Santhal

Droupadi Murmu: From Junior Assistant in Odisha Government to NDA’s Presidential Nominee

Born in the Santhal community, Murmu began her political career as a councillor in Rairangpur Nagar Panchayat in 1997 and rose through the ranks to become a minister in the Odisha government in 2000.

New Delhi: From a junior assistant in the irrigation and power department in Odisha to the presidential candidate of the BJP-led NDA, it has been a long and arduous journey for tribal leader Droupadi Murmu. If elected, Murmu will be India’s first tribal President.

The announcement of Murmu’s candidature by BJP president J.P. Nadda came on June 21, 2022, a day after she celebrated her 64th birthday.

Born in the Santhal community, Murmu began her political career as a councillor in Rairangpur Nagar Panchayat in 1997 and rose through the ranks to become a minister in the Odisha government in 2000 and later the Governor of Jharkhand in 2015.

A two-term former MLA from Rairangpur, Murmu held on to her assembly seat in 2009 when the BJD had snapped ties with the BJP weeks ahead of the state elections which were swept by the chief minister Naveen Patnaik.

Born on June 20, 1958, Murmu also holds the distinction of becoming the first woman governor of Jharkhand. If elected, Murmu will also be the first president to be born after Independence.

Murmu took her baby steps while struggling with poverty in one of the most remote and underdeveloped districts of the country. Overcoming all odds, she earned her Bachelor’s degree in Arts from Ramadevi Women’s College in Bhubaneswar and served as a junior assistant in the irrigation and power department in the Odisha government.

Later, she also served as an honorary assistant teacher in the Shri Aurobindo Integral Education Centre in Rairangpur.

Murmu was awarded the Nilkanth Award for the Best MLA of the year in 2007 by the Odisha Legislative assembly. She has diverse administrative experience having handled ministries such as transport, commerce, fisheries and animal husbandry in the Odisha government.

In the BJP, Murmu was the vice-president and later president of the Scheduled Tribe Morcha in Odisha. She was elected as the district president of the Mayurbhanj (West) unit of the BJP in 2010 and re-elected in 2013. She was also named a member of the BJP National Executive (ST Morcha) the same year.

She held the post of district president till April 2015 when she was appointed as the Governor of Jharkhand.

Murmu was married to Shyam Charan Murmu and they had two sons and a daughter. Her life has been marked with personal tragedies as she lost her husband and two sons. Murmu’s daughter Itishree is now married to Ganesh Hembram.

(PTI)

‘Repressive’: Teachers’ Group Condemns Arrest of Deocha Pachami Coal Mine Protesters

“In these intolerant times we are living through, is that the intolerably long process of seeking justice itself becomes the punishment,” said Teachers Against the Climate Crisis.

New Delhi: A collective of teachers has condemned the arrest of nine activists who were protesting the Deocha Pachami coal mining project in Birbhum district of West Bengal, saying legitimate concern about the harm coal mining may cause to agriculture and related livelihoods should be addressed with sympathy.

Teachers Against the Climate Crisis (TACC) said, “In these intolerant times we are living through, is that the intolerably long process of seeking justice itself becomes the punishment. There are innumerable cases in this country of unnamed resisters languishing as undertrials in jails on trumped-up charges.”

TACC is a group of college and university teachers who believe that the climate crisis has become one of the most pressing concerns of our time.

TACC also questioned the wisdom of initiating such a massive expansion of coal use when equally affordable energy options are now widely available. “Repressive response to those who interrogate the wisdom of such projects seems foolhardy, in both the short and long term,” TACC said in a statement.

The full statement is reproduced below.

Teachers Against the Climate Crisis (TACC)

23 February 2022

Public statement on arrests of activists opposing the Deocha Pachami coal mining project

Teachers Against the Climate Crisis (TACC) unequivocally condemns the arrests of nine activists on 21 February protesting the Deocha Pachami coal mining project in Birbhum district of West Bengal. We are dismayed by the gravity of the absurd charges against them, including under section 307 (attempt to murder) and section 364 (kidnapping or abduction of a person in order to murder) of the IPC. It is shocking that two of them, both local activists, have been remanded to police custody.

The context for this unfortunate development is the growing resistance to coal mining in the area. Local Santhals and members of other communities have recently organized themselves under the banner Birbhum Jomi, Jeebon, Jeebika o Prokriti Bachao Mahasabha (Platform to save land, lives, livelihoods, and the environment). The two local activists in police custody are active members of this organization. Many people in the area are justifiably concerned about the harm coal mining may cause to agriculture, related livelihoods, water bodies, and other environmental damage in the area. They are also worried about the loss of their lands to the coal mining project. It has been reported that thousands of people across a number of villages would be potentially affected.

Both the law and justice would suggest that such concerns be addressed with sympathy and transparency. However, there is little reason to believe that due process has been followed so far, including the provisions of the Right to Fair Compensation and Transparency in Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation, and Resettlement Act, 2013. There has been no social impact assessment (section 4), or public hearings for social impact assessment (section 5) that this land acquisition makes mandatory on “the appropriate government”. Instead the West Bengal state government – in keeping with authoritarian responses by governments elsewhere in the country – has planted grave, false cases on leading activists at the slightest hint of resistance to such projects. Our concern, in these intolerant times we are living through, is that the intolerably long process of seeking justice itself becomes the punishment. There are innumerable cases in this country of unnamed resisters languishing as undertrials in jails on trumped-up charges.

The Deocha Pachami mining project is part of one of the largest coal blocks and projects in the country. We question the wisdom of such a massive expansion of coal use when equally affordable energy options are now widely available. Data from the Central Electricity Authority suggests that there has been an impressive expansion of solar power in the country in recent years. However, much else can be done to meet people’s basic energy needs by promoting wind power, decentralized solar, biogas, and small hydropower, all of which, this official data indicates, are stagnating or at best growing very slowly. At the state level, expanding solar projects of varied kinds – to meet agricultural demand, decentralized solar, grid-connected solar – and wind power along West Bengal’s 158-kilometre coastline – would not just generate cleaner energy, it would also create jobs in large enough numbers to more than compensate for the loss of employment from coal projects halted at their inception. Which is why the Birbhum Jomi, Jeebon, Jeebika o Prokriti Bachao Mahasabha has requested the government to set up a solar plant in the area instead of a coal mining project.

