[Reader-list] Fw: Researcher with conscience humiliated by Police

[subhrodip sengupta]

----- Forwarded Message ----
From: subhrodip sengupta <sub_sengupta at yahoo.co.in>
To: reader-list-request at sarai.net
Sent: Tue, 29 December, 2009 11:46:47 AM
Subject: Fw: [Reader-list] Researcher with conscience humiliated by Police






----- Forwarded Message ----
From: subhrodip sengupta <sub_sengupta at yahoo.co.in>
To: prabhat kumar <prabhatkumar250 at gmail.com>
Sent: Tue, 29 December, 2009 11:45:23 AM
Subject: Re: [Reader-list] Researcher with conscience humiliated by Police


Dear Prbhat plz forward my Sympathy n humble suggestion,
U go to Sp's to fight goons? Find more practical ways n tell us about ur feats. Yor running was a wise decision but asking goons for compensation wasn't sir quite remarkable, they do it all the time....  All that illuminated me was 'thus goes the mind of a (presumably) educated SP sitting in an air conditioned office of honour'.  Thank GOD, I never complain to SP about police! Then I thought, 'Poor thing! Apart from keeping up the repute of the post among juniors, there is a gender role too, which We musn't forget. She might be obeying the dictums in fear of loosing her dignity and coming from, presumably feudal high class background. The people who shook huts down r not police, but Goons, violators of others space and perpetrators of disturbing social peace. How can we call such people police, just because of some uniform, listing, or some special category, Imagine what would have happened in the North east mwhere things like special 'powers'
 for armed forces are in force. In delhi, do you find things better. I fond them outright Goons. Somehow Uniform gives them a right to use abusive and offensive language and gestures.  Governance of people or for people is the question. In populated places like India where people care less about others in person, governance can afford the luxurious assumption of taking masses as granted, as no vaccum is ever created by people who leave, die of cold, or even Murder. Sociaal exclusion is only one sided. Governance in such cases is not definitely by the people. I wonder what such fethism of owning means by throwing off others can achieve, at least on counts of respect, popularity and confidence. I ask a more pertinent question, in an age and state where people do not have a clear cut conception of economic classes: How many in and across the institutes of Delhi have been informed. How many of the faculty or student members shall care to mention their
 dissaproval publicly. Neh Naxalite is now a taboo means trouble, though people do not understand it. A humble request to ALL ................ Next time while going in direct confrontation take some conditioned goons with U too... for your own defence. At least the perpretrators should have casualties on their side too. Fear like exclusion, remains one sided, till present. I love the administration for not flaterring anyone and making mistakes the way it has been made, defending it's servants..... This way it breaks and brings in room for change some positive change, some inclusion. Unless we question values how can we break them?
                                                                             My humble empathy to the injuries to the dignity & body of Varun. Beyond the ambit of this list, I muttered some vulgar utterance of these people whom we have long exlcluded from our trust for being demonly by virtue of the special pwers granted to them.........B.......! What law can mix up goons and enforces. Even Indian court6s do not, Alas they still have to depend on a system with a complex network of influences of Goons. Bade bhai Sahab(khadus bhai Sahab0 I'd say!


Love and regards
Subhrodip.






: reader-list at sarai.net
Sent: Sun, 27 December, 2009 4:50:20 PM
Subject: [Reader-list] Researcher with conscience humiliated by Police

From: Rahul Ramagundam
<rahul.ramagundam at gmail.com<rahul.ramagundam%40gmail.com>
>
To: Rahul Ramagundam <rahul.ramagundam at gmail.com<rahul.ramagundam%40gmail.com>
>
Sent: Thu, 24 December, 2009 6:17:21 PM
Subject: something on Bihar (instant reaction)

