and imprisonment.

No justice could be hoped for as the planter often

served as the magistrate. Further, care was taken to

prevent ~ migration. vThe migrants were not always

caste Hindus. They could be drawn from the Scheduled

Tribes of India. In other wrds, migration was an

institutionalised manoeuvre which brought gain to the 1/

beneficiary, the State.

Here is a portrait of woman wo'J-kers in Fuku,

by a missionary, Miss Dudley of the Methodist Mission:

They arrive in the country, timid fearful women, not knowing where they are to be sent. They are allotted to plantations like so many dumb animals. If they do not perfonn satisfactorily, they are struck or fined or even sent to jail. fhe life of the plantation alters their very demeanour or even their very faces. Some looked crushed and broken hearted. Others look sullen, others hard an d evil. I shall never forget the first time I saw indentured women returning from their day's work. The look on their faces haunts me. Not surprisingly, the death rate on the plantations was higher than in the villages in India. (Gillion: 1962: 107).

Under what conditions did the Indian choose to

accept the indentured labour system? A report put it

bluntly. It stated: "Except under famine conditions

the small cultivator will not migrate" ( Gillion: 1968:

44). The Indian worker was pushed into migration for

himself and his family only under the overriding pre­

ssures of famine. He was aware of the conditions of

semi-slavery an d knew that emigrants had never been

known to return.

' Right oyer li f_g'

During field visits in .North Karnataka in 1973, l

learnt of pawning or pledging of children in lieu of

money or subsistence. The institution of the pawning

of children to the master weaver among weaver communities

is associated with famine conditions. It is known

significantly enough as j_eetad-alu meaning nright over

life". The child has to work several years in the

master weaver's home as a spinner in return for the

money paid during the years of scarcity to the parent.

We need to know more about the prevalence of such

institutions. In parts of North Kama taka the

custom of pledging the daughter to the goddess 11 implying

that she is sold away into prostitution" appears to

be concentrated in North Kamataka which has come to

be known as a famine region.

Jackson cites famine pawnship as an institution

among the Akamba. He grants that 11 i ts origin as an

institution rather as a sub-institution is cloaked

in obscurity." (Jackson: 1976: 205). But just as in

North Kar.nataka, paw.nship involved persons being left

in another's family's keeping during the seasons of

famine. The family also had control over the pawn 1 s

labour. But the status of the power was not akin

to that of a slave. Pawnship implied subordination,

but it was not a permanent legal condition.

We also learn of • famine families' which were

spatially joined to larger units that provided refuge,

engaging in food trade among neighbouring communi ties.

These groups were kno\Yn as gthusi. .. meaning the "people

who search :for food". The trade itself was known as

.t(uthua meaning 11 food searching". (Jackson: 1976: 204).

As ':famishment' progresses it brings a deterioration

in the relationship between debtor and creditor.

Peasants in Europe in the middle ages were

caught by the system of mortgages. It was not for­

tuitous that the system was becoming widespread in

the twelfth century Europe when famine was also

becoming a constarl't visitor. The pledging of land v

and labour on the basis of speculation of future

harvests became common. The Council of Paris in the

year A.D. 829 left a striking description of the

situation:

When in time of famine a pauper made weak by lack of all things goes in search of a usurer ••• he commonly hears this response: "If you want to buy, pay the price and take what you need. 11

To which the pauper replies: 11I cannot afford to pay the price, but I beg you to have pity on me and in whatever way you choose to lend me the money that I am asking, so that I won't die of hunger." The usurer answers: "I can only sell you a modius of my com for so many deniers. Or else you will pay me so many deniers at the next harvest, or make up the remainder of the price in corn, wine or other goods. It was not uncommon for the lender to demand, in exchange for a single modi us lent under such conditions, three or even four modii at harvest time. {Mollat: 1986: 34).

As it was aptly stated, ttthe pauper was a peasant

with a modest plot with powerful neighbours eager to

annex his property." (Mollat: 1986: 36).

Such speculation led to oppression by powerful

neighbours eager to armex their property. From being

poor to freeman to a condition of being a client

and finally to becoming a vagrant marks the passage

of the peasant from one phase to another.

