SOCIAL ISSUES
Burning issue
T.K. RAJALAKSHMI
Jats organise a rail blockade in a show of strength as the Supreme
Court takes up the case of arson against Dalits in Mirchpur village.
MANOJ DHAKA
Jat leaders of 12 khaps and their supporters during the blockade of
the Delhi-Ferozpur railway line in January protesting against the
arrest of 100 Jats for arson in Mirchpur, in Hisar district.
ON April 21 last year, Dalit hamlets in Mirchpur village in Haryana's
Hisar district, about 200 kilometres from New Delhi, were set on fire.
A 70-year-old man and his disabled daughter died in the arson; 18
homes were destroyed and looted and more than 150 families fled
fearing reprisal from sections of the dominant Jat community. The
police took into custody 100 people, all members of the Jat community,
in connection with the incidents. Two of them were let off – one was a
juvenile and the other got bail.
Mirchpur has been on the boil since the arrests. Matters came to a
head in the new year when members of the Jat community blockaded the
Delhi-Ferozpur (Punjab) railway line near the Julani village railway
crossing in Jind district on January 15 and carried on with the
agitation until January 26. They were led by 12 khaps (caste councils
based on the gotra system of organisation) and had the support of the
Jat mahapanchayat, representing 42 khaps, which demanded a fresh probe
into the incidents.
The protest was for two reasons: the transfer of the arson-related
cases to Delhi from Hisar in December and the shifting of the
undertrials from Hisar Jail to Delhi in January. The cases were
transferred after counsel for the victims made a representation to the
Hisar court when witnesses began turning hostile.
Apparently, the witnesses and their counsels felt intimidated by the
presence of a large number of relatives of the accused, and these
apprehensions were conveyed to the Hisar court and to the Supreme
Court. On December 8, the apex court ordered that the cases be
transferred to a designated court in Delhi where the matter could be
heard under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of
Atrocities) Act. Then on January 10, a court in Rohini, Delhi,
directed the Haryana government to move the 100 undertrials lodged in
Hisar Jail to Delhi. The trial was to begin. Witnesses were given
protection and some of them told Frontline at Mirchpur that they would
depose fearlessly.
Meanwhile, the protesters extended the blockade to the highways and
other roads as well. This affected several districts in Haryana, and
Jind and Hisar districts were cut off. "It was very inconvenient. But
what could we do? The poor and the daily-wage earners suffered the
most. They did not allow any vehicle to move on these roads," said a
tea shop owner at the Mundhal crossing on the road to Jind.
"The protests were absolutely peaceful. There was no disruption. The
government has agreed to look into our demands. We will take them up
again if they are not met," said Rajbir Dhaanda, pradhan, or chief, of
the 12 khaps spread over 17 villages in the district. He is a brick
kiln owner and a teacher by profession.
T.K. RAJALAKSHMI
RAJBIR DHAANDA, PRADHAN of the 12 khaps: "There was no disruption."
The Bhupinder Singh Hooda government, unmindful of the inconvenience
caused to people, allowed the protests to continue even as a Haryana
Roadways bus was set on fire. No attempt was made to disperse the
protesters. This did not go unnoticed by the apex court. On January
31, while hearing a petition pertaining to the Mirchpur incidents, it
demanded from the State government an assessment of the financial
losses incurred because of the disruption in rail and road services.
Notices were sent also to the Northern Railway and the Central
government.
A Bench comprising Justices A.K. Ganguly and G.S. Singhvi told the
government's counsel that the court would not tolerate any community
denying another community's absolute right to live and that muscle
power would not be allowed to prevail over constitutional principles.
The Bench took a serious view of the blockade. In fact, in June 2010
the Supreme Court had directed the State government to provide
protection to the victims and said that failure to do so would be
viewed seriously.
The arson in Mirchpur and what followed it found resonance beyond the
borders of the State. Congress president Sonia Gandhi, it is learnt,
expressed annoyance at the party leadership in the State for failing
to rein in the elements behind the incidents.
Mirchpur certainly was not the first case of organised arson against
Dalits in Haryana and will not be the last either. Localities where
Valmikis live have often been singled out for violence as was seen in
Gohana in Sonepat district. This is perhaps because Valmikis are the
only community among Dalits that has stood up to the dominant castes
from time to time. Mirchpur also had a quiet visitor in AICC general
secretary Rahul Gandhi; his visit was so quiet that even the
government did not get a whiff of it.
Living in fear
Despite all this attention, the situation has not returned to normal
in Mirchpur. The Dalits (Valmikis) are nervous about what the future
holds for them. There is a heavy police presence in the village,
ostensibly to protect Valmiki families and the witnesses in the cases,
but the Valmikis realise that the police cannot be stationed there
indefinitely.
