The Wire
In Bihar, over 5000 fisherwomen run 13 cooperatives, and own rights to 150 ponds. To achieve this, they have had to rebel against oppressive landlords; compel the government to change the law in their favour; and reclaim their identity as fishers.
Having a bigger share in the population does not imply power.
Beyond politics, the Bihar caste survey is a revolutionary document.
A public document, the first ever after 1931, allowing for people to stand up and be counted.
We go down to the wire, on what each of the numbers unveiled mean.
Who are the people referred to by percentages in the survey?
Today we look at Dhobi (1,505,954 people).
§
Occupations should not have a religion. A doctor should not care about the religion or caste of a patient while offering medical treatment. Similarly, a cobbler also should not care about whose shoes he is mending. And yet, professions have been associated with religion in the Indian social system. However, we do have washerfolk of both Hindu and Muslim backgrounds.
According to the caste-based census report 2022 released by the Bihar government, the population of Hindu Dhobis in the state is 1,096,158 while the population of Muslim Dhobis is 409,796. Together, the population adds to 1,505,954. This number is almost double the total population of Kayasthas which is 785,771.
Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty
But having a bigger share in the population does not imply power.
In case of the Dhobi caste group, we find that despite having almost twice the population of Kayasthas, the participation of this caste in the governance and administration of Bihar is minimal. A lone name that emerges when you think of Dhobi politicians is Shyam Rajak.
Let’s leave politics aside and talk about the job of the Dhobi caste. They have washed and ironed people’s dirty clothes. They have maintained this occupation despite the fact that their work is used to insult them.
Many say they have are credited with discovering a natural detergent in the form of clay soil found in village fields. This had acidic properties.
However, how a large population got involved in this occupation is not known. A theory is that since indigo was cultivated extensively in Mohenjodaro, people of this caste group perhaps plied their trade then.
While Brahmin people comfortably wear clothes washed by Dhobis, they consider the members of this caste untouchable.
This caste has another major contribution in the development of human civilisation – that of better coordination between men and women. This is a profession where a husband works alongside his wife.
There is a mention of a Dhobi in the Ramayana. A Dhobi washes Ram and his family’s clothing. It is also said that a Dhobi’s comment led Ram to abandon a pregnant Sita.
The Brahmin class of the south connects the Dhobi caste with one of their mythological deities, Virabhadra. According to their belief, Shankar had ordered Virabhadra to wash the clothes of all the people as a punishment. His fault was that he had burnt people alive in the sacrificial fire, Prajapati Daksh.
The vehicle assigned to Virabhadra is a donkey.
The Dhobi caste group is known by various names in different states – Rajak, Shinde and Madiwala. In the south, they are a more prosperous community whose job is not restricted to washing clothes. There, they own agricultural fields and coconut orchards. In Maharashtra too they have other jobs besides washing clothes which remains their primary occupation. But they are not untouchable in Maharashtra. They are categorised as a backward class, whereas in Bihar they are categorised as Scheduled Caste.
Neighbouring countries like Nepal, Bangladesh, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka also have similar caste groups. They are not considered untouchable in Sri Lanka but in Nepal, like in India, they are discriminated against as such. In Pakistan and Bangladesh, there are Muslim Dhobis and just like India, they are treated as a downtrodden caste.
The people of this caste group revere Sant Baba Gadge Ji Maharaj who was a contemporary of Dr B.R. Ambedkar and brought about several social reforms.
Translated from Hindi by Naushin Rehman. Read the Hindi original here.
Read earlier parts of the series on the following communities by clicking on their names: Ghasi | Santrash | Madaria | Koeri/Kushwaha | Chaupal | Nai/Hajjaam | Pasi | Rangrez | Chamar | Gorkan | Jutt | Yadav | Kamar | Chik | Bari and Bauri | Dhuniya | Donwar | Sinduria Baniya | Bhathiyara | Dabgar | Kumhar | Amaat.
It is easy to see how the public reception to the caste survey report followed by the job event in the state on November 2 led BJP and Shah to amp up attention on Bihar.
Union home minister Amit Shah, on November 5, said at a public rally in Muzaffarpur district’s Patahi that the Bihar caste survey has shown an “inflated number of the Yadavs and Muslims.”
