Photos of Chuni Lal Meghval family and their farm life
Photos 01-42 from 2006 to 2008
01 Chuni Lal cutting bajra stovers after the cobs have been removed.
02 Chuni Lal's wife
03
04 Stacking the stovers for drying
05 Harvesting cotton as labourers at their neighbour Bagsa Ram's field.
06 Weighing the cotton
07 The barren fields of the limestone uplands
08 Chuni Lal watching a limestone quarry at a neighbouring farmer's field.
09 Chuni Lal's limping she-buffalo
10 Grazing at the field of the khejri tree.
11 Chuni Lal watering his buffalo at Bagsa Ram's well.
12 Bagsa Ram Mali watering his three she-buffaloes
13 Chuni Lal with his limping she-buffalo at this village home.
14 Chuni Lal with his granddaughter in school uniform
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16 Chuni Lal's wife at their house yard.
17 Chuni Lal with friends at the village basar.
18 Chuni Lal participating in wedding ceremonials at the Meghval mohalla.
19 Chuni Lal listening to the genealogist of his clan together with his male relatives.
20 The genealogist reading aloud the names of Meghval relatives of earlier generations.
21 Preparing for winter crop irrigation with water purchased from well-owning neighbour farmers.
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24 Emerged monsoon season plants of pearl millet and a kind of water melon.
25 Chuni Lal's wife and daugther weeding the field.
26 Night watch at the adjacent field of a Joshi farmer.
27 The limping buffalo brought to the field for grazing.
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29 A sandy outwash after rainstorms.
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31 Sesamum plants wilting due to some kind of root rot disease.
32 The bajra (pearl millet) has reached the earhead stage.
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34 Unattended herds of stray cattle driven away from the area by farmers protecting their maturing monsoon season crops.
35 The harvested bajra loaded on the tractor trolley.
36 At the threshing ground
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41 Chuni Lal has hired a tractor for this job. He has worked as a tractor driver most of his life.
40 Chuni Lal's grandson Mahendra
42 Mahendra has a nice rest on the trolley while the bajra load is entering Chuni Lal's home. Bajra roti bread will be their staple food for many months ahead.
Photo 01-86 from 2011 to 2012
01 Manesh and their she-buffalo at the entrance of Chuni Lal's farm field.
02 The camp in the midst of the sesamum crop
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04 Manesh's mother and grandmother busy weeding the til (sesam) field.
05 Sesame, a cash crop grown this year instead of the pearl millet for bread.
06 Manesh, newly married at a wedding that put the family in debts
07 The cotton crop, another cash crop for paying off the debt.
08Chuni Lal's wife busy in a house yard full of monsoon season flowers.
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10 Mahendra, the youngest brother
11 An irrigated field of winter season cumin seed, a profitable but risky cash crop.
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17 Manesh with his friend at the neighbouring farm.
18 A wheat field, highly water demanding.
19 The saump cash crop grown by Chuni Lal's neighbour of the Meghval caste kinship group.
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23 Jamna spreading a new cowdung coating on the angan floor before the Divali festival.
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25 Plenty of mungbean in that cowdung, indicating that the stray cattle herd has been grazing in a mung bean field.
26 Semistarving stray cattle enjoying the greenary around Durga Dan's house.
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28 The flood protection wall in the background and the excavated sandy soil in the foreground.
29 Durga Dan digging a plant he will use as a herbal medicine against burn wounds.
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31 Durga at Chuni Lal's farm for getting vegetables growing in their own in fallow fields.
32 Picking bean pods, probably guar beans.
33 Durga Dan and Chuni Lal
34 Cotton crop.
35 Bagsa Ram Mali and his brothers dig a deeper tubewell. The submersible pump and engine in the orange tube.
36 The drilling rig with many pipes to be driven down in the limestone rock.
37 Bagsa Ram's sister or niece picking cotton on their farm.
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40 Akara plant growing on the divide between farms.
41 Chuni Lal with a new buffalo cow. The daughter of the limping one.
42 Chuni Lal
43 The luxuriant khejri tree in the fallow bajra field.
44 Sparse pearl millet among other crop plants and a lot of weeds.
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48 Plants cut from this field will be used as fodder.
49 Weeds for fodder being dried in stacks.
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52 50 Fallow field with a thin cover of bajra.
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54 Chuni Lal at his fieldwatch platform and farm hut.
55 At the water pot.
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60 A harvested til (sesamum) field.
61 The path to the exit of the farm.
62 Deshi babul pollen balls.
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64 Equipped for a night protecting the standing crop from intruding animals.
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66 Chuni Lal's grandson Dinesh at the watch platform after the Divali night.
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68 Covered cotton at the threshing ground.
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71 At the gate of Bagsa Ram Mali's farm after the Divali night and Govardhan puja.
72 Two Govardhan puja heaps with symbolic trees on symbolic mountains of cowdung.
73 The road to the village.
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76 The long stonewall along the road.
77 The shrub forest area behind the wall.
78 The seasonal dam area viewed from the flood protection wall with limestone kilns at the horizon.
79 The footpath up on the dam wall.
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81 Some water left in the seasonal dam in November.
82 Some old memorial stone with a message difficult to interpret.
83 Chuni Lal with his brothers.
84 Chuni Lal and his wife at the bus station going for a family function.
85 At the village bus station.
86 Early morning at the bus station with a stray animal herd looking for something edible.
collage-chuni-lal-2006-2008-photos-01-42.pdf