BIHAR SEES CLASHES BETWEEN UPPER CASTES AND DALITS AFTER LS POLLS

REJUVENATED CPI(ML)-L LEADS NEW RESURGENCE IN STATE AGAINST THE BJP

After a long gap of more than 50 years Bihar is once again witnessing emergence of class war though of not that magnitude and dimension that the state witnessed in early seventies. The basic character of upper caste oppression continues to be same as was evident in those days.

If during those years the upper caste feudal lords and landed gentry had come together to foil the OBCs and
EBCs to emerge in a strong way on the political horizon of the state and control the instrument of production
and decision making mechanism, this time , they have started attacking the Dalits and proletariats for preventing them to grow and expand.

There is no denying that the upper  caste people have been contemplating to assert their rights and power under the stewardship of BJP. But their desire received a major setback with BJP not performing well. Even in the midst of the electoral exercise, the saffron supporters and Modi Bhakts were sure of BJP crossing 400 seat target set up by Modi. But the realisation of losing the ballgame as the Dalits and OBCs have shifted their allegiance to INDIA bloc, made them belligerent[as1] .

They shed away the façade of being democratised under Modi rule. The Dalits and OBCs turned out to be the main target of upper castes led by the BJP. With the upper caste  dominated police and bureaucracy
coming to their aid, they were not to worry. The first incident of revenge killing took place in Saran. The violent incident that took place in Saran made it abundantly clear that poll violence, booth capturing and influencing elections through muscle power continues to dictate the politics of Bihar.

A day after polling on May 21, violence broke out between the Yadav and the Rajput communities in Badi Telpa village, in which a Yadav youth Chandan lost his life when goons of other community fired on them.
It was alleged that Dalits and voters from the marginalised communities were being prevented from casting
their votes at Badi Telpa. After getting the information, RJD candidate Rohini Acharya reached the spot. Police restored peace but only for the time being. Next day the revenge turned violent.

In the post-election violence one development that has featured prominently is the BJP supported landlords have been quite aggressive against the CPI(ML) cadres and local level leaders. Sukar Ram of remote Dumraon in Buxar was implicated in false case and sent to jail on June 18. He was implicated in a petty case of a drain. He tried to intervene and settle the dispute. The dispute aggravated and one person Bitan Ram was killed.

The BJP leaders used the opportunity to implicate Sukar. He is now languishing in jail. But the local poor, dalits are restive and they see the incident as a move to silence them and finish CPI(ML). In another incident 65 year old Shivnath Ram, a small vendor selling eggs, of Sahebganj in Muzaffarpur was killed on July 2.
His crime was he had dared to drink water from the tap of an upper caste lord Anesh Thakur. He was not only chased away but was killed by a group of upper caste people close to Anesh. So far police has not arrested any culprit.

The CPI(ML) factfinding team after visiting the village, alleged that police has in fact terrorising the family members and relatives of deceased. It is really shocking that in a state which claims to have leaders like Lalu Yadav and Nitish Kumar, who swear by the names of the Dalits, such atrocious incidents are taking place.

In village Tekari under Gaya, once the red bastion, the hands of Sanjay Manjhi were cut. This is the home
district of Union minister Jitan Ram Manjhi. The village has 120 houses of Manjhis and two of Paswan’s. The bone of contention has been the government waste land allotted to the pasis and other 25 families in earlier ears. But recently the entire land was allotted to Indradeo Mishra of a village Chirali. Manjhis fought the case. But it was not corrected by the local land officials. Only 55 Manjhi families were allowed to live on the land. The other land was declared as vacant land.

Taking advantage of the situation, Shivendra Mishra took control of the land. Sanjay Manjhi’s father had
raised a two feet high mud wall for keeping his pigs. In the afternoon of June 5 Shivendra Mishra descended on the scene with 10 people. Getting information Sanjay also reached. But the moment Sanjay came he was attacked with a sword by Shivendra. While defending his head his left hand was chopped from near elbow. The CPI(ML) fact finding team led by its legislator Ram Bali Yadav is of the view that it was deliberate attempt of the local officials to deny the right of land to the Manjhis.