As Caesarius of Arles explaine d, 111 t is the hypocrisy of the buyer who in expending his estate passes himself off as a protector and benefactor. He pays cash and provides the service, but the seller uprooted from the land falls into a s1 tuation of dependency if he is lucky enough to remain a free man. u (Mollat: 1986: 30).

The eleventh and twelfth century was a period of

considerable change in Europe. The characteristic of

the process is transfer of land. By 1179, mortgages

became common. The loss of rights to the soil, and loss

of status is doclWlented by Mollat.

A mortgage then required cession to the mort­gagee of all benefit and usufruct of the mort­gaged property with no deduction from the principal of the loan, thus rendering illusory any hope of eventual reimbursement. Peasants were caught in a vise: creditors were relentless and the law permitted no delays. The peasant caught in such circumstances had no choice but to abandon his family, his land and set out alone towards the unknown. Abandonment of one' s land means crossing the dividing line between poverty and indigence: this was a break w1 th the social order. {Mollat: 1986: 68).

This passage sums up the process of famishment

and its nature.

There is evidence that during the twelfth, thir­

teenth and fourteenth century Europe such a pledging

took on mass dimensions. This kind of economic crisis

and collapse occurred during the second half of the

twelfth century in a number of regions in France.

Peasants were forced to abandon their property and

reduced to begging and vagabondage. That the conditions

Mollat refers to the Labour Council meeting of 1179 wh en Pope Alexander condemned mortgages that were becoming widespread.

apread rapidly is evinced by the following:

"It was the turn of the grape-growers around the

rich valleys of the Rheims and Beauvais. They had

borrowed against the next year• s grape harvest. The

harvest was bad and they were forced to abandon

their property." (Mollat: 1986: 68).

It was not drought but speculation that forced them

out. It is this collapse that we find in Kersha 1 s

testimony of the transfer of lands during the famines

of the fourteenth century in England. Kershaw cites:

for instance, entries like the one for Tugford in

South Shropshire, 11 where tenants do not cultivate

their lands beccu se of poverty, and six tenants are

begging. 111 He notes that these entries are fairly

common. He also notes the loss of tenements by

tenants who could not pay the rent arrears at the

close of the famine years in 1325-26. The law took

over the tenements. Entries in the margin of the

account suggest 11 dead in poverty and so nothing, died

a pauper or fled from the town as a pauper"2 supplying

reasons for the rent defects.

We would also like to juxtapose the evidence

offered by Jackson. He notes that 11often a famine

will be named Ngambu and adds for contemporary Akamba

1 See Kershaw, Ian, • 'rhe Great Famine and Agrarian Crisis in England 1315-1322', Past and Present, Vol. Page 46.

2 Ibid, page 16.

this name conjures correct history because the word

signifies 'grabbing' or 1 tresspassing' or 'squeezing'."

The illusion captured in the -word is to 'thievery' and

specifically to the land thieves. (Jackson: 1976: 199).

Consider theevidence from nineteenth century

India:

The fact twith which Government here and else­where has to deal with i s, a general insolvency affecting large classes of people, who are under one name or another, tenants of Government, and in whose prosperity Government has, therefore, a direct interest." (The Deccan Riots Commission Report, 1875, Ch X, Page 90).

On the condition of indebtedness of the peasants:

It may be thought that there is no foundation to the somewhat startling statement that the creditor is allowed by our law to recover his debt by the &aye labour of his debtor. It is true that the civil procedure code does not in so many words say that the creditor may compel his debtor to work for him as a slave.

The words of the law are, ttif the decree before money it shall be enforced by the imprisonment of the party against whom the decree is uade, or by the attachment and saleof his property, or by both if necessary.

At first sight this clause does not appear to authorise slavery but on further consideration it will be found that it does authorise it.

