Mainpuri (Uttar Pradesh) [India] Apr 20 (ANI): The parliamentary constituency of Manipuri in Uttar Pradesh is considered to be a VVIP seat, for being the stronghold of Samajwadi Party supremo Mulayam Singh Yadav and his family for decades.
The importance of Mainpuri seat is such that it was here on April 19 that two sworn rivals -- Mulayam Singh Yadav and Bahujan Samaj Party chief Mayawati -- shared a stage for the first after nearly 24 years, overcoming their political and personal acrimony of years.
However, the VVIP tag that Mainpuri gets every five years seems to disappear soon after the elections are over. Promises and claims galore in the days leading up to the polling day, but all of these are forgotten and buried once the voting is done.
In Mainpuri Lok Sabha constituency is a village named Nagla Darbari. Locals identify this village as a village of snake charmers. Most of the populace of this village depends on what they earn by entertaining the public by putting up 'snake shows.'
Children here are taught the art of catching snakes and doing various moves with them from a very early age so that they can earn a livelihood as snake charmers when they are grown up.
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According to villagers, they have no means to educate their children and that they are forced to teach them the art of catching snakes at an early age of just three.
In the name of basic facilities, the village does not even have proper roads. The only way into the village is through farming fields which the landowners, the villagers claim, allow them to use only as per their convenience.
Suraj Nath, who has lived here for more than 50 years, told ANI: "The only way to reach the village also passes through the fields. In such a case, even if we try to send our children to schools, the owners of the fields do not let us do that."
"It is such a scenario that generation after generation is forced to be illiterate. We are forced to train our children to catch snakes and beg as well," he said.
The faces of the children here narrate a different story from those on the first pages of the newspapers, where different 'government schemes' are claimed to be reaching every nook and corner of the country through paid advertisements.
'Right to Education,' 'Sarva Siksha Abhiyan' or 'Beti Bachao Beti Padhao' -- none of these schemes has been able to pass through the farming fields to reach this village in Uttar Pradesh.
Sunil Nath, another villager, said: "We want our children to study but there is no way for them to reach the schools. We just want the government to provide us with adequate facilities so that our children do not spend their lives in this profession as we have done."
The pain of the future generations being destructed, and the people being forced to become snake charmers or beggars is quite visible on each and every face in the village. They, however, still hope that things will change for them after the results are declared on May 23.
They hope that whichever party comes to power at the Centre, they will do something for the future of their kids. Their hopes of roads, electricity, gas, and so on are quashed, but they still want a place where their children can read, write, study and build their future.
Nagla Darbari residents are hopeful that their demands will be fulfilled. After all, the luck of the village is such that even though villagers have the 'right to vote,' the village finds no place on the official map. It, thus, becomes more convenient for the officials to completely forget this village after the elections is over.