He added, “Nitish Kumar has done so under the pressure of Lalu Prasad Yadav to appease the Muslims and undermine the extremely backward classes.”
It is clear that the Bharatiya Janata Party leader who is regarded as number two only to Prime Minister Narendra Modi said this in an apparent bid to give a communal twist to the exercise. His goal could have also been to create confusion among the extremely backward classes or EBCs, who are largely understood to be sympathetic to the opposition now.
But Shah’s claim seems to be incorrect in the context of facts and data too. The caste survey report has put the EBCs at 36.1%. The Other Backward Classes are at 27.12%. Yadavs are a part of OBCs, and are 14.26%. Muslims are 17.7% of the population in Bihar.
The theory of ‘appeasement’ strikes as odd once you consider empirical analysis of the reality, which shows that the Hindutva party has subjected Muslims to significant neglect.
For instance, the BJP did not offer a single ticket to Muslims of the state in the 2019 Lok Sabha and 2020 assembly elections. It has few Muslims in its cadre structure from the top to bottom. Compared to this, the Rashtriya Janata Dal and Janata Dal (United) have had representation of minorities in the legislature and executive of the government, as well as in its cadre structure.
Reacting to Shah’s claims of ‘appeasement’, Bihar deputy chief minister Tejashwi Yadav, said, “If they [BJP] feel that the Bihar caste survey has inflated the number of the Yadavs and Muslims, they should conduct the Caste Census at the national level. Who is stopping them? Shah is trying to give a communal twist to the exercise that we have done to uplift the socially and economically backward sections of the society. His communal card won’t work whatever he does”.
A day after Shah alleged that the survey report has inflated the number of the Yadavs and Muslims at the cost of the EBCs, the JD(U) came out with a graphic on social media. It showed the Nitish Kumar government paying Rs 50,000 and Rs 1, 00,000 to the youths of the OBCs and EBCs as “encouragement amount” as they sit for the Bihar Public Service Commission and Union Public Service Commission examinations respectively.
The Nitish government also gave appointment letters to over 1.20 lakh teachers in adherence to its reservation policy for EBCs, OBCs, Scheduled Castes (STs), Scheduled Tribes (STs) and women.
Also read: Bihar Caste Survey Highlights Marginalised Micro-Communities; BJP Faces Electoral Dilemma
Religion
Apart from levelling the allegation of ‘appeasement’ against the Nitish government, Shah appealed to the people of Bihar to “join the nation” in participating in the aarti rituals at the pranprartishtha (infusing life) ceremony in the Ram temple of Ayodhya.
He also talked about Sanatan Dharma and the upcoming Chhath festival – the most popular festival of the state. Observers, however, interpreted Shah’s speech at Muzaffarpur more as an effort to rope in Bihar’s EBCs in the same manner as BJP has done in neighbouring Uttar Pradesh.
It is easy to see how the public reception to the caste survey report followed by the job event in the state on November 2 led BJP and Shah to amp up attention on Bihar. Shah took time off from the elections in five states and addressed a rally at Muzaffarpur and announced that he would address rallies in all the districts of the state in the next 13 months in the run up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.
He attacked the INDIA alliance describing it as the storehouse of family promotion and selfish elements. “While one leader is working to make his son a CM, another is dreaming to become PM. They won’t succeed and Narendra Modi will win again,” he said, referring to Lalu Prasad Yadav and Nitish Kumar.
Unease
Despite Amit Shah’s efforts the BJP does not seem to be making much headway in Bihar where INDIA alliance appears to be on its strongest wicket, thanks to Nitish and his deputy Tejashwi. But not all is well.
Speaking at a Communist Party of India (CPI) rally at Patna on November 2, Nitish said, “The Congress is too preoccupied with the assembly elections in five states and is not paying much attention towards the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance (INDIA)” indicating his unhappiness with the grand old party.
Nitish’s remark preceded the Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav attacking the Congress for not accommodating his party in Madhya Pradesh. The SP was said to have wanted the Congress to spare about six to seven seats for it in the MP. The JD(U) too has fielded 40 candidates in Madhya Pradesh. The party’s secretary general K.C. Tyagi said, “It is up to the Congress to accommodate us”. His statement indicated that the party too wanted its share in the seats in the state.
