This Hajare too is a fighter, despite a ‘body blow’ a decade ago

Immobilised by rheutomoid arthiritis, shunned by family later, 37-year-old living alone hasn’t seen sunlight in last six years, but is still fighting against graft.

At his Talegaon home, from where he runs his organisation.

THIRTY-seven-year-old Raviraj Hajare boasts of the famous second name, but has no relations with Anna Hazare. While Anna is crusading against graft in Maharashtra and beyond, Raviraj is fighting against the corrupt in Maval taluka of Pune district.

There is another similarity between the two. Both have little to do with their respective families.

But here, the commonalities end and what emerges is a heart-rending tale of a lonely activist who is fighting a battle both within and outside.
Hajare, a resident of Rao Colony in Talegaon, runs the Human Rights Association from his residence where he has been living a lonely life for nearly a decade after rheutomoid arthiritis delivered a crippling blow to his body. His wife, a havaldar in Pune police, left him along with their children. “No, I don’t want to talk about her… but I wish to see my children some day,” he says, wistfully.

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His right hand has become stiff and he barely manages to move his other hand. He finds bending absolutely difficult and most of the time keeps lying on the bed. On top of it, he cannot walk, has to depend heavily on crutches to move around his house where nobody is available to even offer him a glass of water.
His house remains shut all the time. In the morning hours, there is some light flickering inside, but in the evening hours, there is total darkness as the MSEDCL has cut off his power connection due to pending arrears. The local civic body has, however, not severed his water supply though he has not paid the bills. “How can I pay the bills ? I have no source of income…,” he reveals as a matter-of-fact.

In the last six years, says Hajare, he has seen sunlight only once. “And that day as I stepped out of the house, I fell flat on my face and suffered injuries. Nobody came to even pick me up… I crawled inside my house,” says Hajare, who was a civil engineer by profession, earning a handsome salary, before illness struck him.
After life delivered a body blow to him and family dumped him, Hajare did not sit brooding. Instead, he took up public causes in all seriousness and purpose.
“Several people come to me complaining about violation of human rights and also after they are cheated in land deals in Maval area. Our organisation takes up the cases with the police and the authorities,” he says, showing a file of piled-up complaints. He himself does not participate in morchas, but sends letters through other activists to the police and other government officials and follows them up strictly.

A few months ago, after he started taking ayurvedic and herbal medicines, Hajare says he has been able to walk somewhat. “Before that, I spent lakhs of rupees on my illness, which left me in penury,” he recalls.

Daniel Chakranarayan, an herbal expert from Dehu Road, says,”I was moved by the plight of Hajare. Just for his sake, I travel nearly 50 km to bring him herbal medicine free of cost. I am glad he can walk a little now.”

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But where does Hajare get his food from? “Some Good Samaritans drop in, some time even those whose cases I take up bring in some food. At times, people who I fight for take pity on me and help me with some money… the maximum is Rs 50,” he says with a smile.

“Actually, I eat only once, one bhakri and whatever with it…” he says.

Hajare’s only connection with outside world is his cellphone which has no outgoing call facility.

“Yes, I know I am living a nightmare, but I have immense fighting spirit in me to keep him going against all odds,” he says.

Manoj Dattatrye More

Manoj More has been working with the Indian Express since 1992. For the first 16 years, he worked on the desk, edited stories, made pages, wrote special stories and handled The Indian Express edition. In 31 years of his career, he has regularly written stories on a range of topics, primarily on civic issues like state of roads, choked drains, garbage problems, inadequate transport facilities and the like. He has also written aggressively on local gondaism. He has primarily written civic stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad, Khadki, Maval and some parts of Pune. He has also covered stories from Kolhapur, Satara, Solapur, Sangli, Ahmednagar and Latur. He has had maximum impact stories from Pimpri-Chinchwad industrial city which he has covered extensively for the last three decades. Manoj More has written over 20,000 stories. 10,000 of which are byline stories. Most of the stories pertain to civic issues and political ones. The biggest achievement of his career is getting a nearly two kilometre road done on Pune-Mumbai highway in Khadki in 2006. He wrote stories on the state of roads since 1997. In 10 years, nearly 200 two-wheeler riders had died in accidents due to the pathetic state of the road. The local cantonment board could not get the road redone as it lacked funds. The then PMC commissioner Pravin Pardeshi took the initiative, went out of his way and made the Khadki road by spending Rs 23 crore from JNNURM Funds. In the next 10 years after the road was made by the PMC, less than 10 citizens had died, effectively saving more than 100 lives. Manoj More's campaign against tree cutting on Pune-Mumbai highway in 1999 and Pune-Nashik highway in 2004 saved 2000 trees. During Covid, over 50 doctors were asked to pay Rs 30 lakh each for getting a job with PCMC. The PCMC administration alerted Manoj More who did a story on the subject, asking then corporators how much money they demanded....The story worked as doctors got the job without paying a single paisa. Manoj More has also covered the "Latur drought" situation in 2015 when a "Latur water train" created quite a buzz in Maharashtra. He also covered the Malin tragedy where over 150 villagers had died. Manoj More is on Facebook with 4.9k followers (Manoj More), on twitter manojmore91982 ... Read More

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