The power to imprison clearly gives the creditor power to compel the debtor to do whatever yill be less unpleasant to bear than imprisonment would be, and undoubtedly most cultivators would prefer to work in their native village and their ancestral lands than being sent to a dis­tant jail which has to them all the terrors of the unknown \ empnasis added.} •

The Deccan Riots Commission Report as well as

Wedderburn's Special Report that followed it are

significant because they throw light on the processes

that pauperised the peasantry.

The famines that occurred in India must be

seen in the context of the rules and laws as well as

the impact they had on the economy of the peasantry.

The mortality of 1877-1878 can hardly be

comprehended without an understanding of the total

destitution of the peasantry that needed it.

'l'he documents that throw light on the processes

of impoverishment and the legal enactments and rules

within which these processes were enacted are criti­

cally important for the understanding of not only

how famines are caused but what is famine. The

recorded history of famines identify it with the

year of mortality. Would not the famine-stricken

families who suffered the process not perceive in­

differently? In the next Chapter I shAll demonstrate

this in detail.

~7

'MORBILI TY'

_/

The fading of famishment into morbili ty begins

even with the termination of the obligation of the

patron or other employer to maintain his client - the

snapping of life support systems. What are the

strategies that are available to the stricken at

this phase? The strategies adopted can be termed

strategies of survival risk as well as strategies

of decimation. By decimation I mean the termination

of life of dependents as a preferred option. I

catalogue the available evidence in this section from

literary sources.

The lack of access to food, the loss of right

even to dependence is epitomised even in the accounts

of foods consumed. The foods that are resorted to

need to be documented in order to fathom the extremes

to which they have been pushed under the pressure

of starvation. J

\1hen we begin to consider what the famine stricken

eat in the final phase of famine, it appears that

language begins to break down. The famine-stri ck.en

share the food with other specie - birds as well as

animals particularly cattle. As a rule the leaves

and grasses that herbivorous animals consume are

generally acceptable as .famine :roods. As Major Short,

a surgeon wrote during the Madras Famine of 1877,

11 The bastard cedar (Guazema Tomentcosa) was introduced

into southern India to be cultivated :for supplying

cattle with fodder. The woody seeds are sweet from

containing sugar and they are eaten by the poor in

times of scarcity. 11 (Government of Madras !11 Digby:

1978: 478). In Salem district, in Tamil Nadu, the

:fruit of the neem tree consumed by birds and bitter

to the taste is eaten.

Proverb which compares the fam ine-stri ck.en

unfavourably with an imal kind can be c1 ted. It says,

11A starving tiger will not eat grass. 11 lPuli pasi thaaJ,.um

pullai thippathu). Two kinds of grasses - arqgam

pilloq and muttanga pilloQ. (pvnodon Dactylon,

Eleusi.ne Aegyptiaca) have been identified as consumed

during periods of famine.

If food can whet the appetite, famine food is

meant to kill it. Both in Gujarat as well as in Kenya

roots and tubers that have the property of killing

the appetite have been identified. The kand root

consumed by the tribals of Dharampur in Bulsar kills

the appetite for about three days. The root is bitter

and the edge of the bi ttemess is sought to be removed

by keeping it doused in a running stream for a few days.

(It is stated thatthose being trained in guerilla

warfare are now being taught to identify such roots).

Similarly, Audrey Richards has noted thatamong

the Bemba, "one of the best ways of staving off

hunger is to eat the dish known as ici tata, a hard

dry cake made of various legumes. n1 Mothers say that

if they give this to a child during the hunger season

and then ask it to drink water so that the food

'swells inside', it will not feel the pangs of hunger

for a long time. 11 {Richards: 1965: 53).

J Notions of taste, palatability and nutrition and

even safety are set aside. Poisonous foods are known

to be consumed. The Gazetteer of Bombay offering a

list of famine foods cites the plant known as Sap-kanda2

in Marathi \Arisaema Tortuosum) a tall tuberous plant

that is poisonous and is said to provide violent

illness if eaten raw. Ganja {Abrus precatorious) used

as an into xi cant becomes a food in famine times. The

boiled seeds are eaten although it is known that they

contain abrin, a poison, used for instance, by the

Chamars (leather workers) for poisoning cattle. The

seeds eaten in large quantities act as an acrid poison

1 Richards uses this statement to illustrate n clearly the ~emba theory as to what may be considered nourishing. 11 I shall offer little as comment on the Bemba 1 theory'. It seems to me that there is scant attempt at providing 'nourishment' when a mother seeks to kill hunger pangs of her child. {Richards: 1965).

