It was a quiet morning — half sunny, half cloudy — in Lapaliya, a small village in Gujarat’s Amreli district. As Kannubhai Jadavbhai Lunagriya sinks into the familiar creak of his charpai (rope cot) on the veranda of his home, the woven bed groans under his weight. For the first time in years though, his mind feels light. There are no more threats. No more repeated knocks. No more fear of losing his of land, 30 bigha (approximately 12 acres) of which has fed his family for generations.
“At 70, I finally feel safe – not from illness or old age, but from the fear of losing the land. I lost it, but now it has been returned to me,” Kannubhai Jadavbhai Lunagriya, a resident of Lapaliya village in Gujarat’s Amreli district, while sitting on a charpai (rope cot) on a partly cloudy morning. Just a few steps away, his wife Champaben, 65, swaying back and forth on a wooden swing, nodded in agreement.
Mr. Lunagriya says the 30 bighas (approximately 12 acres) have fed his family for generations.
Over the past three years, the couple has allegedly been harassed by a man from whom their eldest son, Shailesh, took a loan. “Fearing for our lives, we left the village and went to live with our younger son Jignesh, who sells cutlery in Surat,” they say.