While Jats accuse Dalits of spoiling the brotherhood, or bhaichaara,
by taking the matter to the court, the Valmikis feel that there is no
justice in the existing system and want to be relocated to another
village. "Here might is right. We do not have drinking water supply in
the village. The upper-caste families have their own taps. They don't
let us draw water from their taps and wells," said a village resident
requesting anonymity.
Other Dalit communities, too, feel equally uneasy following the arson.
The problem is that despite the high-profile status that Mirchpur
seems to have acquired, things have only gone from bad to worse for
the landless and the land-dependent. With the increased fragmentation
of agricultural holdings owing to population pressure on land,
agricultural work has become scarce. Added to this is the deepening
hostility between Jats, who own the land, and Dalits and backward
castes, who are dependent on the land-owning castes.
T.K. RAJALAKSHMI
THE DALIT LOCALITY in Mirchpur looks deserted.
"There is no work in the village for us anymore. They do not let us
enter their fields. Earlier, we used to work on their fields and get
paid in cash or kind. We used to pick dried wood for fuel as well from
the fields, but all that has changed now. They hire labour from
outside Mirchpur village. They don't give us work. We are all
agricultural workers. How are we expected to survive? A handful of us
who are in government service no longer live in the village. We told
the government right in the beginning that we cannot live in the
village anymore," said Santra Devi, an elderly woman from the Valmiki
colony. She said women and children lived in fear.
"The Jats have relations in all the neighbouring villages. We do not
get work anywhere. There are a few good people among them, but they
succumb to pressure," said Nihali Devi, another Valmiki woman. Most of
the families in the village have moved out, either to Hisar or to
nearby districts.
In Hisar town, Valmiki families had moved en masse to the farmhouse of
Rajesh Tanwar, a local businessman who, according to Rajbir Dhaanda,
nurtures political aspirations.
"There is no danger to Valmikis in the village. Tanwar aspires to be a
leader and is doing all this for publicity. There is no ill-will in
the village. We have socially boycotted Tanwar for attempting to
foment caste tensions," Rajbir Dhaanda told Frontline at his house in
Budana village. According to him, certain non-governmental
organisations were keeping the issue alive. The Valmikis, he said, had
agreed to withdraw the cases against those who had been framed.
"Mirchpur was an accident. Rahul Gandhi and Kumari Selja [Union
Minister for Culture since January 20] vitiated the atmosphere by
promising the Valmikis homes," he said.
Rajbir Dhaanda was one among the 41 representatives who met Hooda in
the parleys with the protesters. "Had the police and the
administration not helped us, the protests would have taken a violent
turn," he said and added that in all only five to seven people were
involved from "both sides" in the Mirchpur violence. "There is really
no need for police protection of the witnesses," he said.
The assurance cut no ice with the Valmiki families. "I have a gunner
as an escort. He is with me all the time, but how long can this
situation continue? Every family wants to leave the village and be
resettled in alternative plots elsewhere," said one of them.
Anxiety among Dalits
T.K. RAJALAKSHMI
Valmiki families moving out of the village fearing violence.
The mobilisation by the khaps on the Mirchpur issue has only increased
tensions and anxiety among Dalits. Interestingly, other Dalit groups
have begun speaking up. Some persons from these groups told Frontline
that members of the Jat community had tried to force the non-Jat
groups to participate in the blockade.
"They said that if we didn't join, they would not let us enter their
fields," said a youth. Other people said members of the Dom caste, who
are Muslims, were the worst off as even their burial grounds had been
taken over by the powerful sections in the village. "As we are forced
to burn our dead in the Hindu cremation grounds, we do not get
alliances from our community as they say that we are not Muslims,"
said a youth from the Dom community, requesting anonymity.
The problem in Mirchpur is that once the issues relating to the
incident die down, it will be status quo. Barring the Left parties,
the Communist Party of India (Marxist) in particular, none of the
other political parties in the State cares even to respond to the
developments. In a statement, Inderjit Singh, State secretary of the
CPI(M), cautioned people to be vigilant against vested interests
operating under the garb of caste or khap.
The frequency of caste-related violence indicates that it is not just
an outcome of caste conflict or caste tensions but is symptomatic of
the sweeping changes taking place in economic and agrarian relations.
Indeed, the caste mobilisation on issues such as that in Mirchpur is a
worrisome trend and its ramifications go beyond rail and road
blockades.
There are enough indications that the non-Jat communities are appalled
by the State government's benevolent response to the 11-day blockade.
This, along with the aggressive posturing by the dominant caste on
various issues, ranging from honour killings to the demand for Other
Backward Class (OBC) status, an amendment to the Hindu Marriage Act
and the release of the accused in the Mirchpur incidents, does not
inspire confidence in them of a return to peace anytime soon.
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