But the differences between the Congress which is the prime player against the BJP in Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Rajasthan and the regional parties are said to be rooted more in the desire of the regional parties to expand themselves beyond their states than the ideology and the larger goal to defeat the BJP in 2024.
“At the level of the issues and commitment to drive the BJP out, the Congress and other INDIA partners are on the same page. We will fight together against the Hindutva party on the issues of saving democracy and constitution,” the Bihar Congress president, Akhilesh Singh said.
Nalin Verma is a senior journalist, author, media educator and independent researcher in folklore.
The Madaria caste came into existence during the British era, post 1857.
Beyond politics, the Bihar caste survey is a revolutionary document.
A public document, the first ever after 1931, allowing for people to stand up and be counted.
We go down to the wire, on what each of the numbers unveiled mean.
Who are the people referred to by percentages in the survey?
Today we look at Madaria (86,658 people).
§
Castes were not created in the heavens. Nor did God ask humans to discriminate amongst themselves. There is no dearth of evidence for this. One such piece of evidence is existence of the Madaria people – a caste which came into being during the British rule, after 1857.
This isolated caste is present only in the border districts of Bihar and Jharkhand. No matter how hard you try, you will not be able to locate members of this caste anywhere else.
Their story is not very old but it has not been recorded in history in a systematic manner. Ethnographers never paid attention to them. Most sociologists also did not give them much importance. Madarias currently live in Sanhaula and Dhoraiya blocks of two districts of Bihar – Bhagalpur and Banka respectively. But who are they and what earned them the name Madaria?
Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty
Let us first find out about their traditional profession. The members of the Madaria caste have largely been engaged in farming. Most of them own tiny tracts of land where they grow food to sustain them for three to six months. For the rest of the year, they have to work as agricultural or daily wage labourers, building and painting houses, working in grocery shops or sorting grain in the markets.
At this point one might be wondering whether they are Hindu or Muslim. If they are Hindus, one might further wonder if they are a so-called ‘untouchable’ caste. I would not be surprised if such questions come to your mind. As stated above, castes were not created in heavens, and it was on the earth that inhabitants created religions and castes to identify themselves. For example, someone who rears cows and buffaloes is a Gwala or Yadav. Someone who makes comfortable shoes and other items from leather is a Chamar. Someone who beautifies people by shaving hair is a Nayi. If someone makes society clean by washing the dirty clothes of others, he is a Dhobi, and if someone cultivates paddy, he is a Dhanuk.
The people of the Madaria caste are basically Dhanuks, and categorised as Madaria Muslims and Dhanuk Hindus. The Dhanuks of Bihar are no longer the same Dhanuks who used to add the word Mandal to their names. Now, they consider themselves equivalent to the Kurmi caste living in the area south of the Ganges. It is a matter of research why the Kurmis living in the districts like Patna, Nalanda, Jehanabad, Gaya, Nawada, etc. have huge land holdings, whereas in the region where the Ganga crosses the state boundary, the Dhanuks have smaller land holdings. Could there be a connection or is it political propaganda?
The population of Dhanuks, according to the report of the caste-based survey conducted by the Bihar government, is 2,796,605. One can observe that the caste is widely spread in areas of North Bihar. Meanwhile, the total population of Kurmis in the state as per the report of the Bihar government is 3,762,969. If one adds the population of the Madaria caste to it, that is, 86,665, the total is 6,646,239.
Before analysing the political implications of the data, one may ask why the people of Madaria caste accepted Islam. Was there any pressure on them? Had any Muslim ruler persecuted them and forced them to do so?
As already mentioned, this caste came into existence during the British era post 1857. At that time, there was no fear of any Muslim ruler in the region of Bihar inhabited by the people of this caste. But there was certainly the influence of saints or peer–fakirs. The impact was such that Bhagalpur, an industrial city situated on the banks of Ganga, which was once famous for silk clothes, is named after a Peer – Bhagalu Mian – whose tomb stands in the centre of the city even today.
Therefore, it is clear that when the Madaria people accepted Islam, they did it out of their own will and awareness. It is possible that they had learned from the saints that there is no caste discrimination in Islam, unlike Hinduism. No matter which caste a person belongs to, no one discriminates against anyone. In the mosque, everyone prays together and embraces each other. After embracing Islam one also does not have to take a dip in the Ganga.
