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LATEST NEWS UPDATES | Munger massacre underscores changing face of Bihar's Naxal movement by Shoumojit Banerjee

Munger massacre underscores changing face of Bihar's Naxal movement by Shoumojit Banerjee

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published Published on Jul 25, 2011   modified Modified on Jul 25, 2011
At half past four on the morning of July 2, a gang of Naxals donning Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) uniforms swooped down on the jagged Raunakabad hills and surrounded the tribal village of Kareili in Bihar's Munger district. The band, numbering 60-odd, massed in front of the village mukhiya's house and began rounding up a score of indigent Koda tribals at gun-point. The captives were beaten with INSAS rifle-butts and dragged along the length of the rough village path with their hands bound.

Half an hour later, six bodies pumped with bullets lay at different spots in the village, while 11 others, including a 10-year-old boy, were held hostage in the hills. Two among the slain six were later revealed to have been Special Police Officers (SPOs).

As a parting shot, the extremists pumped 20 rounds into the village headman's house with a warning cry of “Remember Phulwaria-Korasi!”, alluding to the killing of 12 members — among them women and children — of the Koda community and other backward castes in Jamui district's Phulwaria-Korasi village. Mercifully, swift police action within the hour prevented further carnage. All 11 hostages were let off in less than 36 hours.

The prime perpetrators of both Phulwaria-Korasi and Kareili were powerful Yadav Naxal leaders who use terror to maintain supremacy over tribal communities across the Jamui-Munger belt.

The Yadav village of Kaithwan, adjoining Kareili, bears a deserted look as most male members are absconding after the massacre. The Munger carnage underscores a larger pattern emerging within Bihar's Naxal movement wherein caste antagonism and personal vendetta have been conveniently masked under the guise of “Naxalism”.

The Naxal conflict in Bihar erupted primarily as a bitter landlord-tenant conflict in the early 1970s. But today it has degenerated into a crude form of primitive banditry in the Jamui-Munger-Lakhisarai belt with levy collection, organised theft and imposition of arbitrary diktats being the order of the day. According to police records, Rs.56,621,26 in levy money has been recovered across the State between 2006-10.

Vast tracts of land in the Jamui-Munger belt bordering Jharkhand are populated mainly by Adivasi and extremely backward communities like the Kodas, the Santhals and the Sahs who mostly eke out a living as daily wage labourers. In the past, their Yadav neighbours squeezed the life out of them by routinely stealing their livestock, crops and usurping land.

“The very same people later became notable Naxal leaders who continued to oppress us in Naxal garbs,” says Vinod Rai, a Koda who narrowly escaped with his life during the Kareili incident.

The 2001 panchayat elections proved a big turning point in the Kodas' political awakening after Kabir Koda won from a General constituency in Bangalwa (the panchayat which encompasses Kareili), beating more than a dozen rival candidates in the process. Kabir, a bhajan singer, had been instrumental in mobilising the tribes in the area since the late 1980s.

The Koda community's steady accession to power was cemented following Kabir's second successive election as the mukhiya in the 2006 panchayat elections, a fact which provoked unbridled hostility from the Yadavs.

“At that time we had no support from the police or the district administration, who were complicit with the Yadavs,” recalls Kabir's younger brother Ashok.

On July 31, 2008, Kabir and his retinue of 12 people were ambushed while returning from a community meeting. Kabir was mercilessly shot through the cheek. Since then, the Koda community have been systematically targeted, with witnesses, being intimidated by the Yadavs.

“The same perpetrators conveniently shuffle in and out of the Naxal garb as and when it suits them” says Kabir's second brother Bhola, who was shot through the leg in September following a failed attempt on his life.

This bitter schism between the Yadav and other lower communities of the region is reflected within the Naxal hierarchy as well, most notably in the Lakhisarai police hostage encounter in September when dire organisational and operational conflicts surfaced to the fore. The result is that of the four policeman held hostage by the rebels, the blow after much drama fell on a tribal assistant sub-inspector Lukas Tete, who was “chosen” to be killed, while the Yadav sub-inspectors in the group were freed by the extremists owing to “caste affinity”.

To combat the rebel threat in Bihar's backwoods, the police have recruited 1,800 SPOs so far, with vacancies to be filled for an additional 4,200 posts. “The whole process has been done legally, and more importantly, it is working in Bihar,” State Director General of Police Neelmani speaking to The Hindu . “We are not going to arm them,” he clarifies. “The whole SPO apparatus has proved counter-productive in Chhattisgarh, where police excesses have forced tribals to go over to the other side.”

“Bihar's police force is determined not to do to anything to provoke the extremists. There has not been a single instance of a fake encounter killing in Bihar,” he states, handing down statistics to prove his point. A total of 137 area commanders and top Naxal leaders have been nabbed in Bihar since 2009, with 45 being the total police haul this year alone.

“We live with the fear of death everyday. What is the harm with community policing as long as the police and administration are fully supportive?” says Ashok Koda. The opinion is seconded by others sitting in the village square.

But the most crucial factor that has dramatically altered the tide of social affairs in the region is the widespread success of a chain of self-help groups and the advent of NABARD-sponsored watershed projects — which has economically mobilised the Adivasi and backward communities along the Naxal-hit Munger-Jamui fringe.

The SHG miracle has been wrought by Jaya Devi, a tireless 32-year-old woman who hails from an economically backward community. “I used to be threatened frequently by them [the Naxals]…but I did not cave in,” says Devi, a fourth-grade pass, who was recently honoured with the National Youth Award for 2008-09 in the field of Environment Protection and Rainwater Conservation.

Known as Munger's “Green Crusader,” her movement of more than 250 SHG formations in this belt has snapped the oppressive stranglehold of the Yadav moneylenders, ushering economic relief for the lower castes and tribes. The region being a harsh terrain with scarce drinking water sources, Devi along with her mentor Kishore Jaiswal, a JNU scholar and social activist, have pioneered several horticulture projects in Dharhara.

Braving Naxal threats, the tribal populace from Kareili and adjoining areas constructed the first watershed in 2006. Today there are six such watersheds in Dharhara Kol alone, employing hundreds of villagers in the region, assuring them of a steady income of Rs.110 per day.

Despite a police picket in place after the Kareili carnage, Naxal posters and leaflets appeared on village walls this past weekend threatening the Musahar populace of neighbouring Gopalichak village with dire consequences if they cast their lot with the district administration.

# Caste antagonism, personal vendetta conveniently masked under the guise of “Naxalism”
# SHGs, NABARD-sponsored watershed projects have dramatically altered tide of social affairs

The Hindu, 26 July, 2011, http://www.thehindu.com/todays-paper/tp-national/article2294450.ece

Tagged with: naxal



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