How a chicken dish made this part of Andhra Pradesh Maoist-free
The popularity of bamboo chicken, a local tribal delicacy, in the dense forests of Andhra Pradesh’s East Godavari Agency, has attracted foodies from far and wide, thus mainstreaming the area and reducing its remoteness — thereby making it less attractive for Maoists.
The dense forests of Andhra Pradesh’s East Godavari Agency, once a safe-haven for outlawed left wing ultras — things came to a head with the kidnapping of eight IAS officers on December 27, 1987 at Gurthedu — is now a peaceful place with visitors from all over the state visiting it. The reason for the turnaround is chicken — rather, bamboo chicken, a local tribal delicacy that has caught the fancy of foodies from far and wide.
The origins of the dish are unclear, as are the specifics of how news of it spread to other parts of the state, but no one denies its role in ridding the area of Maoists, insurgents owing allegiance to the Communist Party of India (Maoist), although there is some debate on the centrality of this role.
The theory is that the popularity of the dish attracted visitors, mainstreaming the area, and reducing its remoteness — thereby making it less attractive for the insurgents.
“I started practising law in Rampachodavaram a year before the kidnap of IAS officers before I shifted to Rajahmundry,” says Palla Trinadha Rao, a Rajahmundry-based advocate. According to him , the influx of visitors drawn by the chicken was accompanied by an increase in road and mobile networks in the area.
“With hardly any villages inaccessible to communication network, the Agency can longer be treated as remote nowadays”, he adds.
The retreat of the Maoists from the East Godavari Agency to the Andhra-Odisha border about 150 km away can mainly be attributed to bamboo chicken stalls flooding the area, says Kallu Srinivas, a local activist fighting for tribal rights.
Additional Superintendent of Police Rahul Dev Singh confirms that the agency tracts have been completely free of the movements of armed squads of Maoists, but attributes this to police action, among other factors.
Bamboo chicken is prepared by stuffing chicken in a fresh bamboo shoot and slow-cooking it over charcoal. Connoisseurs (Advocate Rao is one) swear by the aroma, tenderness and suppleness of the meat that has stewed in its own juices within the bamboo.
Maredumilli, located in the heart of the East Godavari’s Agency area with Rampachodavaram as its Integrated Tribal Development Agency (ITDA) headquarters, has now become a picnic spot with bustling crowds, especially over the weekend, with the main draw being the chicken.
The dish, which was initially popular in the Araku area of Visakhapatnam Agency, was introduced by a Kondreddy tribal families that settled in the East Godavari Agency; they also introduced their own variation and spices.
Now, the dish is no longer made by the tribals alone. Many Kondareddy tribals complain that the “business” has slipped into the hands of enterprising non-tribals over a period of time. Srivas says activists tried “petitioning the ITDA authorities at Rampachodavaram for giving some kind of patent to tribals over the bamboo chicken” but that this “did not materialise”.
Interestingly, the dish has also become popular in urban areas such as Vijayawada with posh hotels serving it. Most foodies however claim the local dish, cooked with tender bamboo shoots, tastes the best.
Srinivas says that the bamboo chicken is now being showcased at food festivals held in Silparamam in Hyderabad and Visakhapatnam. While welcoming the commercialization of the cuisine he says that the interests of tribals must be safeguarded.
There’s a flip side, though. Forest range officer A Sunil Kumar says the increasing popularity of bamboo chicken has resulted in indiscriminate cutting of bamboo in the reserve forests.Even though Rao rules out the possibility of bamboo chicken causing any environmental concerns since the Andhra Pradesh Forest Department has started advocating bamboo cultivation to facilitate promotion of the cuisine and adds that “bamboo grows fast”, Kumar insists that large tracts of bamboo forest have been cleared to meet the demand for bamboo chicken.
That demand is evident in the number of bamboo chicken stalls in Maredumilli, which now even boasts of air conditioned hotels for visitors. The forest department has chipped in with an eco-tourism project by developing waterfalls and parks. Kumar says that the tourist spots are being maintained by the tribals themselves. But it is the bamboo chicken that rules the local economy.