Ahmednagar— The Famine Tract Moses Ezekiel

A distinguished botanist discusses how some of the potentially most fruitful tracts of the Bombay State, containing the richest soil retentive

of moisture, have become an arid waste in the course of a few decades. . . .

AH M E D N A G A R , Sholapur a n d B i j apu r districts are black

spots on the agricultural map of the Bombay State, so described because, over a greater or lesser por t ion , famine conditions prevail in these districts for three years out of every five. Paradoxical as it may seem, these very areas have some of the finest soils in the Bombay State, highly retentive of moisture and ex­tremely responsive to tillage and manurial treatment and capable of giving bumper yields of such a wide variety of crops as wheal, maize, m i l lets, legumes, oilseeds and spices, and a number of fodder crops. These are the tracts which can produce the most nourishing held and garden crops and even money-crops such as sugar cane, tobacco and the spices and yet today, they arc thirs t ing for water. The finest breeds of cattle and the most lucious fruits and vege tables are produced in these very areas. Even today, they supply the great markets of Bombay, Poona, Baroda, Ahmedabad, Viramgam w i t h poultry, mi lk and eggs, fresh vege tables, root-crops and flowers and fruits.

How can these tracts then be des­cribed as famine tracts, and why? Let us consider the district of Ahmed-migar. It lies in the rain-shadow area to the east of the Western Ghats. Yet only 150 years ago, area was covered w i t h huge forests. My father was a mil i tary officer sta­tioned at Ahmednagar for a few years from 1877 . The Ahmednagar M i l i ­tary Camp had been qui te newly established. For this purpose, a large area had been cleared from the forests. An impenetrable forest sur rounded the camp on three sides. It was extremely dangerous to go into the forest for fel l ing trees for fuel even dur ing the daytime and many who went in too early 111 the morn ing or too late in the evening paid for their recklessness w i t h thei r lives. For the forest was fu l l of w i l d beasts of all k inds- tigers, hyenas, wi ld cats, etc.

The Army Officers started obl iging the residents of the area by shooting as many of these animals as they could. "The " Adivasis " were quite w i l l i n g to take advantage of the safety of l ife that ensued. They began a process of " s h i f t i n g cul t ivat ion which ruined the forests and la id the

foundation for the conversion of the district in to a famine area.

They burned down a few acres of land from the borders of the thick forests and used it for cul t ivat ing some of the local millets (usually bajra and jowar). After a few years of their crude methods of fanning, the land became exhausted. Then they fired a few more acres and aban­doned the previously cultivated area. This process was repeated and in this way the deeper regions were penetrated.

The need of the local inhabitants for free fuel aggravated the pheno­menon of " indiscriminate destruc­t ion of forests ". W r i t i n g at that t ime my father spoke of the forest having been driven a few hundred feet by the twin processes of " shift­ing cult ivation " by the Adibasis and the indiscriminate fell ing of trees for fuel.

Evidently, this devastation of forests started 150 years ago, had its cumulative effect in the complete destruction of all forests from the whole of this once prosperous dis tr ict . W h e n I visited Ahmednagar in 1950 and went to have a look at these thick forests so near the can­tonment—being interested in them as a botanist —T discovered not a trace of them; they had long since gone up in smoke. For miles and miles around the camp, no " forest could be seen. Only a few Babul trees scattered sparsely about the area eked out a miserable existence. The kind had been left high and dry. open to the devastating effects of the elements- w ind and water, heat and cold.

The soil in Ahmednagar district is a rich clay, which sets in to a polished marble at the first direct impact of rain water. It rapidly begins to flow and gathers momen tum as it flows along the deep ravines cut through the h i l ly tract dur ing the last few decades and gives rise to floods in the low ly ing areas. Fields, gardens, villages and nullahs arc flooded to suffocation' if there is only an inch of rain in the h i l l s . Complaints arc heard that cattle, sheep and goats are carried away in the low ly ing tracts at the slightest frown of the Rain God. W h a t is worse, the rain car ries away the finest silt from the shallow and unprotected fields—re­sult ing in soil erosion on a gigantic

scale. There is no vegetation to absorb the impact of the fa l l ing water, no t even grass. W h e r e such vegetation does exist, the roots of the grasses and of large trees serve to perform the funct ion of " soil-b ind ing " . A l l the natural agents present in a forest conserving soil fer t i l i ty and reducing soil erosion have long ceased to operate and the lovely soil is left high and dry to fight for survival against the vagaries of an in te rmi t ten t ly active monsoon. A chain reaction takes place—the un­checked activity of H o m o Sapiens, deforestation, soil erosion, infer t i l i ty , and ult imately famine.

The role of forests in protecting the soil is of the utmost importance. Ram, even torrential rain, loses its momentum when it falls on the thick foliage of the forest trees. The drops are broken into a fine spray. Slowly, they gather in to l i t t le shearns down the leaves, twigs and branches, and then on to the stem. Then slowly the water moves along the stem to the ground, where it sinks gently into the soil. This gentle movement into the clay soil enables it to be quickly absorbed and thus the water passes into the substance of the soil—the '' sub soil " as it is technically known. W h e n an abundance of water has sunk in , the superfluous water begins to flow—but never fast. By that t ime much of the water has reached the roots of the plants where it can be absorbed by the plants. The shallow roots hold the soil, and the deeper roots the sub soil, and so erosion is pre­vented. Even on the steep slopes of hi l ls , if they are properly afforest­ed, the water moves only slowly. There is ample t ime for the water to reach the water table—the depth of the well where water is available. Addi t iona l water only leads to a us­ing of the water table. In this way the soil is protected by forests. The denudation of the forests of Ahmed-nagai is thus one of the main reasons for its conversion in to a famine dis­t r ic t .

Forests also play another import­ant role. Ahmednagar has records of rainfall of from 30 to 45 inches. T w o mi l i ta ry campaigns to conquer Ahmednagar town—dur ing its early history from 1 559 to 1 563—are stated to have failed because they were i l l - t imed and the monsoon rains served to defeat them. Today. forests having disappeared, the humi­dity of the area has decreased beyond measure. Clouds passing over the area have a lower moisture content because they have already deposited most of it on the western slopes of the ghats. Today, they fail to gather more moisture as they move over the

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May 2, 1953