SEPPADU : Indigenous Fisheries Commons In Nagapattinam Region

Marine fisheries, much like all direct uses of natural resources has its own systems of tenure rights, resource governance systems, in order to manage the resource in accordance with the values of the resource using communities it serves. In slightly more egalitarian societies, the rules and institutions governing the resource would be fairly equitable, and in others, not so much. For instance, in a totally caste based agrarian setup, the best lands and water drawing rights would be of the dominant castes and as we move down the hierarchy, the lowest castes would have practically no rights over these resources.

Seppadu:
Among fishers in Nagapattinam district, there existed the system of ‘Seppadu’, which was an indigenous resource allocation and governance system. A Seppadu is a fish aggregating device made from various reeds and leaves attached to a central casurina trunk (Soukku in Tamil). This apparatus would be placed out at a specific spot in the sea and anchored with a heavy stone at the seabed. This would act as a source of nutrition, with the nutrients oozing out of the vegetation slowly into the waters. This would attract phyto-plankton and zoo-planktons, which in turn would attract tiny anchovies, and slowly in time, attract species higher up the trophic levels. Such an apparatus would last for up to 6-8 months, after which it would be repeated next season.

Seppadu Rights:
This whole process of preparing the Seppadu, and laying it on a specific spot in the sea would be done by families who invested finance and labour in that Seppadu. In return, boats associated with those families would be allowed to fish in and around that Seppadu. Fishers here traditionally used various types of bag-nets, including one called idai valai, whose operation could be seen as some sort of a precursor to today’s ring siene nets.   

In this way, each Seppadu would be shared by a group of families, and in turn a village would have any number of Seppadus. Thus, the whole village would have fishing rights over the areas spanned by all the Seppadus belonging to that village. This was a kind of spatial zonation of the marine space to distribute and allocate the common fisheries resource. Fishers from one Seppadu would not be allowed near other Seppadus. Fishers from one village would not be allowed in Seppadus belonging to other villages. Thus the entire stretch of near coastal waters in the Nagapttinam-Karaikal region was divided into Seppadus.

Significance of the term:
Each Seppadu would also be named after the families who have fishing rights around that Seppadu. Thus, the term Seppadu would not only mean the actual fish aggregating device, but also a term for fishing grounds, or locations on the sea. To an outsider, all the sea looks the same, but traditional fishers have cultivated a marine sense of location and direction that is a little difficult to appreciate by completely terrestrial communities, who are much more comfortable with sense of direction, routes and location on land. Thus, fishers could be out at sea, and would identify locations on the sea by referring to different Seppadus as landmarks. Even in Pulicat, the term Padu is used in this spatial sense, to refer to specific fertile fishing grounds on the lake. In due course, the term Padu has also come to mean a rich haul of fish, caught from these fishing grounds. The various changing uses and origins of these terms is in itself an interesting question worth pondering by those interested in cultural heritage and linguistics. From a resource governance perspective, this shows how intimately connected fishing rights, access to fishing grounds and actual fish catch are.   

Institutions:
Obviously, for such a system to be operational, it would need dispute resolution mechanisms. Any dispute between boats in the same Seppadu would be resolved within those families. Any dispute within Seppadus of the same village would be resolved by the local village panchayat – which is the traditional panchayat of the Pattinavar fishing caste, and not the Panchayati Raj Institution introduced by the state as part of local self-government. For all disputes between villages, you had the regional head village of Nambiyar Nagar (called Nuzhaipadi in medieval Tamil texts) which was vested with powers of adjudicating inter-village disputes. It was meant to consult all the village heads and take decisions on behalf of the collective Nagapatinam-Karaikal region.

