Tag: dhar district

If India Is To Fight Corruption, the Focus Must Be on Dam Projects

While the dam breach in Madhya Pradesh’s Karam river is a recent example of poor construction quality, the politician-contractor-engineer nexus in these projects has long been known.

In his eighth Independence Day speech from the ramparts of the Red Fort on August 15, 2022, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi underlined the need to fight against corruption and nepotism. Highlighting the steps his government has taken to check corruption, Modi said:

“In the last eight years, we have been successful in working for the betterment of the country by saving two lakh crore rupees which used to go into the wrong hands, using all the modern systems like Direct Benefit Transfer, Aadhaar and Mobile. Those who fled the country after looting banks during the tenure of previous government, we have seized their property and are trying to get them back. Some have been forced to go behind the bars. We are trying to ensure that those who looted the country are compelled to return. Brothers and sisters, the corrupt are eating away the country like termites. I have to fight against it, intensify the fight and have to take it to a decisive point.”

However, during the speech, the prime minister did not speak about one sphere that remains dogged by corruption and scams – dams and hydroelectricity projects.

There are many examples to cite, but a recent case of corruption, which jeopardised the lives of people, is from the Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP)-ruled Madhya Pradesh. In August, the lives of over 10,000 people from 18 villages in the Dhar district of Madhya Pradesh were put in danger after a dam built on the Karam river could not withstand the massive rain in the region. Reacting to the development, the Shivraj Singh Chouhan government blacklisted two firms – Delhi-based ANS Construction and Gwalior’s Sarthi construction – for not completing the construction of the dam.

But why was the project given to ANS Construction, whose license was suspended and cancelled by the Madhya Pradesh government in 2016-17 because of indulging in corrupt means? The work on the dam was allotted to ANS at Rs 113 crore. The firm in turn hired Sarthi as a sub-contractor, at less than Rs 100 crore, to complete the work. This project was planned to provide water for irrigation and drinking to 52 villages, mostly inhabited by tribal communities. The dam has a catchment area of 342.50 square kilometres.

The Rs 113 crore dam is part of a larger irrigation plan whose total cost is Rs 304 crore.

Even before this instance, the Karam dam project was rife with accusations of corruption and scams. In 2021, the state government informed the assembly that the dam was one of the projects under investigation by the Economic Offence Wing because of corruption charges in the e-tender process.

A Congress party leader alleged that Sarthi construction is owned by a friend of a senior leader from the BJP. The Communist Party of India (Marxist) leader Jaswinder Singh alleged that after a scam was identified in the tender process, the Enforcement Directorate accused the company of paying Rs 93 crore as bribe money.

Water projects have been at the centre of corruption in India. Decades ago, in Bihar, the irrigation mafia was “nourished and institutionalised” mainly under Jagannath Mishra’s tenure as the chief minister of the state. The situation was such that, Jagdanand, the irrigation minister of Bihar during Lalu Prasad Yadav’s first term as CM, once said, “The waters of Kosi used to provide petrol for the 200-car-strong cavalcade of Mishra.”

It is estimated that during those times, the Bihar government used to spend between Rs 250 and 300 crore annually on construction and repair work. Of the total, 60% was pocketed by the politician-contractor-engineer nexus. After doling out the fixed percentages of money, contractors took around 25% of the sanctioned amount. So there is little surprise that 30 years later, nothing much has changed. People still live in fear of annual floods, which affect around 8 million people in Bihar.

In 2020-21, Bihar allocated Rs 440 crore towards flood control programmes and Rs 1,353 crore for various irrigation projects. It remains to be seen if the situation will improve in the coming years.

