ALMOST per week after clashes over alleged encroachment of personal property led to a number of properties of individuals from the Mahadalit neighborhood being burned down and one individual being killed in Bihar’s Purnea district on May 19, the difficulty continues to be simmering. A string of FIRs have been filed and each the Opposition and the BJP, which is a part of the ruling coalition within the state, have known as for motion in opposition to the accused.
Purnea SP Daya Ram mentioned 5 individuals have been arrested to date.
According to police, rigidity between the 2 sides was increase for some time in Niyamatpur Majhua village in Purnea’s Baisi block.
It flared up on April 24, when Lakkhi Devi filed a police criticism naming 13 individuals from the minority neighborhood and accused them of burning down her under-construction home and misbehaving together with her. In a cross-FIR filed the identical day, Mohammad Shabir accused 31 members of Mahadalit neighborhood of encroachment and assault, amongst different costs.
“It was regarding a land dispute…31 people were constructing houses on my land…when I and my wife enquired, they started beating us with lathis and other blunt objects…. Then one man and his wife, Lakkhi Devi, set their own houses on fire,” mentioned Shabir, as quoted within the FIR.
Things got here to a head round 11.30 pm on May 19, when a mob allegedly set on fireplace round 25 properties belonging to individuals from Mahadalit neighborhood and allegedly beat them up, killing a villager named Nevalal Rai.
According to a few FIRs registered on this case, individuals from the minority neighborhood got here armed earlier within the day and violence occurred in Baisi at 6 pm. Later, simply earlier than midnight, the complaints said, a mob of 100-150, comprising individuals from the minority neighborhood, reached the Mahadalit colony and allegedly attacked them. FIRs on the midnight violence have been registered beneath sections of rioting, voluntarily inflicting damage, wrongful restraint, damaging property and beneath varied sections beneath SC/ST Act.
A couple of particular sections resembling homicide, try and homicide, molestation, assault to disrobe girls have been added as per the crime.
Chaukidar Dinesh Rai, who was posted there together with one other chaukidar, Bharat Rai, informed The Indian Express: “On May 19, violence occurred around 6 pm. We informed the police and requested them to deploy forces in the area to avoid any untoward incident. But we were not taken seriously.”
The first FIR of May 20 was registered on the occasion of Dinesh Rai, who named seven individuals from the minority neighborhood as accused. Another FIR registered on May 20 was based mostly on a criticism by Newalal’s son Fakira. He named 11 individuals from the minority neighborhood and said, “There was a land dispute between my father Nevalal and Iliyas and Rizvi. The administration and local residents settled the matter on May 19. Around midnight, when they attacked again, my father could not run away as he was old and the mob beat him to death. They also looted our house and beat up many people.”
The third FIR was registered on the occasion of Pinki Devi, a resident of Majhuwa Niyamatpur and belonging to the Mahadalit neighborhood, whose home was fully burned down. It named 61 accused belonging to the minority neighborhood.
Mohammad Nizam, sarpanch of Khapra Panchayat, beneath which Majhuwa Niyamatpur village falls, informed The Indian Express that land dispute within the space between a number of households has “disturbed peace”. He mentioned, “There is no tension between Muslims and the Dalit community. The dispute is between one or two Muslim families and one or two Mahadalit families.”
“The problem started when Mahadalits started living in makeshift houses on the roadside, and they did not want to use their piece of land, which was in the interiors,” Nizam mentioned. “Now, the makeshift houses were adjacent to the house of one Muslim family, which asked them to move to their allotted space. They also claimed that they had bought the land where Dalit families had made their houses.”
“Nobody wants to reach a compromise. I sat in a meeting between the families of both sides, but there was no concrete result,” he mentioned.
Nizam mentioned there was “some lapse” on a part of the administration for the reason that matter was pending and small incidents of violence saved recurring. “But I fail to understand how so many people were mobilised by our community…. Many people in the area say they were not part of it. Some said the Muslim families had called in their relatives from outside. I will reiterate: this is not a tension between two communities, but between two or three families.”
Purnea SP Daya Ram mentioned: “We had earlier registered two FIRs on the April 24 violence based on statements by both parties. On May 19, there was some violence initially and later, violence occurred again, killing one person. There have been lapses at the local police level and we have suspended the SHO of Baisi Police Station and placed a permanent police picket in the area to avoid any further violence.”
The incident quickly turned political, with BJP leaders visiting the village and in search of fast motion in opposition to the accused.
Purnea District Magistrate Rahul Kunar mentioned that in 2010, the federal government had distributed a plot of land to 46 households from Mahadalit neighborhood. “As years passed, their families grew and some started making makeshift houses on empty spaces, which ended up encroaching on private land,” he mentioned. “On May 19, violence broke out over a path. Some hours later, violence occurred again.”
The administration has compensated Nevalal’s household with Rs 4.25 lakh, and can give the same quantity as soon as the cost sheet is filed.