Origins:
Oral history is that Nambiyar Nagar is named after a prominent figure, Nambirajan from this village, who won the favour of Sarfoji Raja of the Tanjavur Maratha dynasty when they ruled the delta areas in late 18^th centuries. It is said that Serfoji Raja made Nambirajan as the representative of all fishers in his court, and thus all marriages, big events, disputes were brought to his village for settling. However, it is also believed that the traditional head village status is much older than this, and that Nambirajan was just a prominent figure in the lineage. The powers of the head village were also etched in religious, social and political affairs. Thus, this is to show that resource governance systems formed the base for the entire organisation and cultural-material life of the Pattinavar community here.

Technology and Decline:
However, this Seppadu system no longer functions, and the head village tradition too is under strain. From the 1970s onwards, the long floating nylon gillnets first made their entry to this region, by a few fishers in Akkaraipettai, another fishing village close to Nambiyar Nagar. These became a commercial success as it was durable and got good catch. However, it would frequently float along with the currents and get entangled and damage the Seppadu apparatus out at sea. This was a cause of increasing conflict between the Seppadu holders and the new gillnetters of Akkaraipettai. Old fishers even say that Akkaraipettai fishers were unruly, and unresponsive to decisions of Nambiyar Nagar even then!

Also while this tension was simmering, trawlers also began to proliferate. The success and proliferation of the trawlers in this region was down to 2 causes – new prawn traders who came from Kerala, and also the jugaad innovation of using second hand 110 HP Leyland bus engines to power their trawlers, which suited these high current waters of Nagapattinam. With the coming of trawlers, many Seppadu apparatus got entangled and destroyed by the fast trawl nets. The combination of new gillnets and trawlers thus put an end to the Seppadu system. Thus bringing to end an indigenous system of commons resource management.    

However, the institutions of the fishing panchayat and head village however havent yet fully died, though under stress. The tensions and politics of these institutions at present, is a story that deserves another post soon !!

Kalaignar – a political survivor, a social reformer . The curious mix.

The task of writing an obituary for anyone is fraught with risks. And especially so for someone who has spent over 65 years in active public life – someone who has seen politics from the pre-independence days. His sheer longevity and political survival has meant he has made several twists, turns and compromises in his career. There is almost too much material to analyse and comment upon. Almost anything written on him shall be an act of neglecting major events. But more fundamentally, what is an obituary meant to do? Is it a review and analysis of the man and how he lived his life? Are we meant to sing praises for the dear departed? Should we look at what his legacy could be?

Kalaignar lived through a tumultuous and radical era of tamil and national politics. He is as much a product of his times, as much as he shaped it. Born in Thirukkuvalai village in erstwhile Thanjavur district (presently in Thiruvarur dist), as Dakshinamurthy, he is said to have an early initiation into social reform and political activism, and changed his name to Karunanidhi to remove references to god and religion in his name in his early days itself. Hailing from a backward Isai Vellalar community, that accompanied music troupes playing the Nadaswaram, he had a ringside view of how caste played out in all walks of life, including music. They were considered as lower grade to the singers, and hence were to be bare chested while performing. It is said that he dropped out of music lessons early on due to such caste based biases he faced, and chose not to accept. Another anecdote narrates that as a kid, he would visit the annual Thiruvarur temple festival where the whole town would join the procession of the temple chariot. Dalit caste labourers would be whipped by landed classes and their henchmen, in order to pull the heavy chariot faster and keep the procession moving. These scenes hardened his views against the caste system. In fact, he has more than once stated that if he hadn’t formally joined the Dravida Kazhagam, he may well have joined the Communist Party of India, which was playing a lead role in labour mobilisation in the Kaveri Delta region at that time. Such incidents show that from very early on, he was showing an intuitive and innate understanding of social injustice. This wasn’t a man who had to get to college to get his political education; long before his entry to formal activism, he was quite politicised himself.