A woman carrying fodder for cattle in a boat in a flooded area of Bihar. Photo: Manoj Singh

In Maharashtra, some activists who were fighting corruption in dam projects, revealed flaws in the tendering process in 2012. They found that costs were spiked manifold in the case of four dams: Kondhane (from initial Rs 56 crore to Rs 328 crore), Balganga (from Rs 420 crore to Rs 1,320 crore), Kalu (from Rs 640 crore to Rs 1400 crore) and Shai (from Rs 410 crore to Rs 1,139 crore). Then, in 2014, in a letter to the then chief minister of Maharashtra, Devendra Fadnavis, a Pune-based contractor revealed that almost 22% of dam costs are paid as bribes. Everyone – from a clerk to a politician – has a share in the bribe.

A grim situation across the world

Not only in India but across the world, dam building is dogged by corruption. In a paper, Benjamin K. Sovacool and Gotz Walter found that in Lesotho, Indonesia, Thailand and Kenya, dam builders used “corrupt practices” to capture reservoir sites preserved for indigenous people. The authors have also given some other examples where corrupt means have been used to swindle millions.

First, in China, government officials reportedly stole around $50 million of resettlement funds appropriated for the Three Gorges Dam. Second, costs for the Yacyretá Dam between Argentina and Paraguay increased by $2.7 billion, largely because of paid bribes and misappropriation of funds. Finally, in 2013, in Malaysia, a Norwegian company, Sarawak Energy, was accused of granting $220 million worth of hydropower contracts to companies controlled by the family of the chief minister of Sarawak, Taib Mahmud. He is considered by many as one of the most corrupt politicians in Asia.

To conclude, measures to tap corrupt means in awarding tenders, checking the raw materials used for building structures, and strict vigilance on misappropriating of funds allocated for resettlement and other works hugely depend on the political will of the government.

Amit Ranjan is a research fellow at the Institute of South Asian Studies, National University of Singapore. His forthcoming book is on inter-state water disputes in India. Views expressed in this article are personal.

MP: Over 12 Muslims Held, Muslim Man’s House Razed After Communal Clash Over Hindutva Rally

Stones were pelted by both communities, allege eyewitnesses. A Muslim man’s house was razed by administration because it was rented by three of the accused and did not have “building permission.”

Bhopal: Rightwing Hindutva groups’ attempts to enter a locality primarily populated by Muslims – against police instructions – as part of their ‘Shourya Yatra’ in Manawar tehsil of Madhya Pradesh’s Dhar district developed into a clash with stone pelting from both sides recently. However, police have only arrested Muslims among those accused and inexplicably razed a Muslim man’s house for harbouring three of the accused there and not having “building permission.”

On December 23, 2021, Hindutva groups led a massive ‘Shourya Yatra’ (‘bravery rally’) with a DJ playing music. When they tried to enter the Gandhi Nagar locality, they were stopped by the police with the use of mild force.

Police action led to rumours spreading that a communal clash had begun between Hindus and Muslims. The region had seen a similar clash in 2016 and is understood to be communally sensitive.

The rally and the clashes later are similar to how events transpired in 2016.

On January 12, 2016, communal violence broke out during the Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s ‘Shourya Yatra’ in Manawar city forcing the district administration to clamp down Section 144 to restore peace. During the violence, the mob burned down dozens of shops owned by the members of the Muslim minority community.

On December 23, minutes after the Gandhi Nagar incident, a clash broke out in Sindhana Road and Nala Prangan of the city between Hindus and Muslims. The site of the clash is almost a kilometre from Gandhi Nagar, police said.

Dhar police has registered three separate FIRs in Manawar police station against 30 named and 22 unnamed people, under various sections of the Indian Penal Code, including rioting, attempt to murder, kidnapping and Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act, 1984.

Police have also arrested over a dozen accused – all of whom are Muslims.

“Infighting between organisers of the Shourya Yatra over the route of the rally and police’s intervention to ensure that the given route was followed created a chaos leading to the rumours of communal clash in the region. Subsequently, an incident of stone pelting was reported in Sindhana Road and Nala Prangan which is over a kilometre away from the rally,” said Aditya Pratap Singh, Dhar Superintendent of Police.