These incidents may be small in nature. But these have wider political implication. The Dalits, proletariats and OBCs have come to nurse the feeling that upper caste people and landlords are planning to punish them for raising their voice against them. The top BJP leaders strongly hold the view that CPI(ML) emerging as a major political force in Bhojpur and Central Bihar would endanger their existence.

Bhojpur peasant uprising is the first major class conflict that took place in seventies in the villages of the
district of Bihar. Agricultural labourers and the poor peasants had rebelled against the tyranny and oppression of feudal landlords primarily belonging to uppercastes. Two issues that triggered the class struggle were, fight to protect dignity and assert the right of selfdetermination and exercising voting rights.

The rightist forces and anti-poor political leadership tried to present the clashes as purely of the nature of caste skirmishes and caste-based oppression. They made every effort to dilute and confuse the basic
character of the clash. Belchi episode is the classic example. It was projected as a clash between two criminal gangs. It is a historical fact that the criminals who nursed antagonistic caste differences with the other lower castes were used by the feudal lords to serve their interest. Most of the landlords were from the upper-caste; they were Rajput, Bhumihar, Brahmin and Kayastha. The agricultural labourers belonged to the Schedule Caste or the Backward Castes like Yadav, Kurmi and Koeri.

The first major class struggle took place in village Ekwari. Majority of landowners were upper caste
Bhumihars. The genesis lies in the attempt of a school teacher Jagdish Mahato to prevent the goons of
Bhumihars from rigging the election. He was brutally assaulted by their goons. Jagdish Mahato, popular among the Dalits and poor as Jagdish Master, had also protested control the power structure of the village by the landlords.

In those days the landlords and their men, even from surrounding villages will combine together to attack the Dalits and labourers. The landlords of one particular date would send “newata” (invitation) to their castemen in other villages. In almost cases the plan to attack the dalit ghettos would have the tacit support of the local government officials specially the police.

As recently Congress leader Rahul Gandhi unravelled that 90 per cent of the important government posts
were filled with upper caste people, in those days the situation was worse. They dictated the course of rule and governance. With increase in the feudal tyranny, the dalits also started asserting. Determination of the agriculture labourers and poor peasants to protect their dignity and improve their social status got its
manifestation in struggles between them and the elite “upper caste”.

From 1971 to 1973, nearly fifteen big Zamindars were killed in retaliatory actions. For electoral compulsions the CPI(ML) may have joined hands with RJD and its chief Lalu Yadav, but the fact cannot be ignored that
under his rule, when he was chief minister, the Dalits and proletariats led by CPI(ML) suffered most. It
was in this phase the Yadavs became aggressive and targeted the Dalits. Coinciding with his rule dreaded Ranavir Sena of Bhumihars launched reign of terror in central Bihar and carried out a number of gruesome massacres.

The 1980s witnessed a meteoric rise in political violence: “violent incidents increased from 260 in 1977 to 617 in 1984, nearly 100 people were killed in the 1985 election, compared with 34 in 1977, including 4 candidates”.

Between 1988 and 1989, Bihar saw the rise of caste armies like the Lorik Sena (Bhumihars) and Kunwar Sena (Rajputs). The class struggle in Bihar had two prominent features; it was political struggle for control of the state pitting the forward castes against the backward castes, and a socioeconomic struggle of the landless lower castes against the land owning forward and backward castes’.

Now after the Lok Sabha elections this year, the victory of two CPI(ML) Liberation candidates in Bihar by fighting the upper caste NDA nominees has led to big enthusiasm among the dalits. These are not limited to the two constituencies, the message that the upper castes can be defeated in both electorally and politically at ground level, has reached the other parts of Bihar. There is a sense of resurgence among the oppressed
people.

CPI(ML)-L as a part of the INDIA bloc has been fighting the NDA on all fronts. This new resurgence among the dalits will have its impact on the coming assembly elections in Bihar next year.

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