In his long innings in electoral politics and in government, he has helped initiate several reforms in the economic and social development of Tamil Nadu. Many have been discussed at length in the popular press including the expansion of govt schooling and the midday meal scheme, the health insurance scheme among others. Several obituaries have highlighted many of these achievements, I shall try to highlight the not so well-known ones. TN has among the best bus networks in the country with high frequency buses to the remotest corners of the state. Much of this was due to the state takeover of private bus companies when Kalaignar started the State Transport Corporation in 1972 and banned inhuman hand rickshaws (the ones we still see in Kolkata). His starting the Transgender Welfare Board in 2006 and reserving seats in colleges has meant a whole generation now has access to professional education for the first time. This is partly the reason why TN has quite many transgenders in regular white collar jobs – banks, police, lawyers, etc. TN was the first state in India to legally recognise other genders and extend all welfare benefits to them.

His impacts are indeed greater on the national scene, as a bulwark for federalism and state rights. Under his leadership, the state govt and the party have always resisted over centralizing tendencies of New Delhi, and has provided a political cushion for other states to maintain autonomy. The Inter-State Council, though recommended by the Sarkaria Commission, was formed in large part due to the political pressures of leaders like Kalaignar. The legal status of all regional languages as official languages, and the fact that Hindi isn’t our national language, is largely down to the DMK.

But personally, the true lasting impacts of Kalaignar will be the hardest to gauge for those unfamiliar with TN society. The extent of feudalism and the strength of the caste hierarchy is much lower than most other parts of the country. Mere change in policy and schemes doesn’t result in social change. Kalaignar kept alive the rhetoric of social reform very strong throughout his political career. He made sure the public discourse in the state always had social justice woven into it. Coupled with the various social justice schemes, adequate representation of all communities in administration, education, govt jobs, and through universal public welfare schemes – it is his political rhetoric of anti-caste and secularism that ensured the state inched towards actual social change, and not just on paper. For instance, he championed the giving up of caste surnames for all TN households – something rest of India still fails to understand when reading a TN name. His constant rhetoric of rationality and opposition to superstition has also enabled a whole generation of tamilians to speak up against religious bigotry, for atheism and against blind belief in religion in a free and engaging manner in mass public discourse. Indeed, several of the ideas that even now exist in the liberal fringe of the national discourse have been relatively mainstreamed in tamil discourse, thanks largely to the overall political climate of social reform he championed. Especially in today’s times of Hindutva aggression, where we see increased reluctance to call out bigotry, Kalaignar’s DMK has placed TN in a far more progressive position on this question.

Critics have often highlighted a culture of corruption and family nepotism under him, albeit as part of a whole systemic criticism of our Indian political process itself. More specific to him is the criticism of a political culture of personal attacks, ridicule, mockery and general fall in standards of political debate. Ironically, it is this same trait that his supporters cite as introducing characteristic wit and sarcasm to tamil political debate. These are thus, a matter of taste and aesthetics. Indeed, so strong has been his impact over the language of political debate in TN that his opponents have all come to use these same techniques of ridicule and high literary flourishes in speeches. His characteristic voice speaking in “stage tamil” indeed is the gold standard for politicians now.  

Obviously for a career spanning 65 years in public life, political opponents aside, Kalaignar has had his share of ideological opponents as well – those who bemoan some of the above social changes in TN. With the demise of the 2 big colossus of TN politics, Dravidian politics faces threats from 2 fronts – Hindutva as well as Tamil Nationalism, both of them have been more vociferous in the last few years. Over the years, Dravidian forces largely succeeded in TN thanks to their strong ground mobilisation on the social reform plank, their strong intellectual and literary tradition, combined with a political face that Kalaignar provided. But far more than Jayalalithaa or MGR, it was Kalaignar who offered the ideological opposition to these forces. Some say he tasted power too quickly in 1967, and the taste of power has inhibited the ideological and institutional growth of the Dravida Kazhagam. In his absence, the coming years are certainly unclear and hazy for Tamil Politics as well for the larger social reform story of TN.

Sea Weeds in the Gulf of Mannar

An understanding of ecology and its inter-related existing livelihood practices of the community is essential for conservation as well as livelihood promotion. However, our present ideas of conservation are bereft of the community and our ideas of livelihood are bereft of the local ecology.