Given how vulnerable West Bengal is to the ravages of climate change, one would expect that the state government would respond with more sympathy to such demands. Due to its unique landmass, the West Bengal Sunderbans is already facing the highest rate of sea level rise in the country and possibly in the world. The IPCC’s latest, Sixth Assessment Report suggests that sea level rise will continue inexorably for centuries. Millions of farmers, fishers, and other communities along West Bengal’s and India’s coastline will also be affected by erratic rainfall, heat stress, more intense cyclones, and other effects predicted by the 2020 climate change report of the Indian Institute of Tropical Meteorology, Pune. In the face of the looming climate, pollution, and other ecological crises, a conventional reliance on coal power and a knee-jerk, repressive response to those who interrogate the wisdom of such projects seems foolhardy, in both the short and long term.

In this context, TACC demands that:

All the nine detained activists be immediately released.
All the charges against them be unconditionally dropped.
The West Bengal state government engage in a transparent dialogue with those opposing the coal mining project, and follow due process laid down in the relevant land acquisition laws.
The central government speed up the expansion of solar, wind, biogas and other renewable energy, prioritize people’s basic energy needs, and engage meaningfully with farmers, workers, trade unions, and other concerned bodies in civil society around a just energy transition.

After Walking for Seven Months, Migrant Labourer Reaches Home in Jharkhand

54-year-old Berjom Bamda Pahadiya lost his job during the lockdown and was ‘looted’ by his contractor. Penniless, he decided to walk 1,200 km to reach his home.

New Delhi: Berjom Bamda Pahadiya, a 54-year-old migrant labourer from Jharkhand, arrived home from Delhi after seven months, much to the joy of his family members.

Pahadiya began his journey homewards on foot in August 2020 from Delhi with zero money in his pocket after he was looted by his contractor, denied his wages, and thrown out of the place he was staying at.

His arrival home this past March 13, after so many months of walking, has only refreshed the recent memory of the tragic saga of thousands of migrant labourers forced to walk home for months together from various cities due to the sudden national lockdown announced by the Narendra Modi government to limit the spread of the coronavirus.

As per a report in the Telegraph, Pahadiya arrived home in Amarbitha village of the state’s Sahebganj district after trudging 1,200 km from Delhi. He told the newspaper that he left for Delhi in February 2020 on a train with ten others from his village after being offered “a good salary” by a middleman.

“I worked for 20-25 days before the lockdown but the middleman paid me nothing. He just arranged two meals a day and a place for me to stay. After the lockdown in March, he snatched all the money I had brought from home, about Rs 7,000, as well as my belongings and the Aadhar card,” the news report quoted him as saying.

Thereafter, Pahadiya remained a pavement dweller until August, when he thought of walking back home as he had no money to buy a train ticket. That he could speak only Santhali made his case worse.

He told the newspaper that he survived the entire route by begging and once remained without food for about a fortnight. He continued walking by the railway line.

This past March 11, a member of an NGO, Roti Bank, found him hungry at the Mucharaidih railway crossing in Mahuda, in Dhanbad district. On relating his saga, the NGO members not only decided to pool in money to buy a train or a bus ticket for him till Sahebganj, but also bought him new clothes, provided him food and found a room for him to rest.

“Some of our members uploaded his pictures on social media with an account of his ordeal. A contractor who was about to leave for Sahebganj contacted us and offered to take him to his village,” Suraj Kumar from the NGO told the Telegraph.

An NGO member accompanied Pahadiya in the contractor’s vehicle, which had left for Mahuda on March 12 night and reached his village on March 13 morning.

The newspaper said the Sahebganj deputy commissioner Ram Niwas Yadav had told its correspondent, “I shall send a probe team and, if possible, arrest the middlemen.” He promised to provide government assistance to the duped tribal labourers from the state and “strengthen the mechanism to ensure middlemen don’t lure villagers to big cities with false promises”.

As per news reports in early April, around 6.54 lakh migrant labourers of Jharkhand were stranded across the country and the state government had received more than 17,800 distress calls from such labourers with a week’s time.

From Juukan to Jharkhand: Demanding Accountability for Desecration of Indigenous Cultural Heritage

Respect for indigenous cultural heritage is fundamental to forging a social license to operate in development projects.

In September, senior executives at mining giant Rio Tinto resigned over the destruction of ancient Aboriginal caves in Juukan Gorge in Western Australia after communities and investors alike voiced concerns that the company was failing to hold them accountable for their actions. This incident has focused attention on the need for accountability for the destruction of indigenous cultural heritage in development projects globally.

Across the Indian Ocean, Adivasi communities and World Bank shareholders are closely watching the Bank’s response to the desecration of sacred sites in Jharkhand. The Bank’s funding of water supply infrastructure on lands of deep cultural significance is the subject of community complaints and an investigation by the Bank’s independent watchdog.

Whether in Juukan or Jharkhand, respect for indigenous cultural heritage is fundamental to forging a social license to operate in development projects. That requires conducting good faith and contextually appropriate consultations beforehand and, when mistakes are made, action in the form of remedial measures. The question is: will the Bank accept meaningful accountability for its failings?

Two senior executives of Rio Tinto resigned over the destruction of ancient Aboriginal caves in Juukan Gorge in Western Australia. Photo: REUTERS/Patrick T. Fallon/Files

Water supply schemes forcibly built on sacred sites in Jharkhand

Financed by the World Bank and the Government of India, the “Rural Water Supply and Sanitation Project for Low Income States” is a US$1 billion project aimed at increasing access to piped water for rural communities in four of India’s poorest states: Assam, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Jharkhand. The project is implementing more than 1,000 drinking water schemes across the country.

