Dear all,
For those who are attempting to search
for info on their ancestors in India, the
most valuable archive is the so called LAND RECORDS which was created
during the rule of the moguls.
These land records are extremely precise. its gives details of villages in each pargana and also details of each and every plot of land and their owners. No wonder the British govt of India used this registration system and build collect orates to keep them. I went with 5 students to one of the collectorate in Chhapra where records of former SARAN district are kept. As these records are written in Parsi, the translator of the collect orate came to assist us, for a sum of 500 rupees.( he told us before that it was his duty)
The records are kept in "Gony
bags"", there were no index. We opened at least 25
of these bags to check for info on TARROWA village ( my ancestral place)
unfortunately most of the records were destroyed by
worms and were there-fore unreadable. The roof of the collectorate
building was leaking and most of the gony
bags were wet, some were floating as well .The records kept at the state
archives in Lucknow, U.P in in the same condition.
Our ancestors left their homeland due to
poverty, famine, and because of the caste
system. That was 150 years ago. I visited the village my ancestor came
from recently and I must say nothing is
changed ever since. The infrastructure is
destroyed, there is poverty, no running water, no electricity, no
sanitation, no proper housing and the villagers are still being
exploited by the high caste Zamindars.
There is also Lawlessness in Bihar and parts of U.P.
I have no intention to discourage anybody
searching their roots in India, I simply
wanted to share my experience with you.
Thanks for your attention,
respectfully yours,
atman
This is for sure. As a researcher on Indian Diaspora for last six years
I have seen our records in a bad, sad situation. U have rightly pointed
out, spend money
The journalist who accompanied me wrote about it in Hindustan Times,
the DM read the article and laughed. I read an announcement made by the
gov't of India a couple of years ago called "discover your
roots" based in Lucknow. I contacted them on several occasions they
were of no help. The new site recently launched
I was at the Indian
High commission in the Netherlands
to pick my visa last July and
used this opportunity to ask the staff about the newly introduced
PIO cards. The staff told me that holders of
PIO cards has the same rights as
citizens of India so i asked him if if this card would help me claim any
property left by my ancestors in
India. His answer was no. So this costly card ( 375 euros) is
useless i said. PIO card is introduced in the first instance
to attract people of Indian origin,scattered all over the world to
come and invest in India he replied.
We are in the millions i said, your
govt has introduced this ( useless)
document only to generate a fortune from
people like me!. and what do we get
in return. He turned his back and left the
office. ''your free visa sir"' ( It was a
call from the visa counter)
I made a trip from Chhapra to a village
named EKMA by geep. The distance
is only 65km, but it took us 7 hours
why? because roads in Bihar and
parts of U.P are full with craters. Some
craters are meters deep. We were
also stopped here and there by gangs
looking for money and other valuables
I wish Laloo Prasad and policymakers
from Delhi were with us. As a PIO,
i would never invest one paisa in India as
long as there is lawlessness, corruption,
violation of human rights and above all a bad infrastructure in
Bihar/UP.
Regards,
atman
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