Just as the physical ecosystem of the coast is immensely complex, the livelihood activities of the coastal communities are also very diverse. Apart from the plethora of fishing related livelihood activities, seaweeds are another coastal resource that have been part of the livelihood spectrum of the coastal communities. This has been thriving in this region for the last 40 years at least, ever since a viable market opened in India for Agar extracted from sea weeds. This is heavily used as raw material in the food processing and healthcare industries. Seaweed collection is by diving underwater, without any oxygen support and picking them by hand. 

In the Gulf of Mannar region near Rameswaram, natural seaweed collection of the species Sargassum is done especially by women as a livelihood activity. Men are involved in the fishing works, most of them as labourers on trawl boats, but a minority have their own small country boats. An average trawler labour can earn about Rs.10,000 per month. In this context, women earning an additional amount is invaluable for the household. However, this would only be secondary. Unlike the fishing activity, this sea weed collection is an entirely female controlled activity – from collection, to processing and sales. The money is more in the control of the woman. The seaweed collectors are a group of women sea-divers. Let it sink in again. Sea weeds play an important role in their lives.

Flawed conservation:

In 1986, the Gulf of Mannar was declared a Biosphere Reserve in view of the unique coral ecosystem. But from 2002 onwards, restrictions became strictly enforced and fishers were denied access to the corals and the 23 sea-islands. The concern of the Forest Department was that these activities were a threat to the fragile coral ecosystem. That’s when the community started feeling the heat of the forest department’s harassment, in a bid to clear them from fishing and seaweed collection. There would be physical beatings and threats against men and women alike. Their fish laid out for drying would be thrown away, nets would be confiscated or torn, several worse crimes I choose not mention as well. The actions of the department deserve strict action, focussing on human rights violations.

In a bid to de-escalate the situation and seek a permanent solution, the fishing unions came together with some NGOs and had joint meeting with the Forest Dept and the district administration. The women collectors agreed to scale down operations from 25 days to 12 days a month. The women also agreed to ban the usage of metal scrapers to collect seaweed, and instead only handpick them, like picking tea leaves. The women also decided to clean, dry and sort it manually so that the quality of the product improves. In return, the district administrators helped by negotiating with traders to give higher prices per kilo. 

Figure 1: Collected Sargassum laid out for drying

The women unions enforced these regulations quite forcefully among them. A few villages went even further. They enforced rules of what time of the day to collect seaweeds. They were to collect seaweed only during low tide timing. This was to allow fishes to feed on the weeds during high tide. These timings would keep changing by 30 minutes daily, in keeping with the moonrise times. Some women have prepared tables displaying timings when they could leave each day of the month. They also rejected the Forest Department’s core assertion that collection destroys corals, as sargassum grows in dead coral areas, and not in live corals. The women avoid the live corals. These women say that with these newer regulations in place, they have witnessed marginally higher returns. This despite collecting for 12 days instead of 25 per month, and the number of women increasing to 3 times. Basically, these rules of sustainable commons management are so intricate, displaying a very high degree of understanding of the resource ecology.

But the forest dept doesn’t recognise these extra steps the women are taking, it doesn’t understand these nuances of the resource. Instead, the dept has continued its harassments. They don’t seem to accept that weeds are collected from dead corals and not live corals. The rights of these women to collect seaweed are yet to be sanctioned. 

Flawed livelihood programmes:

In a bid to wean them away from sea weed collection, the govt promoted Gulf of Mannar Biosphere Trust as well as several NGOs in coordination with Central Marine Fisheries Research Institute, Mandapam came up with sea weed cultivation as an alternate livelihood. They introduced an ‘improved’ species of sea weed from the Philippines called Kappaphycus alvarezii, known for its fast growth and maturation in under 45 days. Many women groups were given extensive training on cultivation techniques. The technique used bamboo rods, attached in circular fashion. Strings were attached end to end all throughout the circle. This was called a raft. Tiny grafts of the seaweed were placed at regular intervals along these strings. This raft, would be covered on the bottom side with fishing net and placed in sea water. The net prevented fish from eating off the growing sea weeds. Heavy rocks were attached to these to act as anchors for these rafts.  25 gms of grafts would yield 20 kgs of sea weed in 45 days. A part of the harvest would be kept as the input for the next cycle. These became like seeds for a farmer.