How big a crime could it be to ask the police in Bihar if their ongoing
action is legally informed? Such an innocent enquiry, as my experience on
the afternoon of 22nd December in Khagariya’s Amosi village affirms, could
lead to personal humiliation and physical violence. In the salubrious
wilderness that Khagariya’s rural stretch is you could be called a Naxalite,
done to anonymous death in a brave police encounter.  Something similar
happened to me. I was physically assaulted, abused with filthiest of swear
words, called a Naxalite, and my local companion was slapped, man-handled
and beaten with blows from ferocious lathi-wielding police officers and
constables.
Amosi is a village which came recently under spotlight when some of its
wretched residents were accused of massacring some others from another
nearby village in early October this year. Amosi is a tola populated by some
three hundred Musahar families. They live in thatched huts. Some 34 male
residents of Amosi tola have been accused of carrying out the massacre of
sixteen people of the nearby village. The names of the accused apparently
were given to the police by the relatives of the victims of massacre. Of the
34, a few have been arrested and put in the jail; and few others are on run.
A police party had come to the village to apprehend or to enforce a
kurki-jabti order against the absconding accused.
One reaches Amosi after crossing the river Bagmati twice. The village is
some five kilometers further up from the Etuwa Dhalla, an embankment that
contains the Bagmati when she is in spate. During annual floods, Etuwa
Dhalla is where people seek refuge. In normal times, like this December, a
nylon rope is tied to bamboo stumps on each bank of the stream. Boats are
plied not by rowing but by pulling the tied rope. Anyone desirous of
crossing the river can use the boat. It ferries people, fodder and vehicles.
Vehicles do not go beyond Etuwa Dhalla as motorable road exists no more
after that; taxis wait at the foot of the embankment to take people to
Khagariya town, some ten kilometers further down.
On 22nd December, I rode pillion on a motor bike of Varun Choudhry, a
grassroots activist with a Khagariya based NGO Samta, to reach Amosi. As an
associate professor at the Dr. K R Narayanan Centre for Dalit and Minorities
Studies, Jamia Milla Islamia, a central University in Delhi, I teach a
course on social exclusion to post-graduate students. During my
post-graduate days at Delhi’s Jawaharlal Nehru University, I worked in
grassroots movements for long years. Based on my field-experiences as a
grassroots activist, in 2001 I wrote my first book, Defeated Innocence, on
the adivasi struggle for land rights in Madhya Pradesh. In the latter-half
of the 2005, for close to six months, I traveled into the interiors of
Bihar’s Gaya district to explore the issues surrounding production of
poverty in India’s rural hinterland. In 2008, Orient Longman published my
book Gandhi’s Khadi: A History of Contention and Conciliation. And
presently, along with my
teaching assignment at the university, I am working on a history of the
socialist movement in India. Given these credentials, I did not think twice
in venturing out into the interiors of a Khagaria, a terrain known for its
torturous rivers and endemic poverty.
Moreover, my interest in Amosi was also dictated by the recent political
happenings in Bihar. The Nitish Kumar government in Bihar in order to target
the most deprived had at first created a new category called Mahadalits that
included Musahars alone. Although at present, the category of Mahadalits
include 20 of 22 Scheduled Castes, the move to forge a new political
identity in the shape of Mahadalits is said to have backfired, culminating
in electoral setback to JD(U) in the recently held by-election. Was it a
policy failure of the Nitish government? Contrary to the general reportage
on the matter, the electoral setback could also be an outcome of
government’s failure to access its targeted population. But then in early
October the massacre happened. The midnight massacre of sixteen people, it
is said, threw the Nitish government’s political applecart out of gear. The
victims of massacre were the people belonging to Kurmi-Koiri communities; in
the
caste ridden polity of Bihar it was seen as attack on Nitish Kumar’s core
political constituency as Nitish belongs to Kurmi caste. The perpetrators of
the massacre were said to be Musahars of Amosi village. Some termed it a
‘piquant’ situation for Nitish government. As the core support group is
attacked by the newly minted supporters, what would be the response of the
government?
When we arrived, the village was in excited turmoil. The police party was
going about breaking the thatched houses of the people who were said to be
absconding. Shankar Sada, to whom Varun met in the village, took us to the
spot where the police party after their arrival had dined and rested before
taking up the rip and strip job.  Just as we talked, I saw a most atrocious
scene. The police party at the head of a procession of the village onlookers
had arrived at a house and were pulling down the thatched roof and walls of
a hut. I couldn’t contain myself. I suggested to those few who sat with me
that we should at least ask the police if they have the written order to
take apart the houses of the absconding accused. Shanker Sada understandably
was non-committal. I rose from my plastic chair and walked upto the house
that was being vigorously shaken to make it fall.
A tall uniformed man was staring at me. He could be the leader, I thought. I
most humbly asked him, if he has some written court order to dismantle the
thatched houses of the poor, even if they have been accused of grave crime.
Instead of answering me, he asked me to divulge my identity. I teach in
Delhi, I told him. Name? I told him. Father’s name? I told him. Seeing his
inability to spell my name properly, I asked if I could write in his diary.
No, he said, he would write it himself. But even before I could take out my
identity card from my wallet and show him, he turned aggressive and hostile.
By then I was surrounded by the rest of the team. They were yelling and
gesturing at me. The leader held my collar. He shoved me, pulled me, yelled
at me, raised lathi to hit at me. Just then he was held back by one of his
senior colleague. Police constables in khaki uniform and green fatgue
surrounded me, swearing at me, amusingly at my failure to prevent the
massacre. They had guns slung over their shoulders. An excited constable in
green fatigue called me a naxalite, and moved menacingly to break the cordon
that surrounded me. The village onlookers watched in silent spectatorship.
No one raised a voice. It was police that were in excitement. How come he is
in this village? How has he come? Who has brought him here? The leader
shouted at me to leave the village immediately. He shall not be held
responsible if something happened to me, he said. But by then somebody had
shouted and gestured towards Varun. The leader took me by collar, pulled me
towards the spot where Varun was standing, silently, watching, in total
incomprehension.
The leader left my collar. Now his eyes fell on Varun. The police attention
was veered towards Varun. I saw him being held by neck, and the leader
shouting at him, spewing venom, his raised lathi bashing at his legs. Some
policemen came towards me, asked if I would not flee the village
immediately. In that few seconds, I was in dilemma. Should I leave Varun in
the clutches of the police and run away. But the terrain was such that I had
no chance at running away. Further I go from the village, more were the
chances of being declared a naxalite and done to death in an encounter. I
held back myself, fear flowing through my spine. But if I stayed, and
refused to be spectator to Varun’s beatings, things could go to the extent
of cold-blooded murder. My presence was provocation. My questioning was
threatening to the authority of the police. I calculated, in fear, in
confusion. In that split-second moment, I had the option of instant attack
and startegic
defense,  and pushed by a constable, I began to walk out of the village,
rudderless, with lowered head. Few minutes later, I heard the sound of
Varun’s bike approaching me. He stopped. I rode pillion. We rode the bike on
a sandy patch, crossed two river streams on boats by pulling the rope, and
reached to Etuwa Dhalla. By then, in silence, in humiliation, in violation,
I resolved to fight back. My friends in Patna provided me the numbers of
SP/DM of the district. The SP, after hearing me out, asked me to leave a
‘petition’ in her office. The DM asked me to come over to his office when I
asked for an appointment. From the DM’s office, I went to SP’s residential
office. She met me there, was offensive; orders have come straight from the
headquarters, whose human rights violation I am talking of, what about those
who have been massacred, aren’t me taking sides of murderers. Won’t you be
revengeful if someone murders your family members? I
retained my calm. I asked if the ‘absconding accused’ been convicted of
murders, isn’t it still at the investigation stage? Her colleagues joined
her in buttressing the arguments in the police favour. Difficult terrain
invites some extra-legal measures, they chipped in, naively though. I asked
if police can help me to get Varun medically examined. It was kind of her to
ask the inspector in-charge of the town police station to get a medical
report on Varun’s injuries. It was done at 9 pm, some six hours after the
incident.