Eyewitness accounts differ

An eyewitness of the incident, however, claimed that the mob was trying to enter into an area with a heavy Muslim population – entry to which had restricted by police. They tried to push through police barricades, which was when cops used mild force, said the eyewitness.

Of three FIRs, one was registered on the complaint of a Bajrang Dal worker Pankaj Khushwaha (36) against 12 identified and 13 unidentified Muslim men for attempting to murder (307), rioting (147), trespassing (452), mischief causing damage to the amount of Rs 50 (427) and others.

Speaking to reporters, Dheeraj Patidar, Additional Superintendent of Police at Dhar said that police registered FIRs based on the complaint of locals who were injured in the stone pelting and on the basis of video footage of the incident. “Over a dozen of the accused were arrested by the police and raids are being conducted to arrest others,” he said.

Muslim man’s house razed

Two days after the incident, the district administration razed the three-storey building of 55-year-old Khalil Khatri to the ground. The property is worth over Rs 45 lakhs. Police have said that three of the accused were living there on rent and the owner had allegedly failed to produce building permission within fewer than 24 hours of serving notice.

“In the garb of nonavailability of the building permission, the administration demolished the home which I built after years of toil and hard work because three of my renters were named in the recent incident of stone pelting. I have nothing to do with the incident. All the houses near mine were built without building permission,” said Khatri.

Speaking over the phone, he said, “I pleaded before the Additional SP and Sub-Divisional Magistrate, requesting them to stop the demolition drive and promising them that I will take necessary permission. But they blamed me for sheltering criminals.”

Khatri alleged that, a day after the incident, police detained him along with his 30-year-old son Khalid, seeking details of the renters. “They released me at around 12:30 am, but my son is still in their custody,” he said.

“My house was demolished because I’m a Muslim,” he added.

‘Warning’

Speaking to reporters after demolishing the building, Sub-Divisional Magistrate Shivangi Joshi said, “The demolition of the building is a warning to those anti-social elements who have tried to disrupt the peace. We have also recovered swords and knives from the house. We will continue this drive after identifying the accused.”

Sub-Divisional Magistrate Shivangi Joshi. Photo: Video screengrab/Kashif Kakvi

Jameel Siddiqui, Dhar district Shehr-e-Qaazib termed the incident unfortunate and alleged that police are targeting Muslims. “Stones were pelted from both sides and we urge police to take action against those involved in the violence,” he said, adding that a delegation of Muslims met with the Dhar SP and the Indore Inspector General, urging for fair action.

He further alleged, “The district administration demolished the home of Khalil Khatri who has nothing to do with the violence. All the houses constructed nearby also didn’t have building permission. He could have secured permission, if given time.”

Madhya Pradesh on Friday, also passed the MP Damage to Public and Private Property Recovery Bill, 2021, which enables recovery of public and private property damaged during the riots, protests and rallies by individuals or groups within 15 days of a tribunal’s verdict.

Talking to reporters after the assembly, state home minister Narottam Mishra said, “As I have said earlier, those who throw stones from their houses and cause damage to public and private property will now come under the ambit of law. They will not be spared. This bill has also been brought in so that anti-social elements and those causing riots will now fear the law.”

BJP, Congress Workers Clash in Madhya Pradesh Ahead of Bypolls

Six people have been injured, and a case of attempt to murder has been registered against seven people.

Dhar: BJP and Congress workers clashed in bypoll-bound Badnawar in Madhya Pradesh’s Dhar district in the early hours of Monday, leaving six with minor injuries, police said.

Vehicles carrying workers of the two parties came face to face in Tilagara, some 60 kilometres from the district headquarters, at around 1 am after which the two groups had an altercation, superintendent of police Adityapratap Singh said.

“Six people have been injured. A case of attempt to murder has been registered against seven people, four of whom have been identified,” he said.