But as experienced in several other govt promoted projects, the uptake wasn’t by these women, but by others who weren’t as involved in the seaweed collection trade. 

Figure 2 : Bamboo rafts, before tying strings in the middle

This gave good rewards for 3-4 years. Several women made quite a good amount in these years. There were quite a few who said, “this weed sent my daughter to college!”. One can imagine the number of NGO-sponsored Case Studies and Impact Assessments such stories of “Women Empowerment” would’ve given rise to.

However, after that initial success, harvests began to plummet. So much so that in less than 2-3 years, yields almost stopped. For the last 6 years, none of the women here have been cultivating this sea weed. The entire cultivating activity has come to complete halt. These empty bamboo rafts had been kept aside for a while now. What could possibly explain such a decline?

Theory 1: 

Some of the former women cultivators said that the decline wasn’t just for this species but also for the sargassum also. The waters are getting warmer, and even the composition of the water is changing. One mention of water temperature rise, and our minds immediately ponder about Global Warming. If this were true, this activity can never be revived here. And this would also mean a gradual end to the sargassum collection as well. However, that’s not what is experienced by the seaweed collectors.

Theory 2:  

A few others opined that the seeds had become old. This logic appealed to me. Good farmers replace seeds every 3-4 years, regardless of the variety – native or HYV. It’s considered good practice to use the same variety seeds, but from a different soil every 3-4 years. This theory was the marine analog of the same agrarian logic. If this were true, then if CMFRI were to get new grafts from their labs of the same variety, it would start working again. But the need for getting new ones every few years would be there.

Theory 3:  

The sea weed cultivation was done on bamboo rafts as shown in the pic. Each woman would use about 4-5 rafts. And there would around 20-25 women who were involved in each group. Hence, one would have about 100-125 rafts almost permanently stationed in one enclosed shallow section of the gulf. The seaweed would grow well spread out, with each plant occupying a fairly large volume. Women would insert next round of grafts onto the raft periodically. Meaning that their timings would so synchronised that there would always be some harvest ready raft, and some rafts ready for next round of planting. Thus, this shallow section of the gulf would always be clogged. The natural movement of the nutrients from sea in this section was affected, along with the water flow. The sand accumulated below would not get fully flushed out by the sea waves, due to this clogging. So, essentially 3-4 years of intensive cultivation had drained this section of its nutrients necessary for sea weeds. It could also be that this variety of kappaphycus was too nutrient intensive, like a marine-analog of HYVs, which require dosage of chemical fertilisers.   

This was the most appealing theory for me, as it was very detailed and nuanced in its understanding of the marine ecology. This was propounded, not by a woman who did Kappaphycus cultivation, but by one involved in natural sargassum collection. This just goes to show the extent of understanding that these women have. If this was indeed true, then we could wait for a certain period of time for that section of the gulf to regain its natural depth, for the sea to replenish the nutrients and we can resume cultivation.

I should also caution that I have written this from interacting with people from a very limited section of the gulf. In other areas, there are reports that this kappaphycus has become an invasive species and multiplying rapidly, to the detriment of native sargassum species. However, these weren’t witnessed in the section of the Gulf that I visited.

Whichever may be the correct explanation, it remains that introducing new species to an ecosystem must be done with great care and proper attention to detail. This risk is further increased, when we want to make people’s livelihoods dependant on these species. It was the foresight of the women sea weed collectors not to get into cultivation. How do we expect people to give up what they have been doing reasonably well to take-up something new, and fraught with unknown risks?

We need to gain an integrated understanding of an ecology and people’s livelihoods. It’s part of the same whole, and not two separable entities.