2 The Sap-kanda is processed by burying the leaves in masses in the ground until acetone fermentation sets in when they are dug up, washed and cooked. By this means the poisonous properties of the plant are said to be 'partly removed'.

qo

(Gazetteer of Bombay: 1961: 467). Plants which offer

gum and resins also become a source of food. A foetid

plant, the nurakvei in Marathi (Kedrostis no strata),

normally avoided, is eaten when hunger threatens

(Gazetteer of Bombay: 1961: 470). These do not

·appear to conform to the properties of food, although

they are chewed and swallowed. To the starving,

the consumption of such foods is affirmation of their

famine conditions. To the non-poor it establishes

that they are not starving because they are "eating".

The identification of these toxic and poisonous

materials, their processing and consumption can not be

looked upon as means of nourishment as • food' • They

are mechanisms of survival. And they have become

" part of folk memory.

Suicide is also documented as one of the actions

resorted to. "Wandering", that is, moving aimlessly

from place to place in search of food is yet another

choice. History offers us evidence of the wandering

of the famine-stricken as well as the responses of

the powerful. The biological collapse marks the end

o:f :famine. Again, I would fall back on the evidence

of medical men working in famine-affected areas who

affirm that the death of the famine-stricken is as

much a consequence of ~ety and psycho-social suffer­

ing as the result of starvation and disease.

J The account of morbili ty has to begin with the

loss of status, It is necessary to emphasise that the

society recognises no claim to prevent suffering and

death. The stricken are paupers who 11 lack rights to

soil and have become dependent on others for food."

(Mollat: 1986: 24). They are now described as having

been ttcast out of the society. 11 They have no claims

even to alms. (Mollat: 1986: 7) .-v

Mollat documents the distinction that obtains in

the middle ages between 11 the true pauper" and the

"vagrant". The true pauper had an identity. "Every­

body knows him." He has a place of habitation in his

village. He is a member of the social group defined

by the seigneurie and rural, or possibly urban parish.

He lived on that, he earns from his trade and supple­

mented his earnings by alms - a meagre but resigned

existence. 11 As regards the vagrant nothing was known.

He was a man without identity, status, not defined

by his trade or his habitation. There was suspicion

about the vagrants. "They had fled their rightful

place in society." They could be thieves or disease

carriers. (Mollat: 1986: 8).

1v1any contemplate suicide. During my field visits

in northern Kamataka in 1972, I found three instances

of suicide in Gulbarga from the ~ehsildar's report.

Newspapers often report of whole families in distress

committing suicide. As referred to in the first

chapter, the famine in Tamil .Nadu a hWldred years

ago was named after a woman who jumped into the well

with her children.

Sleeman offers evidence of the 11 colle ctive sui-

cide11 in famine conditions:

Respectable families, w.ho left home in search of the favoured land of Malwa, while yet a little property remained, finding all exhaus­ted, took opium rather than beg, and husband, wife and children died in each other's arms. Still more of such families lingered on in hope till all had been expended; then shut their doors, took poison and died all together, rather than expose their misery, and submit to the degradation of begging. (Sleeman: 1973: 151).

An American missionary, who visited India during

the famine of 1867, has published a memorable port­

rait of the famine of 1898. The document includes an

account by Pandi ta Ramabhai, who was herself a victim

of famine during the year. Pandi ta Ramabhai tells us

about her family contemplated collective suicide.