The four identified in the case are Congress office bearers, leading to the party’s MP secretary Kuldeep Singh Bundela alleging that the police was falsely implicating them.

“BJP workers resorted to violence but Congressmen are being booked under pressure from the state government,” he told PTI.

BJP leader Govind Maloo refuted the allegations and said it was Congress workers who attacked and injured his party colleagues.

Bypolls to 28 seats in the state will be held on Tuesday.

Near the Narmada, a Village Withers in the State’s Blindspot

“We are tired of being angry,” one resident said.

Dhar, Madhya Pradesh: At 8 am, it’s time for buffaloes to graze on fresh green grass – but not so in Kheda basti, where buffaloes will feed on dry fodder instead. Kheda is part of Chikhalda, a village in the Dhar district of Madhya Pradesh. It used to have 739 households but is now knee-deep in water, if not deeper, and eerily quiet. Nearly all of its families and livestock are scattered across three rehabilitation sites that the government erected to house those displaced by the Sardar Sarovar Dam, located only 10 km away.

Babulal Bhai (40) has decided to stay back, however, along with 15 buffaloes, seven cows and four goats. He is a member of the nomadic Dhanghar tribe, which has traditionally raised livestock for food and a living. Bhai’s family is one of 12 from the same tribe currently living on the outskirts of Chikhalda. This village is located in the Sardar Sarovar Dam’s catchment area, and was one of the worst-hit when the Narmada river overflowed due to heavy rains five months ago. Some ten Dhanghar families since switched occupations or became agricultural labourers.

Bhai used to own 40 buffaloes, 11 cows and eight or 10 goats. But when the village went under, so did over 200 acres of grazing land.

“Since the cost of raising dairy cattle has doubled, most families from our community have sold off the majority of their stock of animals,” Bhai told The Wire. “As a result, the village that used to boast of 1,080 livestock, of buffaloes, cows, goats, sheep and calves, is now left with less than half of this number.”

Babulal Bhai with some of his buffaloes in Kheda basti. Photo: Anjali Rao Koppala

Babulal Bhai with some of his buffaloes in Kheda basti. Photo: Anjali Rao Koppala

* * *

The Dhanghar of Madhya Pradesh typically raise the Jafarabadi and Murrah breeds of buffalo. The Jafarabadi is a riverine buffalo that originated in Gujarat and Murrah, a water buffalo that hails from Punjab and Haryana and reared mostly for their milk. Each buffalo costs Rs 1-1.5 lakh.

The dairy cattle used to feed on grazing land, in the forests and hills, at no cost. After Chikhalda lost its grazing land, cattle-herders did the next best thing and took their cows, buffaloes, calves, sheep, lambs, goats and their kids to the cotton fields, after the cotton flowers had been plucked. But the bollworms that often infect these plants, together with the pesticides and insecticides, give cattle acute diarrhoea. Kalubhai (44), another resident of Chikhalda, lost over 100 of his animals this way.

Now, the cattle eats dry fodder, whose price in the last few months has increased from Rs 500 per quintal to Rs 850-900. A little under a score quintals of dry grass used to be able to sate Bhai’s 40 buffaloes and 11 cows, but now he has to spend on 30 quintals for 15 buffaloes and seven cows, as well as on khal, a dried cottonseed cake that helps the buffaloes produce milk. Each buffalo needs 6-7 kg of khal on average, and it costs Rs 42 per kg.

The Dhanghar’s cattlers used recover some of their costs by selling dried dung, useful as manure. But without grazing land, they have no place to dry the dung now, and it lies rotting in and around their houses.

A member of the Dhanghar community looks at a pile of dung outside his house in Kasravat village. Photo: Anjali Rao Koppala

A member of the Dhanghar community looks at a pile of dung outside his house in Kasravat village. Photo: Anjali Rao Koppala

* * *

To make matters worse, their cattle hasn’t been able to produce enough milk. A buffalo that used to make five or six litres of milk a day is now able to give only 1.5 litres. Without the government revising the price – Rs 40 per litre – at which the local dairy plant has bought their milk since 2017, the Dhanghar’s revenue has plummeted.

