At the tri-junction at Govindpur, Mahendra Mahto paused to look at both sides before continuing to push his cycle.
Mr. Mahto, in his 20s, wearing a shirt and trousers and open-toed sandals, had six sacks of coal, each weighing 40 kg, tied to both sides of the cycle. He began pushing the load five hours earlier at 6 a.m., he said. At Govindpur, he joined six cyclists who were waiting for the others to catch up. They sold the sacks to dhabas and tea shops at Rs. 50 each before cycling back home to Godhar.
Mr. Mahto hesitated before speaking about his journey from the Godhar coal mine, 17 km away. After the Union government nationalised coal mines in 1971, digging coal by hand and using it in small quantities as household fuel or selling it in the open market is illegal. Members of thousands of landless Dalit and Other Backward Class families who push cycles loaded with coal every day in the coal-rich areas of Jharkhand live and work in perpetual fear of arrest. Coal traders, however, have prospered.
In Dhanbad’s Jharia, which goes to the polls in the fourth phase of elections in the State on Sunday, the two main candidates belong to the “Singh Mansion,” which is said to be the richest family in the coal business in the State. The BJP candidate, Sanjeev Singh, son of sitting MLA Kunti Singh and former MLA Surya Dev Singh, is contesting against his paternal cousin Neeraj Singh, Deputy Mayor of Dhanbad.
The Singhs are accused of controlling the loading of coal in trucks and railway carriages and of demanding a “tax” on every tonne loaded, in collusion with Bharat Coking Coal Ltd. officials. They are also accused of running syndicates, which bid at electronic auctions and keep the prices low. Every year, up to 20 million tonnes of coal is alleged to be diverted.
“Not a single trader can say we have stopped them from doing business. In fact, we help whoever wishes to do business in coal here,” Mr. Sanjeev Singh said sitting in his SUV after addressing a meeting at the Bhaura grounds. He was one of the accused in the murder of Suresh Singh, a rival in the coal business who was gunned down at a wedding in 2011.
Mr. Neeraj Singh said that after training in engineering, he worked in Kolkata and Ranchi before returning to Dhanbad. He took up the cause of contract workers of Bharat Coking Coal to get them wages and hours of work on a par with permanent workers.
A few kilometres away, in bastis at Bhandora, Jayrampurmod, Jagdorha, the landless cyclists, too poor to find temporary jobs in the mines at Jharia, started returning home after another day of evading arrests and harassment.