This is what might have happened with the Madaria people. They accepted Islam but their caste stayed with them for a long time. This is why they kept using the surname – Mandal. Even today, names like Suleman Mandal, Rahim Mandal or Ashfaq Mandal can be seen in land deeds.
Later, their understanding of Islam expanded and they shed their Hindu identity. But then they were faced with the dilemma of the names to use. They could neither identify themselves with Syed, Shaikh or Pathan on the pattern of Hindu upper castes nor were they like the Qureshis or the Lalbegis or Halalkhors.
Later, they would have opted for a different set of surnames for themselves. If they faced opposition, the next generation would have switched to other names. Again, it is because castes were not created in heavens but are man-made.
The situation changed when the country gained independence and the question of reservation arose. The people of the Madaria community accepted that they are neither Dhanuks nor Ashraf Muslims. They are either landless or farmers with very small land holdings, whose social status is in accordance with this.
In fact, social status in this country is proportional to the rights on land. That is, the more land one has, the higher one’s status. If the Madaria people have smaller land holdings, their status is also low.
Well before the implementation of the Mandal Commission recommendations, when the recommendations of the Mungerilal Commission were implemented in Bihar in 1978, Madaria people were also declared entitled to reservation and they were placed in the category of Yadavs, Kurmi, Kushwaha-Koeri etc. This continued until Nitish Kumar came to power and the caste was declared an extremely backward class. This had political implications as the decision was taken to cause a dent in the support base of Lalu Prasad Yadav.
But beyond politics, Madarias are still present in the paddy fields of this region. Now, the people of this caste have adopted other professions because farming is no longer as profitable. In addition, their population has increased but the size of land holdings is just as small. After the separation of Jharkhand, the situation became even more difficult. Earlier the caste had a sizeable population, due to which they played an important role in elections. They are still quite a significant vote bank at least in Sanhaula of Bhagalpur and Dhoraiya of Banka, where they hold an influence on the poll outcome.
Translated from Hindi by Naushin Rehman. Read the Hindi original here.
Read part one of the series, on the Ghasi community, here, and part two on the Santrash here.
Are the sculptors of the past now ‘Santrash’?
Beyond politics, the Bihar caste survey is a revolutionary document.
A public document, the first ever after 1931, allowing for people to stand up and be counted.
We go down to the wire, on what each of the numbers unveiled mean.
Who are the people referred to by percentages in the survey?
Today we look at Santrash, (287 people).
§
On October 2, when Bihar’s additional chief secretary Vivek Kumar Singh released the first instalment of the caste-based survey report, it undoubtedly created a stir in political circles. This report gave a new edge to the INDIA alliance’s attack on the Bharatiya Janata Party, and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi called for ‘greater population, greater rights’. On the other hand, the BJP, which was on the back foot, started claiming that it did not oppose the caste-based enumeration in Bihar. However, it is well-known that when leaders of various political parties in Bihar led by Nitish Kumar demanded a country-wide caste census from Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the government’s response was negative.
Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty
Beyond the political corridors, the report has raised many questions for ethnography enthusiasts and sociologists. A major question is regarding the castes which were mentioned in the census report of 1931 or the reports of the Kaka Kalelkar Commission or Mandal Commission. One such caste is Santrash.
The caste-based occupation associated with Santrash is carving stones with an iron chisel and hammer. They are also called Sangtarash in Chhattisgarh. From a linguistic point of view, the name of the caste is also quite interesting. Both Sang and Tarash are Persian words: Sang means stone while Tarash means carver. But it is not a Muslim caste. They are Hindus.
There is no evidence on whether older generations of these stone masons have worked in palaces, forts and temples built across the country. But it can be said that they must have played a role and at one point they must have been spread all over the country.
Today, this caste is on the verge of extinction. It can be estimated from the fact that people hailing from this caste now live only in Bihar’s Nawada district, and they have a surprisingly minuscule population. In Bihar’s caste survey, only 287 people in Nawada district claimed to hail from the Santrash caste. However, a caste survey in other states like Chhattisgarh, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and West Bengal would be able to offer more information about this caste.
Whether the Santrash of Bihar or Sangtarash of Chhattisgarh, their traditional profession is the same – carving stones. The development of traditional professions can make the study of history interesting and useful, although very little work has been done in this direction.