The two main reasons appear to be the shortage of green fodder and clean drinking water. Bhai speculates the cattle not being able to roam around has affected their metabolism as well.

The buffaloes aren’t alone. The humans of Chikhalda don’t have access to clean drinking water either. “The water supply has been disrupted since the submergence, and the women have to now travel a kilometre daily to fetch water from the adjoining rehabilitation sites for domestic purposes,” Bhai said.

“Even the water tankers have refused to come to Chikhalda since the connecting routes and roads are flooded,” Kalubhai said. “So the livestock has to meet its requirements from the stagnant water of the Narmada river that had flooded the village in August.”

This water is very contaminated and infested with disease-bearing insects.

Unlike Kalubhai, most members of the Dhanghar have sold their stock of goats and sheep to the butcher to meet their expenses. Their calves in particular had become very vulnerable to disease without green fodder and clean water.

Stories like this abound in village after village along the Narmada’s banks.

The roads have been left mangled and unnavigable after the Narmada's backwater receded. Photo: Anjali Rao Koppala

The roads have been left mangled and unnavigable after the Narmada’s backwater receded. Photo: Anjali Rao Koppala

* * *

These families don’t live in Kheda basti because they want to. They’re here because they were excluded from a survey the Narmada Valley Development Authority (NVDA) conducted in 2008 to identify families whose houses will lie in the submergence zone (once the reservoir is filled). The NVDA is the government body that oversees rehabilitation work. Their names didn’t make it to the final roster even though they did lose their homes, and so they didn’t receive the government’s compensation either.

Each affected household is currently entitled to a 60 × 90 sq. plot of land – or a smaller plot for those displaced after the Madhya Pradesh government notified the Narmada Water Disputes Tribunal award in December 1979 – and Rs 5.8 lakh.

“Some of the families had received monetary compensation between Rs 45,000 and Rs 90,000 in 2002, depending on whether the household had a kutcha or a pucca house, and a plot of land,” according to Kalubhai.

Those who got both left Chikhalda, and most of those left behind were from Kheda basti. They subsequently compiled a list of 54 potential beneficiaries and submitted it to the patwari. Now they wait.

According to the Madhya Pradesh government’s rehabilitation and resettlement (R&R) policy, the NVDA has to to set up cow shelters at its rehabilitation sites and make grazing land available according to the cattle population at each site. However, the R&R sites near Kadmal and Nisarpur villages in Dhar district don’t have either of these amenities.

In a 2017 order, the Supreme Court had directed the NVDA to officially reserve government land for grazing across 83 rehabilitation centres before December 31 that year, and to construct artificial water tanks next to wells to supply their drinking water. The NVDA has effectively defaulted on both counts.

Rukdiya Bhai (38) lives with his father, three brothers, their wives and children at the R&R site near Nisarpur. The family used to own 280 goats and sheep but had to sell them all, and now it makes do with 40 buffaloes. Each of his father and brothers had received plots of land but only two of them also received the first tranche of the promised Rs 5.8 lakh. Fortunately, Rukdiya got the full amount.

Rukdiya Bhai's father and son near their open cattle shed. Photo: Anjali Rao Koppala

Rukdiya Bhai’s father and son near their open cattle shed. Photo: Anjali Rao Koppala

They pooled their resources and built a house and an open shed for their cattle at the R&R site, but the result hasn’t been nearly enough. The 5.8 lakh rupees couldn’t cover the building expenses and the family had to borrow from relatives. They are also cramped for space, and they balk at how much more they would have to spend to erect permanent cattle sheds.

“The banks have stopped lending money to people who hail from submergence zones, and we have no other recourse but to rely on our relatives and friends,” Rukdiya said.

