from Vinay Pais 
for Daijiworld Media Network – Kundapur (NR)
 
Kundapur, Mar 20: The Kharvi community also popularly known as the Konkan Kharvis, are known for their valour and loyalty. However, due to globalization they have been driven to a pathetic life of insecurity, negligence and indifference. Of late, majority of their members have chosen the hard and risky job of mainlining shells from the beaches of Pancha Gangavali river.  

The only means of earning their daily bread is to dive deep into the river bottom and retrieve manually cart-loads of shells of molasses. Come winter or summer, rain or storm, no matter what the season, it is their lot to get up early in the morning and finish mining by 11 o’clock.  

The government and the local representatives have been indifferent and insolent towards the pitiable and agonizing state of the community. These shell workers are a new brood of bonded laborers in the iron grip of their masters.  

Their daily earnings do not exceed beyond Rs 200. Sometimes in a day, in a six-hour labour, a miner does not get even a basketful of shells and his job would be akin to that of  ‘Yajna in water’ getting nothing in return for the hard and risky venture. His labour is in fact akin to an ‘Aranya Rodana’.  

In all there are about 10,000 miners who are in the unorganized sector, sans leaders. They hail from the neighboring villages like Kharvikeri, Kodi, Gangolly, Uppinkudru, Maddugudde, Trasi, Alooru, Guddammadi and Hemmadi. 

Some decades back shell mining in the river was unheard of in the district. But now with the winds of globalization blowing fast, shell mining too has come to this region.  

Thanks to Kateel Devidasa Pai, an octogenarian is the originator of the idea of shell mining in these parts, which has resulted in its establishment in the region.