At last the day came when we had finished eating the last grain of rice - and nothing but death by starvation remained for our por­tion. Oh, the sorrow, the helplessness, and the disgrace of the situation •••• We assembled together and after a long discussion came to the conclusion that it was better to go into the forest and die there than bear the dis­grace of poverty among our O'Wll people. Eleven days and nights - in which we subsisted on water and leaves and a hand.ful of wild dates -were spent in great bodily and mental pain. At last our dear old .father could hold out no longeH the tortures o.f hunger were too much

for his poor, old, weak body. He detennined to drown himself in a sacred tank nearby and thus to end all his earthly suffering ••• It was suggested that the rest of us should either drown ourselves or break the family and go our several ways. While we were placed in such a bewildering situation, the merciful God came to our rescue. He kept us from the dread­ful sin of being witnesses to the suicide o:f our own father. God put a noble thought into the heart of my brother who said he could not bear to see the sad sight. He would give up

(all his caste pride and go to work to give up ~all his caste pride and go to wrk to support our old parents". (Lambert: 1979: 89).

Sleeman also reports of mothers abandoning

children as they are unable to support them. "At

Sagar, mothers, as they lay in the streets unable to

walk, were seen holding up their infants, and imploring

the passing stranger to take them in slavery, that

they might at least live •••••• 11 (Sleeman: 1973: 149).

At Raichur we stayed for a few weeks being unable to move from that town due to the illness of our mother. Brother was too weak to work, and we could not make up our minds to beg. Now and then kind people gave us some food. Mother suffered intensely from hunger and weakness ••••••• now and then when delirious she would ask for different kinds of food. \Ramabhai's account in Lambert: 1898: 93).

Pandi ta Ramabhai then describes of how she mutely

begs for a piece of ba.jri roti (bread of millet) which

her mother craves for, then runs back only to .find her

mother too far gone to be able to eat.

Later, my elder sister died of starvation. My brother and I continued on our sad pil­grimage. Once on the banks of the Jhelum, we were obliged to rest at night in the open air, and tried to keep off the intense cold by digging two grave-like pits, and putting ourselves into the sand covering our bodies -except our heads \"Ji th the dry sand of the river bank. Sometimes the demands of hunger were so great that we would satisfy our empty stomachs by eating a handful of wild berries, and swallowing the hard stones together with the coarse skins. (Lambert: 1898: 95). ·

Evidence on the abandoning of children comes from

diverse sources. Lambert, missionary working in India

offers us this account of Narsinghpur in the then

Central Provinces during the famine of 1897.

The famine is growing sore. This is indi­cated in several ways. The prices of grains are rapidly rising •••• Another indication is that many mothers are now coming to me begging me to take their children. Two mothers are in my compound wanting me at this moment to take their three children. I sent three girls to Jabalpur yesterday whose mother had given them to me. A brahmin mother gave me her boy this week. (Lambert: 1898: 266J.

The Revenue Department from Bijnore, Uttar Pradesh,

testifies to the 'strategy' adopted by the wmen

during the famine of 1869.

Mothers drop their children, and Mr. Ross \the magistrate) has been obliged to post patrols after payment of wages to pick up any children that have been left behind. Things must be bad when natural feeling ceases. (Government of India: 1874: 172).

Reports of the sale of children or selling of

victim themselves into slavery are also available. Tod,

writing about the famines in the Central and Western

States of Rajasthan offers evidence:

Every third year, they calculate upon a partial visitation, and in 1812, one commenced which lasted three or four years, extending even to the central States of India, when flocks of poor creatures found their way to the provinces of the Ganges, selling their infants, or parting with their own liberty to sustein existence.- (Tod: 1920: 1305).

Expectant women seek termination of life of the

unborn or even infanticide as a preferred alternative

to imposing starvation. Firth and his colleague,

Spillius have left an account of descript stratagem

of the women in Tikopia who were unable to support

their children in the -absence of the men, who were

away. During the famine in 1952-53, there were 62

pregnancies of women in Tikopia of which 14 were lost

and according to spillius, most of the observed cases

employed "deliberate termination of life.'' The women

of Tikopia applied hot stones to the belly in order

to prevent live births. Again, according to Spillius,

there were only three genuine still births. Again, of

49 born alive, 11 children died within a month. 11 This

heaVY pre-natal and neo-natal mortality may be attri­

buted very largely to the famine conditions then

prevailing ·" (Spillius, Firth and Borrie: 1957: 236).