Many others have received neither land nor money, and the state seems generally blind to their plight. There are no street-lights and the kutcha roads at the site render walking nearly impossible. “The governments have come and gone but not one of them has lived up to the promises guaranteed by the state,” Rukdiya said.

* * *

Rukdiya Bhai, Babulal Bhai and Kalubhai have all actively participated in protests that the Narmada Bachao Andolan (NBA) has organised. The Dhanghar community also actively mobilised its members across the Barwani and Dhar districts in 2017, bringing out all their livestock onto the roads for a whole day to draw the attention of the district collectors and officials of the department of animal husbandry. Some of them also took part in a six-day satyagraha the NBA organised outside the NVDA office in Bhopal in November.

The animal husbandry department has since agreed to provide fodder, especially for cattle living in tin sheds. The NBA has already submitted the corresponding list of families to the NVDA office.

Bhagirath Bhai (48), another member of the Dhanghar, said, “Unless the government allots grazing land around the R&R sites and provides an uninterrupted supply of drinking water for the cattle, no relief measures will have lasting impact.”

The government must act quickly too, and without having to be prodded every time. The near-constant agitation and worries about their future is taking a steep toll on the Dhanghar. As Rukdiya said, “We are tired of being angry.”

Anjali Rao Koppala is currently pursuing a master’s in development at the Azim Premji University, Bengaluru.

Why Congress Should Tie up With JAYS, the Adivasi Movement in MP That Began on Facebook

A socio-political movement, Jai Adivasi Yuva Shakti is creating a ripple in the districts of west Madhya Pradesh ahead of the state’s assembly elections, and has spurred the dream of creating a leadership of adivasis – for adivasis.

Dr Hiralal Alawa represents the contrarian trend among the beneficiaries of reservation who secure government jobs, join the teeming urban middle class, and sunder their links with the marginal community to which they belong. Few take the trajectory Alawa took – he chose to leave the prestigious All India Institute of Medical Science, Delhi, to return to his home village of Bheslai, in Kukshi tehsil of Dhar district, Madhya Pradesh.

Kukshi has become the epicentre of the Jai Adivasi Yuva Shakti, a socio-political movement, which Alawa spearheads. Popularly known by its acronym JAYS, it began as a Facebook page that Alawa created in 2012. His was an attempt to instill self-respect and pride in tribal youths. It is evident from his explanation to affix Jai to Adivasi Yuva Shakti: “We are treated as animals, yet we do jai-jai [hail] of others. It is time we began praising ourselves.”

His pitch found an instant echo among the educated, either already beneficiaries of reservation or studying to take competitive examinations for entering professional colleges or securing government jobs. Discussions on Facebook gradually widened to include issues such as the skewed nature of development and the pressing need to build a leadership owing allegiance to adivasis than to the national parties.

JAYS acquired ample traction in social media to leap out from the virtual world to land in Madhya Pradesh’s tribal heartland. On May 16, 2013, Alawa convened a panchayat of his Facebook followers in Barwani. Over 3,000 people attended. “The consensus was that our current leaders are failing us – they are not taking up the issues of unemployment, malnutrition, the absence of educational infrastructure, or question the manipulation of our cultural identity,” Alawa recalled. 

The success at Barwani inspired Alawa to summon yet another panchayat in October in Indore. The 2013 assembly elections were a month away, and JAYS asked students staying in hostels to turn down politicians whose wont it was to offer them money to campaign for them. “These are the politicians who supply daru [alcohol], murga [chicken], and paisa (money) to adivasis to get their votes. We gave a call to make videos of these illegitimate activities,” Alawa said with a chuckle.

Five years later, JAYS is creating a ripple in the districts of west Madhya Pradesh, where adivasis account for roughly 45% of its population. For instance, adivasis comprise 87% of Jhabua’s population; in Barwani nearly 70%. No wonder its rallies have been quite a draw – for instance, the kisan panchayat it held in Kukshi on October 2 pulled in an estimated lakh of people. The support that JAYS has elicited has spurred the dream of creating a leadership of adivasis – for adivasis. It has prepared a list of 80 constituencies from where it plans to contest in the forthcoming November assembly elections.