In Jharkhand’s East Singhbhum district, an influx of migrants seeking employment opportunities in Jamshedpur has spurred a high demand for water on the outskirts of the city. The Chottagovindpur and Bagbera water supply schemes purport to extract water from the Subarnarekha River, treat it and supply it to households in exchange for a fee. However, major infrastructure for these schemes was sited in two villages without consulting Adivasi communities, resulting in harm to their sacred sites and cultural practices. These communities currently access clean underground water stores they have conserved for generations through handpumps, wells and ponds, and are now fighting to protect these resources and their way of life.

In Giddhijhopri village, construction of a water treatment plant has disturbed the community’s Jaher Sthal, a sacred grove on a hilltop that marks the boundary of a Santhal village. The construction of the plant, which remains half-built, began in July 2016 through the deployment of security forces. Women were beaten and false criminal cases were filed by police against community members that protested construction. The Santhals believe that ancestral spirits residing in the Jaher Sthal protect them. Communities in Giddhijhopri have buried and cremated their dead, performed ritual ceremonies, and accessed medicinal plants on the hilltop for generations.

Meanwhile, in nearby Sarjamda Purana Basti, a water storage tower was forcibly built over the community’s Shaheed Sthal, the memorial site of three martyrs who lost their lives in the agitation for an independent state of Jharkhand and where community prayers are held. To add insult to injury, after razing the original site, officials placed statues of the martyrs adjacent to the construction site in an attempt to mitigate the damage, but did so without consulting the communities, who do not believe in erecting statues.

In Sarjamda Purana Basti, a water tower now stands on the communities’ martyrdom site, which was destroyed and statues of martyrs erected without the communities’ consent. Photo: By arrangement

Giddhijhopri is a Santhal village and operates under the Manji Pargana Mahal traditional governance system. Sarjamda Purana Basti has a Ho population living together with Santhals, and thus the Manki-Munda system also operates there.

Grave mistakes in World Bank project design and construction

With their sacred spaces trampled on, both communities filed complaints in 2018 through their traditional leaders to the Bank’s independent watchdog, the Inspection Panel, arguing that the Bank made grave mistakes in violation of the Bank’s safeguard policies and Indian law.

In a disturbing revelation, the Bank admitted in early 2019 that it failed to apply its policy on physical cultural resources to the project. The policy requires a systematic identification of physical cultural resources likely affected by a project, an assessment of the impacts on them, and a plan to avoid or mitigate impacts, all of which is to be informed by extensive consultations with communities. In this project, none of these steps was adequately taken.

In fact, the project ran roughshod over self-governance legal protections designed to safeguard indigenous customs, cultural identity, and community resources. The two villages are designated under the Indian constitution as Adivasi-majority areas, known as Fifth Schedule areas. Under the Panchayat (Extension to the Scheduled Areas) Act, 1996 (PESA) and Jharkhand Panchayati Raj Act, 2001 (JPRA), decisions about community land, water and natural resources in Fifth Schedule areas are to be taken by a Gram Sabha, a general assembly of all the adults of a village. In particular, the JPRA states in section 10(5)(i), that the Gram Sabha in a Fifth Schedule area “shall protect and preserve the traditions and customs of persons their cultural identity and community means (Sarna, Masna, [Jaher-Than] etc.)”. In this case, the communities have made clear that valid Gram Sabha consent was not obtained.

The communities have also documented that the project appears to be part of a larger plan to expand the municipal limits of Jamshedpur city, which they worry could nullify the self-governance protections afforded to them as rural Adivasi villages.

Also Read: Conservation Means Little Without Addressing Indigenous People’s Rights

Communities and Bank policies call for relocation of infrastructure

With the Inspection Panel’s investigation complete, the World Bank now has a responsibility to address the violations through a remedial action plan to be developed in consultation with communities and agreed to by the Government of Jharkhand. The communities are aggrieved not only that the infrastructure has disturbed their sacred sites, but also that it risks polluting the clean water sources they have conserved for generations.

The communities are calling on the World Bank and Jharkhand Government to:

Immediately halt construction and relocate the unwanted infrastructure to villages where it is wanted,
address the harm suffered from police violence and false criminal charges, and
ensure community water resources and self-governance protections are safeguarded moving forward.

In April 2019, Hemant Soren, as opposition leader of Jharkhand, in a scathing tweet called out the then government and local administration for failing to seek Gram Sabha consent for this project. Now that he is chief minister, Adivasi communities expect Soren will ensure this World Bank project upholds their rights.

Hemant Soren campaigning for the 2019 assembly elections in Jharkhand. Photo: HemantSorenJMM/Facebook

Relocating the water supply infrastructure will allow local authorities and the World Bank to successfully complete the water supply project while respecting the Bank’s own policies. In fact, relocation is recommended by guidelines on managing physical cultural resources the Bank belatedly developed in 2019, three years after construction began. They include a directive to “identify alternate location[s]” for major infrastructure, such as a water treatment plant, where a community “does not agree to shift/relocate” their physical cultural resources.

Both Juukan and Jharkhand involve major failures in protecting Indigenous sacred sites. If development actors like the World Bank are to retain legitimacy among indigenous communities, they must demonstrate accountability when their mistakes damage sites of vital cultural importance.

Anirudha Nagar is communities director for Accountability Counsel, which supports communities to defend their environmental and human rights. Accountability Counsel is advising communities in Jharkhand on the Inspection Panel process.

Collective Caste Hatred Stuns Bengal Academia, Support Pours in for JU Prof Maroona Murmu

The abuse that the Jadavpur University professor has faced exposes the deep-rooted culture of identity politics based on caste that exists in the upper class mindset.

