THE FAMINE-A Report from Dhubri

THE FAMINE A Report from Dhubri M S Prabhakar THIS is an account of a brief trip to Dhubri in the latter part of September. Newspapers in Gauhati bad proclaimed in banner headlines a disastrous situation in Dhubri in early August, but after a couple of days' scare, the panic evident in the early reports had given place to routine reporting. But even though there were no more headlines in the newspapers, one heard of accounts of large masses of people roaming the streets of Dhubri and other small towns; of corpses in the streets, on railway platforms; of rotting cadavers providing a feast to dogs and vultures; of distress sales of lands and goods at throw-away prices; of abandoned children; of women forced to sell themselves for a few paise; of shrewd political operators making small fortunes by doing the good work of refugee rehabilitation; of rackets aplenty.