Also read: Why Failure to Form an Alliance With BSP in MP Shouldn’t Worry Congress

Simultaneously, JAYS is in parleys with the Congress for forging an electoral alliance. It has demanded 40 seats for itself, but is willing to settle for less than one-fourth of it – and also contest these on the Congress symbol. It’s a case of tempering exuberance with reality.

JAYS will want to enter the assembly to demonstrate that its representatives are made of different mettle. Yet it hasn’t developed sinews to take on the national parties on its own. But fight it will, either as part of an electoral alliance or alone.

Dr Anand Rai, the prominent whistleblower in the Vyapam scam who has joined JAYS and is counted among its principal strategists, said, “We want to align with the Congress because we too want to fight for secularism and battle corruption, of which the Bharatiya Janata Party is guilty in Madhya Pradesh. Also, we do not have the funds required to fight elections nor are our party structures firmly in place. Yet there is tremendous pressure from our supporters to fight the Assembly elections. Our experience will train us for the future.”

But what is mere experience for JAYS could well turn out ominous for the BJP and the Congress. Political scientist APS Chauhan, of Jiwaji University, Gwalior, pointed out, “JAYS and Gondwana Ganatantra Party [another tribal outfit] are like unguided missiles – you just can’t tell which party they might hit.” Likewise, Yatindra Singh Sisodia, director, Madhya Pradesh Institute of Social Science Research, Ujjain, said, “JAYS could well play a decisive role in determining who wins and who doesn’t in as many as 28 assemblies constituencies.”

JAYS has harnessed the virtual world’s tools to bring together an articulate segment among adivasis to froth and fume at the incessant exploitation by those in whom they reposed their faith and hope.

In a way then, JAYS is the adivasi version of #MeToo and last year’s Not In My Name, both of which the middle class elite in metros initiated as social media campaigns that eventually spilled out in the real world.  JAYS represents the imagination of the adivasi middle class that reservation has spawned. Like the better known social media campaigners, JAYS has harnessed the virtual world’s tools to bring together an articulate segment among adivasis to froth and fume at the incessant exploitation by those in whom they reposed their faith and hope.

Unlike #MeToo and Not In My Name campaigners, though, JAYS’ appeal is far wider because it quickly created structures to bring under its umbrella the aspiring adivasi youth wishing to become middle class. It is these students who go to their villages to explain to the elderly why they should support JAYS. There is also a cultural perspective to their rage and activism. “Education and jobs through reservation do lead to assimilation. But it can also lead to an acute awareness of threats to a group’s cultural identity and the need to preserve it,” Sisodia said.

The search for identity

Anxieties over identity are triggered through a complicated process. Born to a school teacher and anganwadi worker, Alawa experienced the stings of stigmatisation when he left home to join a high school in Susari village, where he stayed in hostel. He and other tribal children were derided for their inability to speak Hindi flawlessly. “They used to call us adibasis, not adivasis. The word adivasi means dwellers from ancient times. On the other hand, basi means stale as in basi food,” Alawa reminisced.

In 2001, Alawa shifted to Indore to join one of its coaching shops. The glitz and shine of urban India provided him a frame of reference to feel anguished at the deplorable, exploitative conditions in which his community languished in. After completing his MBBS in Rewa and MD from Gwalior, which was where he adopted the identity of Jai Adivasi Yuva Shakti for his Facebook posts, Alawa shifted to Delhi, where he did three years of senior residency in AIIMS. He was contracted for a year as assistant professor in rheumatology. “Though the contract ended in December 2016, it could have been extended. But I decided to return to Madhya Pradesh.”