Following is the text of the application written immediately after the
incident and that I submitted to the SP, Khagariya Ms. Anusuya Rannsingh
Sodhi for her cognizance
22/12/2009
To,
The SP,
Khagariya District, Bihar,

Subject: Ripping apart the thatched houses of Musahar residents of Amosi
village and violation of rights of common citizens

Dear Madame,

This is to affirm you about the atrocious and deplorable action of the
police personals in the village Amosi of which I am a witness. The police
party was in the village to attach property of some absconding accused.
Along with attaching property, I saw the police party, in most deplorable
violation of human rights, ripping the thatched houses to ground.

When they were taking down one of the house, I went to the police and most
humbly asked them if they also have a written order to rip the houses apart.
The police began to ask for my identity and began getting aggressive in
their approach. One of the policemen who asked my identity turned hostile
and began pushing me. He held my collar. But then another officer intervened
to stop his raised lathi. The hostile officer even said that I should just
run away from the village and he shall not be accountable if something
happened to me. By then all the constables surrounded me and began to abuse
me in most filthy words.

Then they asked who has brought me to the village. As their eyes turned to
my companion, Varun Choudhry, they all turned to him. And began to blow
their lathis on him. They also thrashed him by their hand. I was asked to go
out of the village if I want to save myself. I began to walk out of the
village, most humiliated and feeling violated.

After some time, Varun Choudhry came behind me on his bike. He was most
shaken. He told me that some fifty blows were set on him. We silently rode
bike, crossed two rivers, and came to Etuwa Dhalla. From there I contacted
my friends in Patna and got the telephone numbers of SP/DM and others.

There are two issues that needs your attention:

1. Does police have right to dismantle and rip the houses of the absconding
accused?
2. Does not people have right to ask if police has come with proper, written
order for dismantling of the houses of the most poor of this state, who have
been accused of cases of whatever nature?

I would like to request you to initiate an enquiry into the whole affair and
action to be taken.

Sincerely yours’
(Rahul Ramagundam)
Associate Professor,
Dr. K. R. Narayanan Centre for Dalit and Minorities Studies, Jamia Millia
Islamia, New Delhi-110025, Phone: 09818907590

-- 
Dr.Rahul Ramagundam
Associate Professor,
Programme for Studies in Social Exclusion and Inclusive Policies,
Dr. K. R. Narayanan Centre for Dalit and Minorities Studies,
Jamia Millia Islamia,
Noam Chomsky Complex,
Maulana Mohammad Ali Jauhar Marg,
Jamia Nagar
New Delhi-110025
____________________________

-- 
Prabhat Kumar
PhD student
(Department of History, SAI, University of Heidelberg)
Address
Cluster of Excellence,
Karl Jaspers Centre
University of Heidelberg,
Room No. 118, Voßstraße 2,
Building No. 4400
69115 Heidelberg
Germany
kumar at asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de
Mobile: +49 176 850 500 77
Office:  +49 6221 54 4306
Fax: +49 6221 54 4012
http://www.asia-europe.uni-heidelberg.de/en/research/b-public-spheres/b1/subprojects/kumar.html
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