Another question is, what do people of these castes do now? Since other people also engage in stone carving and it has now become an integral part of sculpting, not everyone can be called a stone carver or a Sangtarash.
Those who call themselves Santrash still earn their livelihood by carving stones. They make stone slabs, on which women, especially in rural areas, grind spices and chutneys. But they abstain from revealing their caste publicly. They live like nomads, but are not a nomadic tribe. Since this is a caste that is also involved in the business and trade of stone slabs and statues, they prefer to hide their caste. In Chhattisgarh, they identify themselves as the Beldar caste, whose traditional job is to cut the soil.
Hiding their caste identity is probably a major reason why the population of this caste is dwindling in Bihar and is limited to 287 members in Nawada district alone. The Bihar government has categorised them as an extremely backward class, while in Chhattisgarh they are a backward class.
However, here are some questions that remain: Where have the Sangtarash of other states gone? What happened to their traditional art? Will the government of this country ever try to find out about them?
Nawal Kishor Kumar is the Hindi editor of Forward Press, New Delhi.
Translated from Hindi by Naushin Rehman. Read the Hindi original here.
Read part one of the series, on the Ghasi community, here.
Who are the people referred to by percentages in the survey?
Beyond politics, the Bihar caste survey is a revolutionary document.
A public document, the first ever after 1931, allowing for people to stand up and be counted.
We go down to the wire, on what each of the numbers unveiled mean.
Who are the people referred to by percentages in the survey?
We start with Ghasi (1,462 people).
§
On October 2, the state government in Bihar released a list of 209 castes, enumerating their names and populations, and their respective share in the total population. From a political perspective, it was not just a census but the beginning of a new era in politics, being referred to as Mandal 3.0. The survey has had a snowball effect on the country’s politics, as the Ashok Gehlot government in Rajasthan announced that it will conduct a caste-based survey in the state just before the election notification was issued. The Congress party has also announced plans for caste-based surveys in other states. Meanwhile, the Bharatiya Janata Party is yet to come up with something to counter this demand – it is neither able to oppose nor support it.
Here, we will discuss the significance of the report released by the Bihar government. What are the traditions of these castes? How far do they extend and what is their status today? Although the social and economic status has not been released by the Bihar government, we will try to uncover these layers within the castes.
Illustration: Pariplab Chakraborty
First of all, let us talk about a caste which has been considered one of the most politically powerful castes in Bihar since at least 1990 – the Ghasi caste. It is ranked 56 in the report released by Bihar government and its total population is stated to be only 1,462 people, that is only 0.0011% of the total population.
Ghasi is historically a caste of shepherds. Unlike those shepherds who live like nomads with their sheep, goats, cattle, etc., these are shepherds who have settled down in the plains. They are also called Ghasiyaras. The name is derived from the word for grass, which hints to their profession of the past – to chop and fetch grass to feed the cattle. The tradition of calling them Ghasi may have started when a group of nomadic herders decided to settle down for a secure and stable life. They must have had two things before them. Firstly, their cattle get fodder and water, and secondly they get land to grow grains to sustain themselves. In this way, the ancestors of this caste might have adopted farming and cattle rearing.
But circumstances have changed with time.
As a result of settling down in the plains, they must have gradually lost their tribal identity, which was replaced with a non-tribal identity. Ghasis are also called Ghoshi and Goshi. The meaning of these two words is not clearly defined anywhere, but in Hindi literature the term Ghoshi refers to ‘caller’, derived from the word Ghosh which means ‘to call’, and Ghoshi means ‘the one who calls’.
Apart from Bihar, this caste is spread over some areas of Uttar Pradesh. It is also a sub-caste of Yadavs. Many foreign historians – Horace Arthur Rose, Denzil Ibbetson, Edward Douglas MacLagan, etc. – have noted that the caste has both Hindu and Muslim members. Some historians believe that those Yadavs who converted to Islam were called Ghosi.
But no one believes this now. Now, even those who were born in Ghosi families have started calling themselves Yadav instead of Ghosi. People of this caste are found, if only sporadically, in the Magadha region of Bihar. They also live in the districts of Mainpuri, Etawah, Hamirpur, Jhansi, Banda, Jalaun, Kanpur, Fatehpur etc. in Uttar Pradesh.