The decision to leave Delhi was largely because the city only deepened his anguish at the plight of his people. Alawa evoked the imagery of speed to explain the difference between the India he had come out from to reside in the India where he worked. “In Delhi, life is hellishly hectic; people don’t have time to spare. In adivasi villages, life is slow; people play cards to kill time,” Alawa said.

The slowness of life back home was symptomatic of a deeper malaise – the lack of agency advisasis have in determining the kind of existence they should have. It was to win back for his people the right to imagine their own world that Alawa began to organise panchayats far more frequently on his return to Madhya Pradesh than what he used to from distant Delhi.

One such panchayat impressed Rai to no end. Having already met Alawa after reading a media account of him, Rai decided to join JAYS, which embraced him enthusiastically because of the fame he had acquired for blowing the lid off the Vyapam scam. An OBC, Rai symbolises the attempt of JAYS to widen its adivasi base to include other subaltern groups. 

About the panchayat he first attended, Rai said, “There were speakers from outside. There were motivational speeches. The audience was explained the importance of the Fifth Schedule, the provisions of PESA or the Panchayats (Extension to Scheduled Areas) Act, the Forest Rights Act and such like. I felt JAYS could well be the vehicle for change.”

Also read: Is Congress Worried About a Rejuvenated BSP?

Alawa feels most of these Acts, designed for the welfare of Scheduled Tribes, have not been implemented or are infringed with impunity. For instance, the Fifth Schedule provides for a 20-member Tribal Advisory Council to advise the government in states having scheduled areas. Tribal MLAs are to constitute 15 of the 20 members of the Council; the remaining five from civil society representatives.

“The tendency is to appoint all 20 members from the ruling party,” said Alawa. “They agree to whatever the government wants.” The consequence is that the government imposes its own idea of development and welfare on adivasis. For instance, the Madhya Pradesh government constructed pucca houses under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojna. These remain unduly hot until late night, compelling people to sleep outside. Toilets have been built in front of dwelling units, leading to these not being used at all.

“Our idea of development is different. It does not mean having ACs and cars,” said Alawa. “Simultaneously, in the name of development, the BJP government has appropriated more land of adivasis in 15 years than what had been done in the previous decades by the Congress.”

Credit: PTI/Ravi Choudhary

Communal temperatures

A uniform development model for the entire country homogenises the diversity of lifestyles. This is compounded in tribal areas because of cultural interventions that seek to transform their very being and create the new adivasi. Imitating the strategy of Christian missionaries who are said to have brought education and healthcare to tribal areas for evangelical purposes, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh has sought to Hinduise the adivasi. “We are opposed to all attempts to change our identity. Without identity, our wajud [presence] will end.”

The attempts to Hinduise adivasis is not confined to the ideational level alone. It is also through the strategy of creating conflicts between Hindus and Muslims. According to Alawa, RSS affiliates trigger communal tension and skirmishes and instigate adivasis to engage in violence. “I have been asking people what harm Muslims have done to them that they want to fight them… Our biggest foe, anyway, is the RSS.”

JAYS gets a thumbs up from Ishrat Ali, who heads the Qazi Council of Madhya Pradesh. “JAYS has re-established the idea of brotherhood in the area. This is a consequence of having an educated leadership. Alawa understands why there is an attempt to replace the flowers of many colours that comprise India’s cultural bouquet with that of one colour.”

There is a structural reason why there is a lowering of communal temperature in west Madhya Pradesh’s tribal belt. “Fact is a lot of adivasis have deserted RSS affiliates to join JAYS. At many places, RSS is unable to hold its shakhas,” Rai said.

In many ways then, JAYS is waging a battle that the Congress should have fought. That alone should be a reason for India’s grand old party to grant a handful of seats to JAYS. It is not just about notching a significant electoral victory before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, but also about rallying small groups sharing ideological similarities to fight for India’s soul.

Ajaz Ashraf is a journalist based in Delhi.