Kolkata: Days after Jadavpur University associate professor Maroona Murmu was attacked on Facebook with casteist slurs, academics across disciplines have expressed their solidarity with her and unequivocally condemned the comments made by the student of a prominent city college. They also expressed deep shock at the racial hatred revealed by the support received by the student, mostly from the student community.

More than 80 faculty members of Presidency University on Monday put out a signed statement in support of Murmu, even as the incident sparked a heated debate on social media on the boons and banes of reservation and a deluge of casteist abuses targeted at the teacher.

“Given the historical exclusion of tribal communities from the mainstream Indian society, Dr Murmu’s impeccable academic success is a matter of pride for all of us. If an accomplished academician like her is targeted due to her identity, then we shudder to think of the depth of suffering of the bulk of Adivasi people who struggle to be part of our academic space,” the statement, signed by senior academics like professors Pradip Basu of political science, Shanta Dutta of English and Zakir Husain of economics, stated. The full statement can be read here.

Professor Maroona Murmu. Photo: Facebook

The attack on Murmu

As The Wire reported on Saturday, Maroona Murmu, who is known for her social activism, had written on her friend’s Facebook wall that students’ lives were being put to risk by holding examinations amidst the COVID-19 crisis. A final year undergraduate student from the Bengali department of Bethune College, who is not known to the professor, responded by using words like ‘incompetent’ and ‘worthless’ (‘jogyotaheen’, ‘opodartho’) to describe Murmu, and indirectly claiming she was taking undue advantage of her identity. Egged on by support pouring in for her and the online abuse of Murmu, the girl posted the following morning that she had only politely ‘reminded a santhal Murmu that she was an Adivasi’.

Murmu, whose family originally hails from Muransole village in the Jangal Mahal area of south Bengal, has been teaching history at Jadavpur University since 2005. She completed her undergraduate studies at the then Presidency College, Kolkata, and then went to Jawaharlal Nehru University for obtaining her MA, MPhil and PhD degrees. Her book, Words of Her Own: Women Authors in Nineteenth-Century Bengal has been published by the Oxford University Press. Her father, the late Gurucharan Murmu, was an IPS officer. He was the first person from the Santhal community to join the Union Civil Services in 1972 and went on to become an inspector general of police.

Also Read: Jadavpur University Professor Faces Casteist Abuse For Commenting on Exams During COVID

On Tuesday, Murmu told The Wire that it has been an agonising few days for her. “I am traumatised. This is no longer a debate, but a series of dreadful personal attacks using my pictures and details of personal life. I have been hounded by over 1,800 online trolls with nasty memes and comments making fun of me or the backward classes in general. I can’t let my mother suffer this, so I had to shift to a different accommodation. I want this to end.”

The girl in question has put out a 10-minute video message claiming she exercised her freedom of speech, and never attacked Murmu. She accused the head of the Bengali department of her college of spreading lies about her, and added that the HOD and Bethune College would be responsible for any ‘extreme steps’ she may take. She did not apologise and instead said Murmu should ‘not be embarrassed’ about her identity.

Jadavpur University. Photo: Wikimedia Commons/Gourav Ghosh CC BY SA 3.0

Several groups express shock

Apart from the teachers of Presidency University, the Jadavpur University Teachers’ Association, the All Bengal University Teachers’ Association, students of various departments of JU, the Bethune College Students’ Committee and the Adivasi Students’ Forum of TISS, Mumbai, have also issued statements condemning the attack on Murmu. Professor Sumita Mukhopadhyay, the head of Bengali department of Bethune College, reached out to Murmu and regretted the student’s comments. However, things came to such a passé that Mukhopadhyay had to take down her Facebook post in support of Murmu, after being constantly heckled online.

The entire episode reiterates one of the worst kept secrets of the Bengali society – that a deep-rooted culture of identity politics based on caste exists in the upper class mindset, and even if an Adivasi person manages to join the mainstream, s/he continues to live as the ‘other’. However progressive and liberal the urban Bengali bhadralok may appear on the surface, he still swears by surnames.

This attitude often spills out in public discourse in the form of debates on reservation. Successive governments have had their own ways to keep such debates alive to save their own backs on questions of joblessness and lack of social security. In this case also, most youngsters who have supported the student’s highly objectionable comments have brought in questions of ‘quota’ and ‘merit’, and valorised the student’s ‘fight’ against the quota system. The girl’s mother also backed her daughter’s stance.

Mahitosh Mandal of Presidency University, a well-known anti-caste activist, points out that the collective attack against Murmu shows an ignorance about the logic of reservation. “In a country where 85% of the population belongs to SC, ST, and OBC communities, their presence in the public sector is less than negligible. This is best demonstrated by their underrepresentation in academia. In a survey published in 2018, not a single OBC professor was found in the faculties of any of the Central universities. If we want a democratic academic space, we must include people from every community,” Mandal told The Wire.

Responding to the argument that reservation should be economic and not caste-based, he said, “In India, wealth and knowledge were mostly the monopolies of Brahmins and upper-caste people for thousands of years. Since the bulk of the poor belong to the ‘lower’ castes, even an economic reservation would end up being a caste-based reservation. It is a good thing that EWS has been created as a separate category rather than merging it with the scheduled castes and tribes.”

The corridor of the Presidency University’s main building. Photo: Wikimedia Commons/ Taritwan Pal CC0

‘Shocked angry and disappointed’

Eminent academic Supriya Chaudhuri told The Wire she was shocked, angry and disappointed at the attacks on Murmu. Describing her as a fine scholar and wonderful human being, Chaudhuri said, “The abuses posted by the student would not be significant in themselves and not worth responding to. What is very disturbing is the volume of online abuse provoked by any support for Murmu, faced, for example, by the head of the Bengali department at Bethune College, or by other friends and colleagues. The army of hate-filled trolls behind such campaigns indicates the extent of caste bias in our society. We have to stand with Murmu and others like her to fight against such hatred and prejudice.”

