Tamil Nadu: Tribal woman in bonded labour, her newborn die mid-delivery

CHENNAI: A debt of Rs 20,000 cost a 35-year-old tribal woman and her newborn baby their lives, after her timber unit employer in Kancheepuram allegedly denied her permission to seek medical assistance when she went into labour.

The police suspect that the deceased, identified as Thenmozhi who belonged to a tribal community in Singadivakkam panchayat in Kancheepuram, was working as a bonded labourer.

According to the police, Thenmozhi and her husband Anandhan (40) had been staying and working at a timber logging site near Vellagate on the Kancheepuram-Arakkonam road for the past six months. The couple had borrowed Rs 20,000 from the owner of the unit.

When Thenmozhi developed severe labour pain on Tuesday, the couple requested permission to take her to a hospital. "I called the owner (Arumugham) on his phone. Despite ringing him many times he failed to answer my call. And when he finally answered and arranged for an ambulance, it was too late," Anandan said in his police complaint. By the time a paramedical team arrived, both the mother and the baby were dead, the police said.

In the past, when the couple had sought permission to go to hospital, the owner had refused to let them leave the premises until his debt wasn’t paid. On Tuesday, with no immediate medical assistance available, Thenmozhi went into labour at a shelter on the worksite. Only half of the baby was delivered, with the other half trapped inside, and she suffered severe pain and bleeding. Both the mother and the newborn died during the delivery.

The family has further claimed that when the representatives of the wood-cutting unit arrived later that evening, they instructed the family not to disclose the incident and allegedly gave them Rs 2,000 before sending the bodies to the tribal community at Singadivakkam.

Makkal Mandram, an organisation working for the rights of tribal communities, took up the matter and a complaint was lodged at the Ponneri Karai police station in Kancheepuram. Further investigations are ongoing.