Welcome to Kallapalli, a village off the phone grid in Kasaragod

'We were already crippled. But during the lockdown, we felt isolated, and our children felt left out when the classes started online,' says ward member Nalinakshi M D
BSNL initiated the work to erect a mobile tower in Kallappalli. But the work is in progress for the past two years. Residents raised Rs 1.75 lakh to speed up the work, but now they are told it needs a generator. (Express)
BSNL initiated the work to erect a mobile tower in Kallappalli. But the work is in progress for the past two years. Residents raised Rs 1.75 lakh to speed up the work, but now they are told it needs a generator. (Express)

KASARAGOD: Ganasree M D, an undergraduate student, treks two km every day to a hilltop to check WhatsApp messages on her phone. "That's the only point near my house where the internet works," she said.

Ganasree is pursuing a Bachelor of Social Work in Dr K Shivram Karanth Government First Grade College at Bellare near Sullia in Dakshina Kannada district. Her teachers routinely conduct online tests and send reading assignments over WhatsApp to keep the students engaged during the lockdown period. "But I will come to know of the assignments only if I go to the mottakunnu (barren hilltop)," she said.
Sindhu George, a homemaker and farmer, is equally exasperated. "I cannot even do the routine things like booking the gas (LPG) cylinder or get an alert from banks on loan repayment. No one can contact us either. For everything, I will have to go to the town," she said.

Welcome to Kallapalli, an out-of-network village on the border of Karnataka, in Panathady panchayat of Kasaragod. "Of the 15 wards in Panathady, Kallapalli is the only ward without mobile network," said Nalinakshi M D, member of the Kallapalli ward.

The ward has a population of 1,400 persons in 353 houses. Of that, 79 houses are in two colonies of Scheduled Tribes -- Kamadai colony of Malakudiya tribe and Padikochi colony of Marathis.
Residents in the hill panchayat feel "crippled" because of the lack of mobile network, said Nalinakshi. "We were already crippled. But during the lockdown, we felt isolated, and our children felt left out when the classes started online," she said.

Till Class IV, the children attend the Government lower primary school at Kallappalli. Then they go to the Karnataka government's upper primary school at Baddaka in Karnataka. For high school, they have to go to Sulliya, 10 km away, or Panathur, 12 km away.

Parents have to travel to either of the two towns for a mobile network.

Kallapalli does not have a mobile tower and the BSNL is in the process of erecting one for the past three years, she said. 

Those who can afford to use a phone signal booster at their house. "I have hung one on a treetop. It gets me one stick on my phone," said George Kallapalli, Sindhu's husband. "We cannot share any secrets over the phone. It always has to be on speaker. Even then if I say knife, the other person will hear knifed," he said.

On a serious note, he said the taxi stand was 6km away and in case of emergency, residents could not even call a cab.

Nalinakshi said the booster is of no use when it is misty or raining.

Waning influence of BSNL

During the 1980s, the residents used to have fixed landline connections of the BSNL. "There was a telephone line running from Sulliya to Karike in Karnataka and because our place was in the middle of the two towns, the Karnataka BSNL gave us telephone connections," said George. "The BSNL used to bill us STD rates when we call our neighbours because we were in Kerala and the telephone exchange was in Karnataka," he said.

After holding on to the landline from 1986, he gave it up in 2010. Not because of the telephone bill, which used to be in the range of Rs 1,000 even back then. "I gave up because of the bribe I have to pay the linemen to fix the line after every storm," he said.
Now the ward has only one BSNL connection, he said.

Struggle for tower

After many petitions to the government, a telephone tower was sanction to Kallapalli in 2017. In 2018, the work was assigned to a contractor based in Ernakulam for Rs 14.67 lakh.
As per the work agreement, the contractor has to start the work in May 2018, and complete it in three months. 

But the work dragged and residents were made to understand that it was because the BSNL was not clearing the bills of the contractor for the work he did. "But we wanted our tower. So a section of residents pooled Rs 1.75 lakh and approached the contractor. He agreed to erect the tower on humanitarian grounds," George said.

Three months ago, the tower was erected but it would need a generator. "We are waiting for the generator," he said.

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