Also Read: In Bengal, Colourism Hides Behind the Veneer of Bhadralok Culture

Presidency University faculty members Rajat Roy and Priyanka Das, who took a leading role in framing the solidarity statement, agreed that it was not about one remark by one young girl. “First of all, the comment was made on social media, which plays a key role in forming public opinion. And then, the fact that the girl’s comment got endorsed by so many others and subsequently Murmu’s quality as a scholar and teacher became a subject of social media trial show the generic pattern of attacking successful persons from socially backward classes,” Das, who teaches English, said.

Roy, an assistant professor of political science, felt the saddest part of the whole episode was that Murmu’s worth as an academic was being measured by her position in the caste-based, hierarchical social order. “Most of the persons abusing her don’t know her at all. Actually, in the bhodralok-dominated Bengali society, the caste question remains invisible as long as things follow the established pattern of caste politics. The likes of Murmu destabilise that pattern, and hence the outpouring of hatred. The views in support of the abusive student also reflect a right-wing mindset of dominating the lower castes,” he told The Wire.

Indradeep Bhattacharyya teaches literature and is a former journalist based in Kolkata.

Jadavpur University Professor Faces Casteist Abuse For Commenting on Exams During COVID

Maroona Murmu said she couldn’t understand what her identity had to do with expressing an opinion on a topic that is being debated across the country.

Kolkata: Professor Maroona Murmu would not have thought even in her wildest dreams that a comment she posted on a social media platform on the ongoing debate about holding examinations during the COVID-19 pandemic will open the gate for someone to attack her identity.

Professor Murmu is an associate professor in the history department of Jadavpur University and has been working there for the past 15 years.

On September 2, when most people in the country were debating the government’s decision to conduct exams across the country despite the COVID-19 emergency, she stumbled upon a Facebook post by her friend Neelkonto Naskar. Thereafter, she expressed her opinion on issue, saying students’ lives are being put at risk by the government’s decision.

A young woman replied to her comment saying, “Maroona Murmu, what surprised me was the fact that Jadavpur University has professors with such mentality. I am astonished. Let me brief you a bit on the difference between ‘quota’ and ‘unquota’ (non-quota). To know that life is more important than an academic year, one doesn’t require to be a professor. It’s not about lagging one year but about how some unqualified and incompetent people take undue advantage of the reservation system and their caste is now helping them be successful, while the deserving lag behind for ever. Our parents are stepping out, taking a risk every day to get us food, while some are sitting at home and getting paid for doing nothing.”

After a few hours, the young lady put up a post on her Facebook profile saying, “Today morning, just reminded one ‘Murmu’ a Santhal about her Adivasi lineage. That too in a polite manner. But some people like her, just made me realise that so-called professors are getting fat simply drawing paychecks.”

‘Appalled, but not shocked’

Professor Murmu was appalled but not shocked as she has been at the receiving end of casteist and racist slurs almost on a daily basis. “I don’t even know her; I had expressed my opinion on something that is being debated across the country. She did not comment anything on that matter but went on commenting on my identity and how reservation gets us [Adivasis] jobs and how we do not deserve those or have the ability to teach,” she told The Wire.

“Do I not have the right to express my opinion on any issue without someone ‘rebuking’ me for being an Adivasi?” Professor Murmu added.

Later, a friend of Murmu showed her that the young woman who attacked her is a graduate student studying Bengali in Bethune College, another heritage college of Kolkata.

The Bethune College students’ committee issued a statement condemning the incident and called the incident extremely shameful, saying it has brought the institution into disrepute. “The Bethune College students’ committee unequivocally condemns Ms Paromita Ghosh and resolves to stand by Dr. Maroona Murmu and the struggles of all the Dalits in our campus, state and the country,” the statement reads.

Though a large part of the student community has stood in solidarity with Murmu and condemned the casteist attack on her, she continues to face incessant trolling on social media. She says people are posting vile comments on various posts that she has published.

When Bethune College’s head of Bengali department condemning the student’s behaviour on Facebook, she became the target of trolls. She had to remove the post.

Professor Murmu told The Wire that for years now, she had been facing such discrimination from students, colleagues, friends and it’s growing by the day. Murmu says until a few years ago, she faced similar discrimination in Jadavpur University also. However, things have changed for the better now, she says.

“The university where I teach is well known as a nursery of protests and as a bastion of progressive politics. Yet, here too, at one point of time, I have seen several instances of everyday casteism. Derogatory phrases like ‘sonar chand’ or ‘sonar tukro’ were used as puns for members of Scheduled Castes or Scheduled Tribes. But things have changed now,” said Murmu.

Professor Maroona Murmu. Photo: Facebook

Bengal and casteism

While Bengal is often projected as the shining example of liberalism because it has never seen caste-based assertions or movements by backward communities, observers believe otherwise.

Professor Partha Chatterjee, a leading post-colonial historian and a keen observer and commentator of social developments, said that caste hegemony of the Brahmin/upper caste (often called as Bengali Bhadralok) is so complete in Bengal that it is invisible.

But recently, there has been a churn in Bengal’s politics. Societal fault lines are becoming prominent and the hegemony of the Bhadralok is being challenged.

In December 2019, five professors of Rabindra Bharati University in Kolkata resigned in protest against a delay in action against students who allegedly harassed an assistant professor of the geography department in the varsity and taunted her on the basis of her caste and skin colour.

“Caste discrimination is quite ingrained in Bengal; just like in any other states in India. But with the ruling dispensation (Central government) in power, people are very open about it,” said Murmu.

Meet India’s First Santhal RJ, Who Wants Tribal Culture to be Truly Understood

Shikha Mandi, who hosts a show about the coming-of-age of tribals in India in fluent Santhali, also wants more indigenous voices to be heard in the public domain.

Perched on the hot seat, her fingers manoeuvring the keys of a mixer console like an artist wielding her brush, 24-year-old Shikha Mandi cuts an arresting frame. The radio jockey punctuates her chat show, Johar Jhargram – about the coming-of-age of tribals in India in fluent Santhali (the language spoken by over six million indigenous people across South Asia) – with mellifluous strains of village songs.