Like all Indian Hindu castes which are divided into gotras, the people of the Ghasi caste are also divided into many gotras and even today they do not form marriage alliances outside their gotras. Some of these gotras are – Babariya or Barbaiya, Phatak, Jiwariya or Jarwariya, Fatkaalu or Fatkiyan, Karaiya, Shondele, Raut, Lahugaya, Angoori, Bhrigude or Bhrigudev, Gainduya or Guduya, Nigana and Dhoomar or Dhunr, etc.
The people of this caste have many legends of their own, and in them the connection with Krishna is central. However, a big change has been witnessed now that everyone has come under the umbrella term Yadav. Therefore, no need is felt for a separate existence in the form of Ghasi or Ghosi. There are political reasons behind this, too. The politics of Lalu Prasad Yadav in Bihar and Mulayam Singh Yadav in Uttar Pradesh have come close to uniting all Yadavs. For this reason, they has become a big political force collectively.
However, the Ghasi caste has been separately mentioned in Bihar’s caste-based survey. It means there are still some people who do not like to call themselves Yadav. They are still Ghasi, the shepherds.
Nawal Kishor Kumar is the Hindi editor of Forward Press, New Delhi.
Political weaponisation of fake news and hate speech via ‘viral’ videos helped in pushing a polarising narrative in Bihar. Only one side stood to benefit.
New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party, which has spent the last few months fending off demands for a caste census from the ruling coalition of Bihar, seems to have found the antidote to its problem in the form of Manish Kashyap. Kashyap has now been charged under the National Security Act by Tamil Nadu.
Kashyap is the ‘citizen journalist’ from Bihar who, in the first week of March, 2023, had made and uploaded fake news videos that showed migrant workers from Bihar being ‘attacked’ in Tamil Nadu.
Since his arrest on March 13, 2023, the BJP has been playing him as a martyr of caste politics, alleging that he was targeted because he is from the Bhumihar caste – a land-owning class in Bihar. The Bhumihars have always opposed Lalu Yadav’s Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), which focuses on the upliftment of ‘lower’ castes and Other Backward Classes (OBC). The RJD is part of the Mahagathbandhan or grand alliance in Bihar today.
On March 23, Brahmin and Bhumihar groups in Bihar called a bandh to protest against Kashyap’s arrest.
Earlier, on March 15, in an interview to Kashyap’s YouTube channel, Vijay Kumar Sinha, the BJP leader of the opposition in Bihar, had said: “The elder brother (Nitish Kumar of the Janata Dal (United), the chief minister of Bihar) and the younger brother (Tejashwi Yadav, Lalu Yadav’s son and the deputy chief minister of the state) had taken an oath that they will create a casteless society and a corruption free society. They are sitting in the lap of corrupt people and using the wave of caste poison to affect Bihar. They are persecuting Manish Kashyap for being a Bhumihar. You should remember that this community (the Bhumihars) led to the downfall of your jungle raj.”
The Kashyap strategy
According to Neel Madhav, an independent journalist and researcher who writes on politics and the media, the Manish Kashyap case has given the BJP the perfect opportunity to take on the Mahagathbandhan at a time when the party has been put on the backfoot in Bihar.
Traditionally, the Bhumihars have voted BJP and though they constitute just about 4% of the state’s population, they wield enormous influence and can even persuade other communities on which way to vote, said Madhav.
Last year, however, when the Mahagathbandhan took power after Nitish Kumar’s JD(U) quit the BJP-led National Democratic Alliance and joined the RJD-led Mahagathbandhan, Tejashwi Yadav had announced that the coalition’s policy now included every caste and class, including the Bhumihars.
This caught the BJP off guard, because for several years, the saffron party has not had a senior Bhumihar leader in the state, according to Madhav. At the same time, the Mahagathbandhan began vociferously demanding a caste census, which the BJP found difficult to counter.
Also read: Why the BJP Is Afraid of a Caste Census
In these circumstances, using Manish Kashyap’s arrest as an example of the high-handedness of the RJD towards the forward castes makes an excellent strategy for the BJP, explained Madhav. Those Bhumihars who might have been interested in the Mahagathbandhan after Tejashwi Yadav’s announcement will now be drawn back to the BJP, while those who thought that a caste census would be bad news for ‘upper’ castes will have that belief confirmed.
