When looking for stories of badass people, I’m always drawn to those that show a clear sense of tenacity, selfless contribution, and long-term dedication. Basically, people who silently keep on doing something they know is right and refuse to give up, no matter how insurmountable the task.
This Indian man named Dashrath Manjhi fits the bill perfectly. He dedicated 22 years of his life to one single purpose: carving a path through a fucking mountain with a flimsy hammer and a chisel, so that his village people can more quickly access medical facilities in a nearby town. His story is so mental that I still find it hard to believe it’s actually true at all.
The Background and The Tragedy
Dashrath was born into the lowest caste of India’s social hierarchy. He was a manual labourer, a landless farmer, in a dirt poor mountainous region. In other words: in terms of economic and social opportunities, this dude had probably the shittiest draw possible. Their village was neglected by the government; they had no school, no running water, no electricity, no hospital.
In 1959, when Dashrath was working in a nearby village on the other side of the mountain, his pregnant wife left home to bring him food and water. To cross to that village she had to climb over a treacherous path over the mountain. She fell and was badly injured.
Dashrath tried to rush his wife to medical care, but he had to go around the mountain which was a 70km route. He couldn’t make it and his wife died. He was devastated.
From that moment, Dashrath decided he’d dedicate his life to carving a road through the mountain to make sure his fellow villagers could access modern amenities in time and no-one would have to die like his wife.
The Journey
Dashrath then sold his 3 goats to buy a hammer and a chisel.
And away he went: every day between 1960 and 1982, Dashrath would get up at 4 am and go to the mountain to chip off the rocks. And then, from 8 am to 1 pm, he would go earn a living by ploughing the fields of other landowners. And then, from 1 pm until the evening, he would go back to facing the mountain.
Think about that for a second — at probably any given day in the 1960s and 1970s, in a remote Indian mountain, from 4 in the morning and until dusk, a man is silently breaking off pieces of rocks by himself, all the while working for a living and raising his children!
Over time, Dashrath developed his own technique to make cutting the rocks easier:
He would burn firewood on the rocks and then sprinkle water on the heated surface; sudden temperature fluctuations cracked the boulders making it possible for him to reduce them to rubble.
Over the years, Dashrath tried to call for help from the government to no avail. His family and fellow villagers mocked him at first for even attempting such a daunting task, but of course he persisted.
Finally, in 1982, he managed to break the last piece of rock and opened a path through the mountain. The path is over 100 metres in length and 10 metres in width. This reduced travelling distance to the nearest town significantly. Children now only had to walk 3 km to get to school, and small vehicles could get to his village.
Dashrath later became a folklore hero and was awarded a plot of land. However, he refused it and donated the land to a local hospital. He died of cancer in 2007, his children and grandchildren still living in extreme poverty.
My Thoughts
To me, the craziest part about this man’s story is that he even decided to attempt to break the mountain in the first place. I mean, how the hell do you hold a hammer and a chisel in your hand, look up at a damn mountain, and say to yourself “Let’s break this shit in half!”?!!
At first, when people heard of what he was going to do, everyone thought he’d gone mad. Understandably. His nephew recalls that people back then said to him “You are a poor man who just needs to earn and eat. Why are you even getting into this?”
Which is incredibly sad and true. Dashrath was destined to be a poor farm labourer forever stuck in the bottom rung of India’s social system. He could have accepted his fate and lived his life away. But what did he have to say?
[Dashrath] thought that in the thousands of years of this mountain’s existence, it must have hurt so many people and will continue to hurt more. He thought everyone has to take birth, eat, earn money and die. But why not do just one thing in this life to make a road through this mountain that is beneficial for not only him but for the whole society?
And so he chose to bring pain upon himself — having spent hours ploughing farmland for a living wasn’t enough, he then picked up a hammer and performed even more hours of back-breaking labour, in the midst of India’s sweltering heat, all for free and against social ridicule.
That is simply fucking nuts — most people would want to relax after a day of hard work, but this dude decided to toil for a few more hours at his own expense. And he just kept doing it, a few kilograms of rock and dirt a day, until an entire chunk of mountain is displaced and a pathway emerges. His biggest motivation, it seems, is in memory of his wife, and in consideration of future generations who will benefit the most from this shortcut.
Of course, at the end of the day, some mines, excavators and trucks could have done the job in a matter of months. You can argue that his work was unnecessary and inefficient. But it is the human spirit, the grit and the drive behind it that makes Dashrath’s such an extraordinary tale.
So here was Dashrath Manjhi — a poor Indian labourer, a simple man with a simple mission in life. He is gone now, but his spirit lives on. Anytime I’m facing a seemingly insurmountable task from now on, I’ll be thinking of Dashrath sitting on a pile of rock hammering it away one piece at a time.