Suicide and killing of in.flants in famine conditions "-"""

need to be fUrther studied.

The decision to wander away is taken by the strong

and the weak alike. Pandi ta Ramabhai describes the

pathetic attempts of the family to save themselves by

wandering.

Here is a testimony from a missionary during

the fainine of 18'.17 :

The need of this part of Berar becomes greater every day. Families from long distances come to us half-starved and almost overcome by fatigue. This morning a family came into our compotmd, almost exhausted. The man saiSd they had walked four htmdred miles. \'Je gave the children SCQ.nj,eg (gruel) but one of the boys died in a few minutes and some of the others are in a critical condition. (Lambert: 1898: 238-239).

The hope of getting food somewhere derives them

on. A young Chinese mother offered th1 s tale to

Jack Belden;

We three went out to beg. Sometimes we had to go very far away and could not get back at night. So often we slept in temples and some­times we could not find a temple and we had to sleep outdoors. Once I asked the children, Are you frightened?" and they said, "we are not afraid as long as we get something to eat. 11

Belden: 1973: 14- ) •

The survivors of 'the long march' are often the

older children. Distress numbs the edge of their

suffering and their behaviour is almost as rational as

soldiers during a war. Here is another page from a

missionary's account:

At the beginning of the distress, the father died. His wife, with her daughter and son set out looking for work. For a time she received enough to get along with her children, but her health began to fail as they came toward Mungali • A short distance from here, the mother fell down from exhaustion, and in a few hours she died. I asked the girl, 11 who buried your mother':'" She looked up plaintively and said, "I was not able to do it, and the dogs devoured her ••• And then my

brother and I came on, but he was too weak and he died. l sat by his side and he had the only covering we possessed. I took it .from him after he died" , and she pointed to a dirty piece of cloth she had on. lLambert: 1898: 256).

Mollat' s account of the wandering during the

middle ages is extremely important although I wish to

state that Mollat has not cited its significance in

relation to famine. Mollat' s account is important

not only for the descriptions he has culled .from the

chronicles of the time of the condition of the wanderers,

but also of the responses of the society to their

condition. He observes that once they had 'fled'

society metaphorically and literally closed its doors

to them. They were not penni tted to settle any\-rhere

and they were termed • transients', people on penna­

nently the move. "In times of 'alann' their access

to the city was denied. Hospices prudently opened

shelter to transient paupers11 for only a limited

period.

~he loss of status is also referred to as dimi-

nution in stature. The poor are referred to as the

"little people". They are heard, but they are not

understood. Their voices are described as 11 the

clamour of the poor." They have lost identity. They

are described as the 'multitudes•. They are turned

away by the cities, the merchants, the monasteries as

well as the common people. Consider the evidence:

"The pauper cannot move his dwelling place in the

house of the prelate \where simony resides) or Knight

(where pillage finds safety) bourgeois where usury ~

lived or commoners where theft resides." (Mollat: 1986: 113).

The indigents either stayed in one place, isolated

or joined together in bands and roamed the country­

side. Those who stayedbut lived in wretched huts.

Mollat reports that vagabonds first roamed from c1 ty

to city in search of food; in a later period t..~ey

went from monastery to monastery.

It is towards the end of the period that they

collapse and their collapse is as much psycho-social

as physical.

Aykroyd, pointing out that when "starvation

progresses and becomes extreme and the personality

tends to disintegrate" (Aykroyd: 1971: 18).

As a member of the .tiengal Famine Commission in

1943, Aykroyd was able to observe famine at close

quarters. He stated:

I have painful recollection of victims of the Bengal famine in 194 3 who had wandered hopelessly in search of food thronging into Calcutta and other cities. They were quite disoriented; scarcely knowing there they were or what they were doing, and very difficult to handle. \Aykroyd: 1971: 18).

