Livelihood Review of Indian Culture

from villages to Calcutta to find better life, but most of them generally live in pavements or in temporary sheds. In Calcutta hundreds of thousands of those who do not have shelter for living, eat, sleep, love and die in the street Segal, 1965: 19.

2.1.2.2. Livelihood

India is a very poor nation. The poverty spreads to the whole country. The average income of the Indians was 80 a year. Only a few people in India who were wealthy. Many Indians only lived with 5 cents a day. Segal 1965: 19 mentions that many people in India especially those who live in the cities do not have shelter in the slums because they are very poor. Nearly three quarters of the population were directly dependent on agriculture. The agricultural sector contributes nearly one-half of the national income, provides livelihood about three-fourths of the population, supplies the bulk of wage goods required by the non-agricultural sector and raw material for a large section of industry 1980: 207. The average size of Indian farms was only five acres, and Indian farmers only had two acres or less. Some large Indian farms belonged to landlords. However, these landlords do not cultivate the farms by themselves. About two-thirds of the farmers own their own land. Most of their land become smaller and smaller with each generation because of Hindu inheritance customs. Usually when an Indian dies, his farm is divided equally among all his sons. The share of each son may be too small to provide a living 1971: 106f. India was the third largest producer of tobacco and bananas and also produced cotton vegetables and wheat. However, India still could not fulfill enough food and proper diet for its people. Inefficient farming and poor equipment caused low production per acre. About 7 of every adult Indians, both men and women, were farmers. However, Indian Farmers earned very little money. Most of them lived and die in debt, and they also seldom had enough to eat 1971: 106f. Segal 1965: 184 explains that India agriculture yields were low because the farmers did not have large-scale mechanized farming, with the employment of fertilizers and pesticides. The Indian farmers also did not have land organizations and enough money to increase yields significantly. Besides, the India’s climate also causes low production of harvest. It causes low production of harvest because India’s climate is unpredictable. The climate of India is described as tropical monsoon type. India has four seasons, the first is winter season January-February, the second is hot weather season, summer March-May, the third is rainy season, south-western monsoon period June-September, and the fourth is post-monsoon period or north-east monsoon period in the south peninsula October-December. Rainfall is not regularly coming in India and the distribution of the rain is not good. In the whole of Assam and the Western Ghats are areas of very heavy rainfall with more than 2,000 mm of annual rainfall. Some places in the Khasi and Jaintia hills of Meghalaya receive the heaviest rainfall in the world. In contrast, Rajastan, Kachchh and the high Ladakh plateau of Kashmir only have a yearly rainfall of between 100 and 500 mm 1980: 3. During the period, monsoons seasonal wind reach India from the southwest and southeast, bringing almost all the rain that falls on India. The southwest monsoons sometimes cause death to millions of Indians. If the monsoons bring enough rain and come on time, crops will grow. However, if the monsoons fail to arrive in time, the crops will fail to grow. Some monsoons also drop too much rain so that they cause flood and ruin crop 1971: 106d

2.1.3. Criticism

Dominique Lapierre has succeeded in writing the story of poor people in a slum, Anand Nagar. The novel that he writes entitled The City of Joy is based on a true story. He conducted the research for two years in Calcutta and various areas of Bengal before he started to write the book. In his book, he writes an epic about the soul of humanity: a song of love, a hymn to life, a lesson in tenderness and hope for all people for all times. After publishing his book, he receives over twenty thousand letters from readers expressing their love for The City of Joy. The City of Joy became one of International bestsellers book. Dominique Lapierre then shares his royalty at least 2 billion dollar to people in Anand Nagar. After reading The City of Joy, many people from around the world have supported his actions by giving donation to people in Anand Nagar, giving criticism for his work, and sending letters. Three magazines that have given criticism to Lapierre’s novel are New York Post, New York Times and Houston Chronicle. New York Post writes that there are many heroes in The City of Joy. All characters in The City of Joy novel are heroes but in their own way. In this novel, the reader can find laughter, love, beauty, and a flooding spiritual Joy. New York Times and Houston Chronicle mention that The City of Joy is a story about suffering. Besides suffering, the novel also contains loyalty, kindness, tolerance, generosity, patience, endurance, acceptance, and faith, even holiness. Another criticism comes from Marynell Ford, TV network executive from