“To hike ‘upper’ caste insecurities, the BJP needs to find ‘upper’ caste martyrs,” Madhav said. “Manish Kashyap makes the perfect martyr – he is the common man who fights bad politicians. Kashyap’s case can also be used to sway ‘upper’ castes outside Bihar, including Brahmins, to show that the jungle raj, as the RJD governments were often called by their opponents, is still present in the state.”
That Kashyap’s personal interests seem to be aligned with BJP policies makes the saffron party’s task of portraying him as an ‘upper’ caste victim easier.
When Kashyap released one of his fake videos on Bihari labourers in Tamil Nadu, he had accompanied it with a tweet about the caste census.
“Tejashwi Yadav ji, remove the spectacles and look at this photo, there are wounds on the faces of the labourers and the mobile number of the media who did the recording is also there. Talk once and see who knows you are lying and the labourers are really troubled in Tamil Nadu. At the same time, let’s talk about caste census, then once you ask these people about their caste, you will get some peace of mind,” he wrote in Hindi on Twitter.
The YouTuber is also aligned with the BJP’s communal narrative – many of the videos he makes as a citizen journalist are anti-minorities – and, like the BJP, he appears to oppose the RJD. He has frequently accused Lalu Yadav’s party of being led by corrupt dynasts and complained that Bihar is being ruled by uneducated people.
Also read: On the Lookout For an Emotive Issue Ahead of LS Polls, BJP Suffers a Setback in Bihar
A criminal background
In portraying Kashyap as a victim of caste politics, however, the BJP appears to have forgotten the YouTuber’s criminal background and history of violence.
Kashyap has no less than nine criminal cases against him: three in the fake news video matter, one in the matter of an attack on Kashmiri shawl vendors in 2019, and others in matters of cheating, forgery, wrongful confinement, rioting, assault, trespass, criminal conspiracy, issuing threats and causing grievous hurt.
He has also been charged under the National Security Act by the Tamil Nadu police for the recent fake videos matter.
Born on March 9, 1991, Kashyap, whose real name is Tripurari Kumar Tiwari, hails from Bihar’s Champaran district. He completed a civil engineering course in 2016.
Before he rebranded himself as “the son of Bihar” – a ‘citizen journalist’ fighting corruption and raising local issues – Kashyap was associated with the Hindu Putra Sangathan, a Hindutva outfit accused several times of anti-Muslim violence and with numerous cases against it in Patna and Hajipur. The Hindu Putra Sangathan was one of 18 organisations whose details were sought by the Bihar Police Special Branch in May 2019.
In 2019, Kashyap was accused of attacking Kashmiri shawl vendors in Patna’s Lhasa market following the Pulwama terror attack. One Nagesh Samrat, a close aide of Kashyap and a prominent functionary of the Hindu Putra Sangathan, was also apprehended by the Patna police at the time. Two years later, Samrat’s name surfaced in connection with the violence against Citizenship (Amendment) Act protesters. In the violence, one Amir Hanzala was reportedly bludgeoned to death, allegedly by activists of the Hindu Putra group.
Nagesh Samrat was also arrested in connection with the fake news storm in Tamil Nadu, according to Sushil Kumar, the superintendent of police at Bihar’s Economic Offences Unit. When the police took Manish Kashyap to court, the van in which Kashyap was transported was followed by Nagesh Samrat. Given Samrat’s proximity to Hindutva leaders, the police believe the idea of following the van to the court was perhaps to pressure the law enforcers. Kumar added that Kashyap had been in constant touch with Samrat when the videos went viral.
Militant against minorities
When Kashyap designated himself as a citizen journalist, it took him four years to establish himself. Now, however, he and his channel Sach Tak have a total of one crore followers across all social media platforms. The combined following on his six YouTube channels is close to seven million and he has over 40 lakh followers on Facebook. This is apart from the dozens of fan pages in his name.
A screengrab of the homepage of Manish Kashyap’s YouTube channel.
Before the alleged attack on Kashmiri migrants in Patna, Kashyap became famous for a viral meme video titled “G*** par goli maar denge”. In the video, Kashyap abuses and threatens Exide battery workshop employees for a faulty bike battery. In another viral video, this one against interfaith marriages, Kashyap repeatedly declares in a loud and angry tone, “Nahi honi chahiye (they should not happen).” Though he has made several videos on crimes against women, these videos almost always involve a Muslim perpetrator and a Hindu victim as can be seen from the names on the thumbnails.
