The Search Story (Part II)

Option 5 : Satara (Contd.)

One of my father’s cousin had been based in Satara for a few decades. His two sons stay there along with their mother, wives and children. Umesh bhaiyya (my elder cousin) was quite interested in our change in lifestyle and suggested to us that we explore the area around Satara. He took us around the area twice. I liked the area very much. Almost everything was picture perfect in terms of macro factors. The language familiarity was very comforting. Sahyadri Hills all around, ample sunlight, ample rain, dams between mountains making water available, fertile soil, very pleasant climate throughout the year, reasonably equipped with electricity and road access. Also, the area is far less urbanized than Pune (110 km north) or Kolhapur (100 km south). The reason as I understand is that the king of the area (supposed to be the 13^th generation in Shivaji’s lineage) was an active administrator and didn’t allow much ‘development’ and also offered protection to the area. Another factor, which I felt good about was that the area was home to Swami Ramdas, Shivaji’s spiritual guru and the followers of his teachings are very active around there. It’s kind of an ‘enlightened’ area. For me, it quickly became the area of first choice.

However, Rekha was not as excited about the area, for no reason at all. She couldn’t explain it to me. I got bugged with her stance. I had all the logical and illogical factors to be positively inclined and she had none, but she wasn’t inclined. I took her to see the place again another day. She liked the place, but I could not sense the excitement I was hoping to.

In any case, we did not have a concrete option of land we could consider buying. So, after spending 4 days in Satara, we  handed the baton to Umesh bhaiyya to spread the word and check if we get some options. As it were to happen, we have still not had any option our way (after almost 2 months).

Option 6 : Hulekal and around

On Jan 20^th, we began the last lap of our long drive plan: Satara to Hulekal. Majority of the road was an expressway. We covered the 350 odd km in 6 hours (incl breaks). Hulekal was planned to be the place to settle in, may be for a few months if required.  So we started with other important aspects of life like discipline with food, exercise and other habits. Vinish and Karuna helped us settle and gave us the comfort and space we required. Their landlady, whose house they’d hired was also very kind and her daughters were very friendly with Rekha and the kids. In every sense of the term, we started living with the families. We met a few of their friends, who soon became our friends as well. Our food and exercise regimen started to take shape steadily. We also went for a few outings around.

After a week or so, the moot question of land search raised its head again. We reviewed the option of buying land in or around Hulekal. It had many positives. Physical characteristics were well suited, but with regard to Hulekal, our positions reversed. Rekha was positively inclined and I wasn’t. I don’t have the ability to say, “I can’t explain why, but we cannot choose this place.” After all, there wasn’t any other option waiting for us! So both of us thought deeper and gave ourselves time to evaluate from a neutral standpoint i.e. positives were agreed, now we needed to take a hard look at the negatives as well.

This was a Kannada speaking area. There was no local person we could depend upon to help us build a rapport with the local community. But working with Hindi was possible there, given that there was a large Muslim population. But a village with communities so diverse ways of life also poses the risk of communal tension at some time. The risk is not sufficient to drop the option, but could not be completely ignored.

Hubli (a little over 100 km) was not a very likable city. Sirsi was only good enough to get essentials, not for the occasional recreation. Also, at some point, if we were required to use our professional competency, a good city within reasonable distance would be preferred.

The area received very heavy rainfall (300 inches or 3 times of Mumbai). This meant that at least 8 months are wet / humid, not very pleasant. As we thought more, this was perhaps the reason why this area was scarcely populated.

Land prices were not very low, possibly because it was suitable for Arecanut, coconut and banana plantations. Road access shot up prices further. Most of the land was mountainous, which meant higher expenses for development. Labour availability was not very easy given the scarce population.

Lastly, we did not have any proposal for buying land. Identifying land through brokers, doing the necessary due diligence to make sure we’re not being cheated appeared a daunting and time consuming task. Besides, even if we were to find one, we could not take a final decision before we see through one monsoon. The whole process will take quite some time –least one year. One year before we can get our cows, build our house and get on with life! We should explore an option in hand rather than wait for the ‘best’ option.

After 10 days of stay, both of us were almost certain that Hulekal or around is not an option. As we thought more, Mysore seemed to be the most appropriate option. I contacted them and got to understand that the group is meeting on Feb 2.

It was finalized then. Mysore seemed to be a very good option from all perspectives. We’ll need to learn Kanadda, but that should not be an issue. The price of the land also wouldn’t be high because they wanted to sell the land at a lower price to encourage people like us. I planned to spend a couple of days extra in Mysore to be able to find a house on rent. We would shift to Mysore and live in the city. It will give us the opportunity to experience living there while we buy land, build a house etc.

I went to Mysore (alone) and met up with all the group members and also spent a couple of days as planned. I couldn’t decide on the house on rent. I planned to return to Hulekal to come back with Rekha and the kids. Together we could search for a house on rent.

The Mysore Option : Round 2

Something amusing started happening in Mysore. The evening before I was to leave for Hulekal, I received a call from the member of the group I was to purchase the land from. They said that I need to hurry with the registration. I insisted that we would like to spend a couple of months in the city before we get into any registration formalities. They agreed, reluctantly though. I’m skipping other details here but I sensed that there was quite a lot of fear / lack of trust given that we were ‘outsiders’ to the group.

When I discussed this with Rekha, we created space for the possibility that this option may not work out. But it still made sense to park ourselves in Mysore for a few months. We could either build confidence amongst the same group of people or explore other options.

We went to Mysore with the kids and stayed with Berty. Berty was known to the group for a few years, but he had purchased land from them and so was in the same boat as us. But we felt a little unwelcome there. Something had transpired in two days. We were indirectly informed that the group had decided not to sell the land to us unless we agree to do the registration immediately. It was a very odd situation. We left quite abruptly after staying only for a day. We were stranded. The only option we’d been banking on was no longer there and we were back to square one. Moreover, we were dependent on Berty for developing any rapport with local community. But that seemed quite unlikely now.

We took an early morning train to return from Mysore. We’d almost reached Hasan (60-70 km) when Rekha asked if we could go to Gudalur. Rajinder (one of the land owners at Barkheda) had purchased a 2 acre land in Gudalur few years back. He had invited us to have a look and see if we’d like to purchase it from him. I told Rekha that we were headed in the opposite direction. If we want to go to Gudalur, we need to get off the train and go back to Mysore. We called Dr Sunil and checked if it is ok for us to visit him in Gudalur. The train had just reached Hasan; we quickly grabbed our luggage and de-boarded the train.