[Reader-list] dalit massacres in bihar and acquitals an ominous pattern anand teltumbde

[Asit Das]

Dalit massacres in Bihar and acquittals: An ominous pattern Written by: Dr
Anand Teltumbde Published: Thursday, October 17, 2013, 12:26 [IST] Use ← →
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Today! Smude.edu.in/Admissions_Open The recent Patna High Court judgment on
the infamous Laxmanpur-Bathe massacre in 1997 acquitting all the 26
accused, who were convicted by the sessions court in April, 2010 has
stunned all right-minded people. The incident in which 58 Dalits, including
27 women and 16 children were brutally killed by the Ranvir Sena, a private
militia of the upper caste landlords was the biggest and goriest one of the
23 major incidents of Dalit killings in Bihar in 1990s. While they are
ignored by the media, the outrage over this blatant miscarriage of justice
is refusing to die. The only result it produced is the declaration of the
Bihar government that it would go to the Supreme Court in appeal. While it
is a positive sign that such outrageous injustices to Dalits evoke
condemnation from a section of public, howsoever small, each time it
occurs, it gives an impression as though the instance is isolated one-off
occurrence. It is forgotten that it is but a part of the pattern formed
over the decades which reveals far more worrisome injustice embedded in the
system. This is the fourth time in quick succession that all accused have
been acquitted As for Bihar, it is an open secret that these killings were
executed by the most notorious of such landlord Senas, the Ranvir Sena led
by Brahmeshwar Mukhia, who was gunned down by an unidentified gunman last
year. The Ranvir Sena, as the aborted enquiry of Justice Amir Das
Commission reveled was supported by cross section of political bigwigs from
Bihar and outside. It had named as many as 37 politicians, who would have
been in trouble if the report was published. Nitish Kumar, the chief
minister abruptly disbanded the commission with an alibi that it had not
submitted the report for nine years. One can assess the political clout
this criminal outfit commanded. But it is not only with Bihar or Ranvir
Sena. This essential feature of the anti-Dalit formation pervades the
entire country with some variation. The perpetrators of atrocities on
Dalits have backing of political bigwigs who manage the entire justice
delivery system right from the local police station to the highest courts.
And this has manifested right from Kilvenmani in Tamil Nadu in 1969, the
veritable marker of the new genre of atrocity stemming from caste-class
contradictions of the new political economy of the post-colonial India. In
the Kilvenmani incident, 44 Dalit labourers mainly comprising women and
children were herded into a hut and burnt alive by the landlords. After the
incident, the district court had acquitted 15 out of 23 landlords arrested
by the police and awarded liberal imprisonment ranging from one to ten
years to the balance eight. On appeal, the Madras High Court acquitted all
of them, saying that it was improbable that the accused who were rich
landowning gentlemen could commit such a crime. Interestingly, 22 Dalits
were jailed for 2 months without trial. Eight Dalits, who lost close
relatives in the fire, received jail sentences for the murder of a hit-man
of the landlord that took place prior to the incident, ranging from one
year to life imprisonment. The details will certainly vary from case to
case but all later atrocity-aftermaths confirm to the pattern created in
Kilvenmani. Major incidents of caste atrocities present a pattern that the
lower courts after years convict some of the accused and the High Courts
acquit them all for want of evidence. In Bihar this is the fourth time in
quick succession that all the accused in massacre cases have been acquitted
by the high court for "lack of evidence". Earlier in July this year, nine
of the 10 persons convicted by a special district court for killing 34
Dalits at Miyanpur village in Aurangabad district were acquitted by the
Patna High Court. In March this year, all the 11 accused convicted by a
lower court for the massacre of 10 CPI-ML sympathisers at Nagari village in
Bhojpur district in November 1998 were acquitted by the High Court. It was
a similar verdict in case of the infamous Bathani Tola massacre in which
all the 23 convicts declared guilty by a lower court for the cold-blooded
killing of 21 dalits were acquitted by the high court last year. And now
follows the Laxmanpur-Bathe! While lamenting the laxmanpur-Bathe aftermath
let us not forget this ominous pattern. [Dr Anand Teltumbde is a management
professional, writer, civil rights activist, and political analyst. He can
be contacted at tanandraj at gmail.com

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