Her story is even more interesting. The daughter of a small farmer from West Midnapore, Mandi worked her way up from the paddy fields of Jhargram’s Belpahari village where she was born, to the coveted mechanical engineering school at Kolkata’s Industrial Training Institute. And now, as one of India’s first tribal radio jockeys, she’s quite the talk of the town.

RJ Shikha commands the attention of hundreds of listeners through Radio Milan – a small community radio station in West Bengal’s Jhargram district – about 170 km west of Kolkata. The radio waves bearing her unusual Santhal imprint ripple through the Jhargram and Kharagpur districts. More fans across India and abroad tune in to her programme online. Her followers on social media are also growing. Not only does Mandi want tribal culture to be understood across India, she also wants to pioneer its representation through popular media. “There’s almost no knowledge of tribal life and its idiosyncrasies. I want more indigenous voices to be heard in the public domain,” she says.

To forefront tribal culture and ethos, Mandi holds her own at Radio Milan – her “working playground,” as she calls it. Here, she writes her own script, mashes up tunes, readies playlists and rustles up ideas for shows on socially relevant issues. “There’s a lot of independence at work, and I’m encouraged by my colleagues to think out of the box,” she says.

Her colleagues at Radio Milan, which was set up last November by Milan Chakraborty, a Kolkata-based entrepreneur, are supportive of her work. “Shikha impressed us with her determination, diligence and language proficiency,” says Tanmay Dutta, a well-heeled radio jockey from Siliguri, who trains young talent. “There are few people in India who understand the Santhali Ol Chiki script and can translate it. Not too many books or academic resources are available, either. So Shikha works hard on her research.”

But the journey to the hot seat hasn’t been an easy one for Mandi. At the age of three, she was sent to live with her uncle in Kolkata so she could receive a quality education. There were reported incidents of Maoist activity in the Jhargram region, which added to their insecurity. “My parents thought it wasn’t safe for me to live in our village. But in Kolkata, despite having a loving family, I felt a sense of uprootedness,” says Mandi.

At school, the young girl would get taunted for her Santhal leanings and demeanour. But that made her more determined to stay true to her roots. “The older I got, the more connected I felt to my tribal mores,” she says. So, Mandi would tune in to Santhal shows on Doordarshan; sing indigenous songs and recite Santhali poetry at social gatherings. Instead of settling into city life completely, she held on to her tribal identity and nursed the dream of going back to Jhargram.

The move back to Jhargram was in some ways fated. Just as Mandi was preparing to take an apprenticeship test at a Kolkata-based shipbuilding and engineering company, she got an interview call from Radio Milan last November. After scouring several resumes, the hiring team cast its eye on Mandi. “We felt Shikha is deeply embedded in the tribal culture. Her ability to identify issues facing indigenous people, and making them accessible through popular media set her apart from other applicants,” says Chakraborty.

Even though Mandi had no formal training in radio or anchoring, she won the hiring team over with her persuasion skills. Soon after getting selected, the 24-year-old moved back to her beloved hometown.

But the transition wasn’t easy. Years of living in Kolkata had taken the sheen off Mandi’s proficiency in Santhali. She had to make herself acquainted with tribal customs, rituals and devotional songs for her show Johar Jhargram. She also spent nights poring over books given to her by four Midnapore-based professors who knew the Ol Chiki script well, including the bi-monthly magazine Sagen Saota. “Going on air was a nerve-wracking experience, and I would have my script open in front of me every day,” says Mandi.

The content-mastering challenge aside, Mandi also had technical challenges to overcome. The 24-year-old was made to undergo training in script-writing, voice tone and modulation, studio sound and audience engagement. “I had no idea about the technical side of radio production, and was literally thrown into the deep end in order to figure things out,” she says.

But Mandi’s love for all things Santhal made these challenges surmountable. Today, she’s a purist in her approach to showmanship. “There’s not a speck of Hindi or Bengali in my show, and I can rustle up and rehearse a script, three hours prior to my programme,” she says with a wry smile.

The young RJ’s command of Santhali and understanding of tribal culture has also made her more experimental. Nowadays, she goes to different villages in Bengal to identify new trends, and ways to build a support-base in indigenous communities. “Instead of just sitting in my studio and doing my research, I like to be in touch with real people and real issues,” she says.

Mandi’s innovative approach has struck a chord with the Santhal people. Priyanka Hembrom, a 17-year-old ardent fan from the Jaigeria village in Jhargram district, says she too wants to be a radio jockey, and entertain and inform an audience. “Shikha brings important issues such as underage marriages in tribal communities to the fore. She adds a touch of humour to all her shows, which makes her stand apart from others,” says Hembrom.

Mandi’s out-of-the-box thinking also gets reflected in her special shows ahead of tribal festivals. Her programme – the ‘Wonders of Waiting’ was a big success, says one of her colleagues. “The act of waiting is pregnant with hope. Those who work on the borders, wait to be united with their families; children living abroad wait to go back home. Shikha wanted to underline the value of time in the act of waiting. Isn’t that an interesting idea?”

Perhaps for Mandi, too, patient waiting has given her career an impetus, and her life meaning. More advertisers are now buying slots during her show. The Santhali programme has been extended by a couple of hours, and there are plans to bring in more tribal artistes to improve people’s understanding of indigenous communities.

“The fact that I’m doing what I love, for the people I love, in the place I love the most is my biggest success. I’m not looking back,” says Mandi.

Priyadarshini Sen is an independent journalist based in New Delhi. She writes for various India and US-based media outlets.

In Bangladesh, Survival of Indigenous Tribes Begins at School

A majority of the indigenous community remains illiterate and cannot keep pace with the fast development taking place in Bangladesh.

