An Adivasi human rights crusader with a history of activism since childhood is entering the fray from Adilabad Lok Sabha constituency in the upcoming Parliament elections, challenging the established leaders.
A fresh face, Atram Suguna contesting from the Congress party, could give a tough fight to her opponents — former minister Godam Nagesh of BJP and former MLA of BRS Atram Sakku. Her close association with her ilk and her work with Human Rights Forum, an organisation started by the human rights champion K. Balagopal, could sway the voters in her favour.
Ms. Suguna, a Gond tribal from Pullara hamlet of Sirpur mandal in the now Kumram Bheem Asifabad district, was herself a victim of deprivation in its most debilitating form. She lost her father at an early age, and was brought up by a single mother.
“We were a family of four, dependent on our mother’s earnings as a daily wage labourer. Our first meal of the day would be after our mother received wages for the day. Once a week, she would carry fodder for the landlord’s barn, and with the ₹3 received as wages, would buy oil to cook daal, which was a luxury for us,” she reminisced.
Her schooling too was in fits and starts, as she had to cross a stream and walk for three kilometres to reach school. Often, she would accompany her mother to work in fields.
She got married at 13 to Atram Bhujanga Rao, a teacher who is also a HRF activist, who intended to rescue her from poverty and educate her. After marriage, she completed matriculation, and went on to become a postgraduate and subsequently completed B.Ed. In 2010, she got selected through DSC for a government school teacher’s post.
Since very young, Suguna has been actively involved in socio-political movements for Adivasi rights. She had also worked with CPI(ML) Janashakthi group for a brief while, and was part of Adivasi Mahila Sangham. Since 2008, she had been a member/district secretary of HRF, and was vocal in the demand for Telangana as a separate state. She has had 51 criminal cases filed against her due to activism between 2017 and 2020.
As a HRF activist, she worked on issues related to farmers’ suicides, maternal mortality, health issues among others. In 1993, she had contested and won as MPTC from Congress party.
She resigned from her job and joined Congress as a full fledged worker in March this year after being obviously promised the party’s MP ticket from Adilabad.
“I was unable to give my undivided attention to either job or activism, hence resigned and joined full time politics. I found Congress as the best choice as it is committed to ideals of secularism and social justice,” Suguna said.
As Member of Parliament, she promises to work on issues such as Adivasi education, health, establishment of Girijan University, and roads to tribal hamlets.
“Our youth never leave the hamlet and surroundings. If they get educated, they can find livelihood outside the country and travel the world,” she says sharing her vision. Citing several instances of pregnant women dying due to non-availability of transport, she stresses the importance of roads to tribal hamlets.
She had been a strong voice on behalf of Adivasis, when conflict erupted between Adivasis and Lambadas with regard to Scheduled Tribe status. With three Adivasi candidates in the fray, Lambada tribals as a consolidated vote bank could be the deciding factor in the constituency. However, Suguna still advocates special status to extremely backward tribal groups such as Thoti and Kollam, though clearly softening her edge about Lambadas.
“Several Lambada community people coming here from outside the State are getting benefits here as STs at the cost of the natives,” she says.
