DEATHS SHINE LIGHT ON UNDERSERVED TRIBAL BELT

The death of two women caused by consumption of mango kernel gruel last week in Kandhamal district and the Odisha government's predictable response encapsulates one thing-the more things change, the more they stay the same.

In 2001, Rayagada district's Kashipur block had jumped to national headlines for 19 such fatalities. After all these years, the villain has remained the same the humble porridge made of dried mango kernels.

The narratives by two governments 23 years apart have an uncanny similarity too: tribal communities' dietary practices and food poisoning. Amid an exchange of barbs between the ruling BJP and opposition parties, one thing is clear: the government of the day is not willing to see it beyond the linear explanation of the gruel's toxicity. When starvation deaths rocked Odisha in the early 2000s, the BJD-BJP combine was new to power.