Kolar gold fields: Promise of gold still holds sway in this mining town

BENGALURU: Premakumari J, a resident of Kolar Gold Fields, spends five hours every day travelling to and from Bengaluru. In the big city, she works as a school teacher. Though the train journey consumes her precious time and even takes a toll on her health, better opportunities and pay dwarf her daily ordeal.
In Kolar Gold Fields (KGF), which was once the cash cow of British Raj and has a fascinating history of mining, around 25,000 people depend on Bengaluru for work. Located 90 km away from the IT capital, this township has been surviving on Bengaluru’s proximity ever since the mines closed in 2001.

Come elections and the residents know what exactly the promises will be. “No election happens in KGF without the mention of reopening the gold mines. In fact, that is the only hope on which we all live,” says P Shanmugam, 63, who has seen several elections unfold in KGF.

Employment is the biggest challenge in this once-thriving town. Following the closure of the Bharath Gold Mines Ltd (BGML), around 4,000 families lost their income. Many poor families continue their legal battles for pending pensions and other settlements with the erstwhile PSU.

Although the government has made promises about resuming mining, nothing concrete has happened. Last year, the state government even made an announcement of developing a new city in KGF to decongest Bengaluru. The project was soon labelled non-implementable.

A Rajan Babu, principal scientist at the National Institute of Rock Mechanics in KGF and the first engineering graduate from KGF, says establishing small cottage and packaging industries would solve the employment problems to an extent. “There should be an end to this everyday commute of five hours. It is disintegrating families,” Babu pointed out.

But the demands have fallen on deaf ears. Hoping against hope, voters here have experimented with different parties and candidates every election. Tamil-dominated KGF, located at 30 km from Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh, is the only constituency in Karnataka where the regional parties of Tamil Nadu have tasted success.

The influence of Tamil Nadu politics was to the extent that AIADMK candidate M Bhaktavatsalam was elected MLA thrice. Prior to the entry of AIADMK, the Left parties dominated KGF. It was natural for the mining workers to support the CPI which gave voice to their issues. After disillusionment with both, the largely Tamil dalit voters supported the Republican Party of India twice.

Things started to change after the 2008 delimitation exercise. “Bringing rural parts of Kolar to the KGF’s fold changed the political game altogether. For the first time in 2008 elections, BJP candidate Y Sampangi, whom the locals call “an outsider” (he is from Bengaluru), was elected as MLA.

During his first term, Sampangi was convicted in a bribery case and was imprisoned for three years. In the 2013 election, the BJP fielded his mother Ramakka Y, who too won. Her opponent turned out to be M Bhaktavatsalam, who had moved to the JD(S).

This time around, while the BJP is banking on Sampangi for the second time, Kolar MP KH Muniyappa is making every effort to field his daughter Roopa Shashidhar from the Congress.