The exhaustion - mental and psychological - of

wandering has been described by a San1 tary Commissioner

of the Bri. tish period:

All those who were attacked by diarrhoea after they had suffered long from the want of wholesome food, combined with bodily fatigue from long marches, anxiety, distress and exposure to alternating heat in the day and cold at night, invariably died, as under these influences, the blood becomes impoverished, the muscles weakened, or wasted, the digestive organs get seriously damaged or destroyed and assimilation rendered difficult; the body emaciated into a bony skeleton covered w.ith skin, gradually reduced to the state of dried parchment in appearance and all the other symptoms of starvation supervened. (Drever: 1877).

They now seek means of dying in dignity. Belden,

writing about famine in China, tells us how all of them

could even dig their own graves:

\"/hen a man was going to die, he dug a pit and sat inside and asked his neighbours to fill in the earth when he was dead. Afterwards however, no one could be found to fill in the pit for all were either dead or too weak to shoval earth. lBelden: 1973: 96).

Sleeman also offers a testimony:

Hundreds were seen creeping into gardens, courtyards and old ruins, concealing themselves under shrubs, grass, mats, or straw, where they might die quietly, without having their bodies tom by birds and beasts before the breath had left them. lSleeman: 1915: 151).

Their collapse has been described by hundreds of

journalists and chroniclers. I reproduce an account by

K. Santhanam, Editor of The Hindustan Times, of the

famine-stricken in Calcutta during the J;engal J:t'amine

of 1943:

(00

It is incredible. If I had not seen it face to face, I should not have believed it. Let the reader imagine groups of men, women, and children of all ages, in all states of emaciation sca­ttered all over the pavements of this premier city. They are to be seen in single families, in groups of tens, hWldreds and they swell into thousands near the relief centres during mid-day where they are served gruel once a day. They live and sleep on the pavements. One cannot move out of one • s house without meeting these unfortunates who bear the foms of human beings but are already fallen so low that it seems to be a satire to call them men and women. The women and children seem to preponderate and their ghostly shapes are the most terrible accusations that one can imagine, of our country, people and Government. ~Santhanam: 1943: 16).

What is important to emphasise in that it is this

phase alone that we have in famine studies is the

account of the famine-stricken in the state of collapse.

The period of even anxiety and wandering has been

eclipsed from the literature.

l t is looked upon as a period of psycho-social

breakdown ~Jelliffe: 1971; Aykroyd: 1971; 1974). The

evidence that I have collected does not appear to

support the ·inference.

We have a fairly extensive documentation of the

.famines that occurred in India when. millions of

people died, between 1770 and 1901, and of the Bengal

Famine of 1943. I myself have been collecting data

.from areas affected by famine and scarcity since 1968.

to I

There is hardly any evidence of the occurrences of the

kind summed up by the pithy statement, "The flesh of his

son was dearer than his love. 11 (Imperial Gazetteer of

India: 1909: 475).

Sleeman, administrator and eye-witness to the

famine of 1833, reported:

In the midst of these and a hundred other harrowing scene s which present themselves on such occasions, the European cannot fail to remark the Patient resignation with which the poor people submit to their fate; and the absence of almost all those revolting acts which have characterised the famines of w.hich he has read in other countries - such as the living feeding on the dead, and ~others devouring their own children. No such things are witnessed in Indian famines. (Sleeman: 1973: 148).

And it does not seem to me to be sufficient

to put down the absence of such practices, as Jelliffe

has done, "to the vegetarianism and fatalism of

oriental countries." (Jelliffe: 1971: 58). These

have not been noticed in the Solomon Islands, and

as Malinowski indicates, the evidence even of the

Trobriand Islands is not definitive (Malinowski: 1965:

162). I might also add that Jelliffe' s attempt to

reinforce his arguments with passages which he cites

as 11historical evidenceu does not appear to be methodo­

logically sound. The suffering of a fall from the

human condition such as cannibalism or necrophagia

that can add does occur during a famine (as well as in

non-famine situations) appears to me to be a reporting

of the aberrations of famine rather than a study of

famine itself.

/ v

These are the three phases of famine. It is the

last phase that is generally identified with famine

both in the popular as well as in the academic

literature. But the stricken communities must nece-

ssarily pass through the first and the second. The

need for identifying the indicators in various types

of famine and to devise means of their quantification ../ would be a necessary task.