On trail of accused, Satellite cops come face to face with Bihar’s poverty

Ghodasahan was surely a strange name for a village, for the Satellite police team that went in search of around a dozen accused wanted in several theft cases in the city.

Although they found none of them, the journey gave them an opportunity to know of life in the hinterlands of India.
Far away from the bustling Satellite police station, Ghodasahan is a place where time stands still. A part of east Champaran in Bihar and bordering Nepal, the place is marred with extreme poverty and of late has earned notoriety as one of the badlands of the state.

Interestingly, it is also one of the places in Bihar visited by Mahatma Gandhi during the freedom struggle.

"We expected the place to be a poor one. But the poverty that we saw when we landed there was mindboggling. It is a land torn by poverty and the population there is phenomenal. Now we understand why so many people migrate from here to places like Gujarat," said a team member.

To the team's shock they also realised that police from across the country have been visiting this place to look for various accused (70 on last count) who have been charged with all kinds of crime.
A couple of days before they reached, a team of Maharashtra police had visited the place in search of some accused.

The Gujarat cops needless to say could not find the people they were looking for.

"To find an accused here is like looking for a needle in a haystack. We went to the houses of the accused and had to return with the statements of neighbours. The accused don't live at one place for long and so even the local police find it difficult to nab them," said the official.

Another cop, who was part of the team, said they shared whatever information they had about the accused with the Ghodasahan police and exchanged phone numbers to keep each other posted of any development.

Ghodasahan is also known for its agricultural produce. It is one of the major vegetable growing areas of Bihar. Apart from agriculture there is no other means to earn a livelihood. The area needless to say lacks even basic amenities.

 "The situation is so bad that we had to go back to the railway station to charge our cell phones. The electricity supply is erratic at best. The population is huge but there is no development," said a team member talking of his experience.

Ghodasahan is around 40km from Motihari, the nearest major and historical city of Bihar.