Woman working in a pineapple field at the Chittagong Hill Tracts. Credit: Flickr

Chatra: Just before sundown on January 30, a group of women labourers from the Santhal indigenous community are in a rush to wind up their work of harvesting potatoes in the village of Boldipukur, some 15 km away from Rangpur district in northern Bangladesh.

One young girl looked indifferent and didn’t seem to be in a hurry to go home. When approached by IPS, she gave her name as Rupali Tudu. Her father died of an unidentified disease some six years ago and her mother is depressed and suffers from mental instability. There is no one to help her earn a living, so she has no option but to work as a day labourer on others people’s farms in the village.

Although Rupali, 14, is enrolled as a ninth grader at a local high school, she cannot attend school regularly. Her eyes tear up when she states that many children of the Santhal community in her village drop out of school as their families are extremely poor and they are obliged to work as manual labourers.

Chatra is a village with an area covering eight square km in Pirganj upazila (sub-district), some 25 km to the south of Rangpur city in Bangladesh. There are about 10,000 people living there including 2,000 members of Adivasi (indigenous) community, mainly Santhal.

The principal occupation of the villagers is agriculture. Potatoes and other vegetables grow abundantly in Chatra as well as in Pirganj. According to statistics from the local government, 90% of the Santhal community in Chatra does not own any land. Men, women and children of the community earn their livelihood by working on others’ lands.

According to the findings of Network of Non-streamed Marginalised Communities (NNMC) Foundation, a platform for the ethnic communities of the North-West of Bangladesh, the school dropout rate among the ethnic communities at early primary level is 33%.

Michael Kispotta, 68, a former teacher at Boldipukur High School and also a member of the Orao community, tells IPS that at least 80% students belonging to the ethnic community drop out of school in the secondary level.

“This is because of the extreme poverty of their family.” He adds, “A majority of the parents are not fully aware about the education needs of their children.”

Kispotta says language is one of the major barriers for the ethnic children to go to school. Their communities don’t understand, read nor write Bangla (the language of Bangladesh people) and are therefore reluctant to attend classes.

Thus isolated, a majority of the community remains illiterate and cannot keep pace with the fast development taking place in Bangladesh, which is becoming a low middle income country. The Oraon, as well as other ethnic communities of the plains, remain extremely vulnerable; socially, economically and politically.

At least 25 languages are spoken by the 54 indigenous communities of Bangladesh, where 80% of the indigenous peoples live in the plain land districts of the North and South-East of the country and the rest in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT) area.

Leaders of the indigenous communities state that under the existing education system, their children do not have the opportunity to receive education in their mother tongue. From early childhood, they are required to learn Bangla and follow the national curriculum which is related to Bengali culture and society. The instructors are mostly Bengalis. This leads to problems in understanding of the curriculum, as Bangla, to many indigenous students, is a foreign language.

The NNMC Foundation, a non-profit voluntary organisation, works with plain land indigenous or ethnic communities in Rangpur (Central north) and Rajshahi (North west) division where at least 28 ethnic communities live.

“While language is a barrier for the plain land indigenous children to attain proper education, it’s not a major barrier right now because the government has taken initiative to solve it in the near future,” says coordinator Sarah Marady of the Oraon community. “What is more important for our education is to eliminate poverty of the communities.”

Marady believes that “sensitising the communities to education is a challenge. But the government as the largest organisation could easily address the problem.”

She also emphasises the need of a localised education system for the indigenous children based on their societal system and distinct language so that they can conceptualise their own society with the Bengali society.

The Bangladesh government has already introduced indigenous language as a subject in the pre-primary school curriculum for Chakma, Marma and Tripura in CHT in the Southeast and Sadri and Garo in the Northeast of the country. The students of these indigenous communities learn their own language in the pre-primary phase.

The indigenous children in the plain lands are yet to get books in their own language. Officials with National Text Book Curriculum Board of Bangladesh confirmed to IPS that language learning books for the indigenous children in the plain lands are being developed and will be introduced to the children soon.

IPS also spoke to Bivuti Bhusan Mahata, former chair of Indigenous Student Council, Bangladesh. Bivuti, a student at Rangpur Begum Rokeya University, says no more than 1,000 indigenous students go on to university each year. Considering that indigenous groups are the most disadvantaged communities in the country, government should take up a national strategy to push them forward, Bivuti observes.

Rabindranath Soren, president of Jatiya Adibasi Parishad (National Indigenous Council) in Bangladesh, told IPS that learning indigenous languages will help the ethnic communities keep their individual identity as distinct tribe or ethnic group but it does not guarantee their social, economic and political rights, which are major challenges for their empowerment.

“For these we need state’s comprehensive and coordinated efforts,” said Soren, also a member of the Santhal community.

In Bangladesh, there are about 48 different indigenous communities living in the plain lands (central north and northeast) and hill areas (southeast). Only 30 of these communities are on government records. Though they claim that their population is over 3 million. The government numbers are different. According to the National Census of 2011, the country’s indigenous population is around 1,586,141, which signifies 1.8% of the total population.

Rabindranath, who has long been in the movement for the rights of the indigenous communities, has identified those in the plain lands as Shantal, Oraon, Munda, Malo, Mahali, Khondo, Bedia, Bhumij, Kole, Bhil, Karmakar, Mahato, Muriyar, Musohor, Pahan, Paharia, Rai and Sing.

Rabindranath says only six are in the government records. “Defeated in the struggle against adversities, a few of the indigenous communities are almost on the verge of extinction,” Rabindranath told IPS. He wondered on their ability to establish their rights when the government does not acknowledge their existence.

The Bangladesh Bureau of Statistics (BBS) shows that among the existing ethnic communities in the plain lands, Santhal is the largest with about one million people. After Santhal is Oraon with half a million.

Leaders of the plain land indigenous communities claim that until now, the indigenous people haven’t been consulted and engaged in the process of National Action Plan for the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) which is currently being developed, although a meaningful engagement in national development is one of the major goals of the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP).

