The Man Who Made War on a Mountain- built a valley of LOVE!

“My wife, Phalguni Devi, was seriously injured while crossing the hill to bring me water; I worked then on a farm across the hills. That was the day I decided to carve out a proper road through this hill,” he told us.
“My love for my wife was the initial spark that ignited in me the desire to carve out a road. But what kept me working without fear or worry all those years was the desire to see thousands of villagers crossing the hill with ease whenever they wanted,” Manjhi said.

Dashrath Manjhi

He was ridiculed in 1959 when he started hewing a way through the Gahlaur Ghati hills of Bihar’s Gaya district, some 150 km from Patna. It would take 22 years for Dashrath Manjhi to finish his 360ft-long, 30ft-wide road — little wonder, for he worked alone, his sole tools his chisel, hammer and shovel. What was once a precarious passage just a foot wide is now an avenue that can accommodate cyclists and motorcyclists and is used by the people of nearly 60 villages with great ease. The road has also reduced the distance between Gaya’s Atri and Wazirganj subdivisions from 50km to just 10km. Children from Manjhi’s own Gahlaur and other nearby villages no longer have to walk eight kilometers one way to attend school — they can now study at a school just three km away.

We met Manjhi a few weeks before the cancer that finally ended his life on August 17 forced him to take to his bed. The 73- year-old was frail, but his energy was undiminished as he relived his work on the road. “I knew if I did not do it myself, neither would the government do it nor would the villagers have the will and determination. This hill had given us trouble and grief for centuries. The people had asked the government many times to make a proper road through the hill, but nobody paid any attention. So I just decided I would do it all by myself.”

Manjhi and his wife Phalguni Devi were a peace loving, simple, poor yet happy couple who lived in Gahlaur with their only Son (name unknown) just beside the mountain. “He is poor. I am Poor. All that keeps us alive is love” Phalguni would remark!

Each day the people of the village of Gahlaur Ghat had to make an arduous and dangerous trek just to reach the nearest market town, or even their own fields at Wazirganj where they had to work to earn the day’s bread!

The Manjhi couple also had to do this task of climbing the impossible hill everyday as Manjhi’s farm was on the other side of the hill. One day, while bringing water to her thirsty husband, Phalguni slipped from the slope of the hill and fell. She was seriously injured. Dashrath Manjhi did not have the money or transportation to save his wife. The hill stood between them and the town. She died.

Manjhi’s only hope for staying alive was gone with his wife’s death. He couldn’t cry; he couldn’t digest the fact. He retired to his bed. Manjhi’s brother came to take care of his Son. But none of this made any impact on Manjhi. His love-his wife was dead! And nothing in this world, nothing, would replace her. He wept in silence. He stopped speaking to people. He was seen speaking to thin air many times by the villagers. Many believed Manjhi had gone mad.
But Manjhi wouldn’t heed to the reactions of the world. Children made fun of him calling him a lunatic. Elders followed the kids. But Manjhi’s eyes were filled with his wife’s face. A year passed.

All of a sudden, one day, Manjhi felt a shiver running down his spine- not out of fear, but out of anger and rage! It was the hill that had killed his wife. “This mountain didn’t let her be happy when she alive, and now it has killed her! I can’t let this hill claim any more lives- any more loves!”

Manjhi got out of his bed and headed to the market. He sold his only sheep to buy a Chisel, a Hammer and a Shovel. He came to the foot of the hill and looked at the merciless piece of earth that had ruined his life. He steadied the chisel and lowered the hammer over it. He dug and dug and dug. For 22 years he dug.

Nothing stopped him.

Every time the hammer met the chisel head, Manjhi reminded- “My wife will not be able to see the fruits of my labor, but no husband will ever lose his wife again because of this mountain!”

The villagers, who were taunting him before, now started offering him tools as an aid to what he was doing. Yet, no one would’ve imagined that Dashrath Manjhi would actually accomplish his task of MOVING THE MONUTAIN!

It took him 22 years (1966-1982) to cut the hill into two and make a 360 ft long, 25 meter high, and 20Ft wide pass through the hill!

Today, the villagers have nothing but gratitude for Gaya’s “Mountain Man”, known almost universally now as Sadhuji.

Dashrath Manjhi belonged to Bihar’s Musahar community, regarded as the lowest among the state’s Scheduled Castes. While other Dalits in Bihar had at least some land rights under the erstwhile Zamindari system, the Musahars never enjoyed any such. Nearly 98 percent of the state’s 1.3 million Musahars are landless today. Not even one percent of them are literate, which makes them the community with the country’s lowest literacy rate. For many of them, the day’s main meal still comprises roots, snails or rats, from which the community’s name is derived.

After Manjhi completed his road, he worked tirelessly for the betterment of his community. Among his other efforts, he managed to persuade nearly 50 Musahar families of his village to settle on government- granted land, although most of them were unwilling to leave their old homes. But when Manjhi started living on the allotted land, the rest followed suit. This new settlement is now known as Dashrath Nagar. Manjhi’s other efforts have been less successful. Despite his herculean feat, the Bihar government has given him only token appreciation and insincere help.

Himself landless, he made a petition once for property on which to build a hospital. Then chief minister Laloo Prasad Yadav allotted him a five-acre plot in a village called Karzania — the people of the village never allowed him to take possession as they were using the land as a grazing ground. More recently, the Bihar government recommended Manjhi’s name for the Padma Bhushan. This never materialized, nor did Nitish Kumar’s promised support for a road Manjhi wanted from Wazirganj to Gahlaur. Government sources say the forest department had refused permission for the road, claiming that Manjhi had violated regulations by cutting away at the hill without the department’s permission. The Padma Bhushan was reportedly denied to Manjhi because of claims made by certain quarters in the bureaucracy that he did not actually carve out the hill road single-handedly. The villagers who benefited from his labor were outraged at these reports.

“Where was the forest department sleeping all these years when Sadhuji was creating history to help thousands of poor villagers? We have seen him from our childhood, hacking at the hill day and night as if he were possessed,” said Raj Kumar, a 30- year-old Gahlaur resident. But Manjhi was unfazed. “What I did is there for everyone to see. When God is with you, nothing can stop you,” he told us as we left. “I will keep working for the development of the villages here so long I am alive. I am neither afraid of any punishment from any government department for my work nor am I interested in any honor from the government.” Brave words, but perhaps only what one would have expected from the man.

Dashrath Manjhi's last days in Hospital

 

The government attempted amends by giving him a state funeral last week — but, as he well knew, it is his work for the love of his life- Phalguni that will live on longer than any honor.

Dashrath Manjhi's Road- Manjhi Road