RAIPUR: A Bastar tribal girl took seven months to persuade the local MLA to approve a 2-km road that can link her remote outlying village in Bijapur, south Chhattisgarh to the main town. Sarita Kursam kept shooting WhatsApp messages every alternate day from July last year on a mobile phone of the local ruling Congress legislator. Until her messages drew the MLA’s attention.
Vikram Mandavi, MLA who is also the tribal and vice-chairman of the Bastar & Southern Area Development Authority, has decided to meet Sarita at her village Naimad in Bijapur district, about 400 km from Raipur.
Sarita didn’t bother if her repeated messages annoyed the legislator. Her only concern was to get a roadway that connects her habitat at Naimad with the main locality. Sarita had met the MLA for the first time during the MLA’s visit to the region on July 26 last year. She conveyed to him the villagers’ expectation for the road-link. She is among the few youths in her village who are educated up to Class 12.
Mandavi had assured her that he would look into the demand. Impressed with the girl’s confidence, he saved Sarita’s number as ‘Naimad ki Ladki (girl from Naimad)’. The Congress leader said owing to his schedule, he couldn’t find time to visit Sarita’s village. “I have been routinely raising our demands with the MLA. When we found the legislator was not responding, I decided to post him a message every alternate day. That continued for seven months. Finally he came calling,” she said.
The MLA eventually called a meeting of the local sarpanch and officials and instructed them to take up the road construction work. During the MLA’s earlier visit to the region on 26 July 2021, Sarita met him for the first time and conveyed the expectation on behalf of the villagers for a road that linked their habitat either with the highway or any major human settlement. She is among the few youngsters who have passed class XII in her village.