An ex-jawan guards birthplace from turning into ghost village
PAURI GARHWAL: The twisty 2km trek from the paved road to a quaint mountainside village in Uttarakhand’s Pauri district is hard to detect. It is overrun by thickets, bears lurk behind the bushes; and leopards too.
Besides the calls of the jungle, an eerie silence surrounds the trail to Baluni, 50km from Pauri town, which looks like any of the quintessential ghost villages dotting this side of the Himalayan landscape.
“Hark, who goes there?” a deep baritone warns as one approaches the spattering of homesteads at the end of the slog. That’s a warning shot, strong enough to freeze hungry cats. From the vantage point of the village temple, that still stands tall amid the ruins of razed stone-and-wood houses, a voice emerges.
The lone sentinel is retired soldier Shyam Prasad, 67, but for whom Baluni would have been any of the 340 abandoned villages in the district.
In his youth, Prasad protected the country’s borders. Now he guards his birthplace in Pauri Garhwal — alone for the past four years.
Two decades ago, this village thrived with 15 families. All of them, save the Prasads, migrated to urban areas for jobs and “better life”. He stayed put with his family after retirement in 1985. When his wife died and his five daughters were married off, he was left alone. His son, also in the army, visits him occasionally.
“Had the government addressed the problem of drinking water, some families would have stayed back,” Prasad said. “No one cares.”