Coir rope traders in a bind in Cuddalore District

Fading away:Coir rope making provides livelihood for a good number of families in Cuddalore. 

 

CUDDALORE:

        Coir ropes that were once ruling the roost are now gradually vanishing from the market. The demand for this natural product has shrunk drastically, and hence, those pursuing the trade are placed in an unenviable situation.

          Earlier, coir rope was the much sought after agent for tying rafts and thatched roofs in huts. But with economic growth, there is a paradigm shift in choosing the building materials. As the huts are being phased out at a frenetic pace, there is a discernible shift in preference for asbestos roofing or terrace and this has cut into the coir rope business in a big way.

           The truck operators too have switched to nylon rope for securing the cargo. Even for drawing water from an open well, a bucket tied to coir rope was used. But with deep borewell being sunk and electric motors fixed to draw water, the coir rope has become redundant. Therefore, in the current socio-economic milieu, the coir rope has come to play a minimal role, that too only in remote villages where it is being used for tethering the cattle. Though the coir rope business is on the decline about 100 families in Cuddalore, for want of any other alternatives, are still persisting with the trade against the odds.

Nylon takes over

               M.Indiran (45), who has been in this trade for over a decade, told The Hindu that now nylon had become the sole substance for rope making. The coir rope compared poorly with the nylon rope because the latter was lighter, stronger and much more durable. Moreover, the nylon ropes were coming in various sizes and in attractive colours. The coir rope on the other hand was less aesthetic, unwieldy and difficult to handle when it gets wet.

           But one salient feature about the coir rope was that it was eminently biodegradable, a credit which the nylon rope cannot claim. Mr. Indiran said that the coir rope making was dependent upon manual efforts or at the least, on simple machines. It would require a set of three people to manually twist the coir rope and above all they would have to walk up and down for the entire stretch of the rope to make sure that the husk fibres bond well without forming knots.

            Only the husk obtained from the fully ripe coconut would have a rich fibre content and quality, and, the seasonal plucking of ripe coconuts lasted five months — from January to May. The rope makers used to procure the husk fibre from the indigenous “mills” at a rate of Rs.530 for a 30 kg bundle. The finished products could be sold from Rs.1.50 to Rs.200 a length (about three to five feet). Unfortunately, the youth were not enamoured by the trade because of low wages, hardly Rs.120 a day, and uncertainty over the demand. Therefore, the survival of the trade was in the realm of conjecture, said Mr. Indiran.

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Cuddalore Underground drainage project to be completed by October: Rural Industries Minister M.C. Sampath

Rural Industries Minister M.C. Sampath reviewing the process on the underground drainage project in Cuddalore on Saturday.

CUDDALORE:

         Rural Industries Minister M.C. Sampath told the presspersons here on Saturday that the underground drainage project, now being executed in Cuddalore town, would be completed and brought into use by October.

          After attending a review meeting on the progress of the works here, the Minister said that the pipe laying work would be completed by August-end and all the roads that were dug up for laying the pipeline would be repaired by the highways department by September-end. The strength of the workforce would be increased to speed up the execution and the contractors too had agreed to engage the labourers for extended hours to keep up with the schedule.

         The Minister warned of either penal action or imposing fine on the contractors if there happened to be a slippage in meeting the deadline. As for overcoming the impediments in the drinking water supply, the Minister said that fresh water sources would be identified and with the consent of the government, the new water project would be implemented. 

               About the formation of proper link road from Jawan's Bhavan and Khammiampettai, the Minister said that this road stretch was now under the jurisdiction of the Public Works Department (Water sources) and a proposal had been sent to the government in order to bring it under the purview of the highways department to take up the work in a speedy manner. District Collector V. Amuthavalli; District Revenue Officer C. Rajendran; Superintendent of Police P. Pakalavan; Executive Engineer (TWAD Board) Raghunathan; and Municipal Commissioner M. Elangovan were the participants.

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Schools' plea on fees

CUDDALORE: 

            The fee structures recommended by both Justice Govindarajan Committee and Justice Raviraja Pandian Committee would cripple matriculation schools and render them economically unviable.

            Hence, the State government should set aside their recommendations and go for a two-tier arrangement in which State-level and district-level tripartite committees, consisting of representatives of school managements, parents and government, should be formed to scrutinise extensively and carefully all the relevant issues before finalising the new fee structure.

           So states a resolution passed by the Cuddalore District Matriculation Schools' Management Association at its extraordinary meeting held in Chidambaram on Saturday. President C.R.Lakshmikandan, patron K.Rajendran, correspondents, principals and teachers participated. The resolution further stated that while the State-level committee would frame the guidelines for fee fixation, the district-level committees would arrive at the fee structure without any delay.

            Any appeal in regard to the fee structure could be made to the State-level body for reconciliation. In another resolution, the association called upon the State government to revoke the Tamil Nadu Schools (Regulation of collection of fee) Act 2009 “that spawned all the controversies over the fee structure.” In yet another resolution, the association noted that since the arbitrary fee structures enunciated by the committees had caused disquiet in the educational sector, as an interim remedy the schools could be allowed to collect fees based on the following formula: the schools could be allowed to collect fees as in 2009-2010, besides 15 per cent extra, so as to make provision for inflation and cost index.

            Besides this, the association suggested collection of 15 per cent fee on an annual basis toward corpus fund for school development. It called for posting the clause (recommended by Justice Raviraja Pandian Committee) on the Internet that “the term “fees” means all inclusive annual fee, of various fees like admission fee, library fee, maintenance and amenities fee and other recurring expenditure and development charges excluding the fee for imparting education through technology like smart class and so on, for books, notebooks, uniforms and transportation facility, if any.”

             The association sought four to six times increase (ranging from Rs.15,000 for LKG to Rs.40,000 for Plus-2) in the fee structure recommended by Justice Raviraja Pandian Committee to enable the schools to run in an effective manner. As for the standard of education, the association noted that the government could adopt fully any one of the three streams, namely matriculation or the Central Board of Secondary Education or the National Council of Educational Research and Training. It called for waiver of property tax levied on the nursery and matriculation schools in the rural areas.

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