In 2020, Kashyap contested elections as an independent candidate from Bihar’s Chanpatia assembly seat. When he lost the election, he began to focus his videos on local issues, aggressively shouting at local officials and voicing problems concerning people with little legal recourse and representation in mainstream media. This was when his follower counts went up.
His videos use a variety of comical and theatrical techniques. In one viral video, he catches an auto driver after a dramatic car chase and accuses him of rash driving. In another video, he follows an overloaded bus in Bihar and then shouts at the driver. In yet another video, he claims that he has stopped the actor Shah Rukh Khan from shooting a web series in Mumbai.
Kashyap represents a militant brand of citizen journalists who become part of the story. Sometimes they even become the story. Many of his most viral videos have titles such as “Why did Manish get angry with X?”
The Wire trawled through several videos, interviews, tweets and posts on Kashyap’s channels and found that they are rife with abuse against minorities – his second favourite target after Bollywood. Old tweets on his verified Sach Tak account are filled with abuses and violent tropes regarding Muslim and Islam. The tweets mock Muslims as ‘puncturewalas’ and Islam as ‘a headache’. Some carry open threats against the minority community and politicians like Asaduddin Owaisi.
The anti-Bollywood ecosystem
The recent social media video wave in support of Manish Kashyap carries videos from the anti-Bollywood video ecosystem that often makes propaganda videos against the opposition and Muslims. In December 2022, The Caravan magazine carried a detailed report on this ecosystem, whose viral videos often disrupt news cycles in India.
Kashyap had also made several videos on the Sushant Singh Rajput suicide case and amplified conspiracy theories regarding the case. He was closely associated with the ‘Justice for SSR’ social media storm and featured in multiple videos with Nilotpal Mrinal, the man managing this campaign. In the same way that his fake videos of Bihari labourers in Tamil Nadu caused national tension, his videos on the Sushant Singh Rajput case stirred up enormous trouble in Mumbai.
“From the initial probe, it seems that Rhea Chakraborty had taken wrongful control over Sushant Singh Rajput and was transferring his money in an illicit way into her account…She is this country’s biggest thief,” he says in one of the videos.
In a video in which he is asked about Rhea Chakraborty’s relationship with Mahesh Bhatt, Kashyap says, “If he is like a father figure to her, then I feel like shooting such a father.” He adds: “They didn’t kill her, that’s a big favour. Till now, she should have been finished.”
Media personnel surround Bollywood actor Rhea Chakraborty as she arrives at NCB office for questioning, in Mumbai, September 6, 2020. Photo: Reuters/Francis Mascarenhas/File Photo
The YouTuber also participated in the ‘Boycott Pathaan’ campaign that targeted actor Shah Rukh Khan’s first new film since 2018, alleging that Pathaan defamed India and that it was funded by the underworld don Dawood Ibrahim.
One of his problems – a reasonable one – with Shah Rukh Khan and other Bollywood stars is that they promote tobacco products. But he presents this problem in a crass manner, saying things like he will “spit gutka on Shah Rukh’s face’ and make him lick it and say whether it tastes good.
He also recorded a video outside Shah Rukh Khan’s house in Mumbai after the arrest of the actor’s son Aryan Khan, in which he says: “This is Mannat, where Shah Rukh Khan lives and in this house his elder son Aryan Khan also lived. Right now, he’s in jail. We have made him a star. Look, people come here to click photographs and feel as if they are in heaven. Now, tell me, a person whose son takes drugs and a son whose father tells you on TV that his son will grow up to be a womaniser and be involved in drug addiction … Who have we made a superstar?”
He then proceeds to lambast Shah Rukh Khan because the road outside his house is not clean.
In India, fake news and hateful rumours go viral all the time. These theatrical antics, lies and hateful utterances often violate all journalistic ethics. Kashyap’s recent propaganda videos were perhaps the breaking point for the authorities, since similar disinformation campaigns have sometimes resulted in multiple mob lynchings and large-scale riots in the past. Whether his ‘martyrdom’ will work in favour of the BJP, only time will tell.