In its seventh Five-Year Plan, the government of Bangladesh expressed its “strong commitment” to consider implementing UNDRIP and ratifying ILO Convention no. 169 on Indigenous and Tribal People. Almost the same words were used in the sixth Five Year Plan.

“Unfortunately, no significant changes have been noticed on the ground. We want to believe that this time the government will come forward to make good on its promises,” Subin Chandra Munda, Secretary of National Adibasi Porishad, tells IPS.

Munda says the indigenous people must be engaged in the SDGs, their voices must be heard, and their rights must be respected, protected and fulfilled in the spirit of the UNDRIP. The indigenous peoples of Bangladesh with their distinctive identities still continue to feel marginalised, protesting against land grabbing, corporate greed, forestry and energy projects on their inherited lands.

(IPS)

Writers, Activists Condemn Banning of ‘The Adivasi Will Not Dance’ in Jharkhand

“The ban on The Adivasi Will Not Dance is not only deplorable in itself but also adds to a series of dangerous precedents of books being banned on flimsy grounds in India.”

<em>The Adivasi Will Not Dance</em> is a collection of short stories by Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar. Credit: Facebook/Speaking Tiger

The Adivasi Will Not Dance is a collection of short stories by Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar. Credit: Facebook/Speaking Tiger

Activists and academics have issued a statement in favour of author Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar, whose book The Adivasi Will Not Dance was recently banned in Jharkhand for its ‘negative’ portrayal of Santhal people, particularly women. A protest was carried out in Pakur, where he works, where his book and effigy were burnt. Shekhar has also alleged that he is being harassed online by people who disagree with his work.

The full text of the statement, signed by 90 people, is reproduced below.

We are bewildered and dismayed to learn about the recent banning of Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar’s collection of short stories, The Adivasi Will Not Dance, by the Government of Jharkhand. This ban is absurd and sets a dangerous precedent.

Freedom of expression is a fundamental right under Article 19 of the Indian Constitution. The same article, admittedly, allows the state to make laws that impose “reasonable restrictions” on this fundamental right, but only based on specific grounds (such as national security or public order), none of which apply in this case.

Superficially, it may appear that one of these pre-specified grounds, “the interests of decency”, could be invoked to justify the ban. The book does include some sexually explicit scenes, but calling them “indecent” would be extreme prudishness. If books that include love-making scenes were to be banned, hundreds of thousands of novels would have to be banned, not to speak of the Kamasutra. Those who think of sex as indecent are free to read something else.

It has been argued that some stories in the book are “derogatory to Santhal women”, in particular a story where a Santhal woman consents to casual sex with a policeman in exchange for money. Even if it were true that this story is derogatory, that would not constitute a permissible ground for banning the book under Article 19. Further, the view that the story is derogatory overlooks the fact that it is a work of imagination. The imaginary incident described in the story does not cast any aspersions whatsoever on Santhal women. It is just possible that the story is inspired by some real-life event, but if that is so, it makes the story all the more legitimate.

The ban on The Adivasi Will Not Dance is not only deplorable in itself but also adds to a series of dangerous precedents of books being banned on flimsy grounds in India. This ban mania (also targeted at films, events, statements, tweets, foods, relationships and what not) is an ominous attack on freedom, democracy and rationality.

Signatories

Aashish Xaxa (research scholar)

Abhay Xaxa (research scholar)

Agnes Murmu (retired teacher)

Ajitha George (researcher)

Akash Poyam (research scholar)

Alpa Shah (anthropologist)

Anjor Bhaskar (research scholar)

Ankita Aggarwal (independent researcher)

Anpa Marndi (assistant professor)

Anumeha Yadav (journalist)

Arundhati Roy (writer)

Ashish Birulee (photo-journalist)

Ashish Gupta (research scholar)

Balram (right to food campaign, Jharkhand)

Bani Hembrom (doctor)

Bela Bhatia (researcher and writer)

Chayanika Murmu (MBBS student)

Binod Murmu (concerned citizen)

Dheeraj Kumar (right to food campaign, Jharkhand)

Dula Besra (concerned citizen)

Dulal Kisku (concerned citizen)

Ghasiram Soren (literary activist)

Gladson Dungdung (human rights activist)

Gouri Chatterjee (journalist)

Gunjal Munda (concerned citizen)

Harivansh (member, Rajya Sabha)

Harsh Mander (activist and writer)

Ipil Alma Kisku (concerned citizen)

Jean Drèze (development economist)

Judith Hembrom (social worker)

Kalipda Tudu (concerned citizen)

Kanika Sharma (research scholar)

Kanuram Tudu (teacher)

Karamchand Hembrom (concerned citizen)

Kavita Krishnan (political activist)

Kavita Srivastava (human rights activist)

Khagen Hembram (concerned citizen)

Kritika Pandey (writer)

Kumar Rana (researcher)

Lipika Singh Darai (filmmaker)

Mangal Mandi (senior management)

Maroona Murmu (historian)

Mast Ram Soren (concerned citizen)

Meghnath (filmmaker)

Miltee Horo (research scholar)

Nandini Sundar (sociologist)

Nayan Soren (research scholar)

Neel Mukherjee (writer)

Nilay Kumar Murmu (concerned citizen)

Niraj Lakra (concerned citizen)

Nora Samad (social worker)

Peter Martin (concerned citizen)

Philip Peacock (theologian)

Praveer Peter (social activist)

Prem Verma (convenor, Jharkhand Nagrik Prayas)

Priyanka Priyadarshini Marandi (research scholar)

Priyanka Purty (student)

Priyanka Sandilya (research scholar)

Reetika Khera (economist)

Remalia Hembrom (social worker)

Rimil Hembrom (research scholar)

Ruby Hembrom (publisher)

Sanjay Bosu-Mullick (rights activist and writer)

Santosh Kiro (journalist)

Savya Sachin Bankira (student)

Seral Murmu (filmmaker)

Shankar Mardi (concerned citizen)

Shivprasad Singh (Bagaicha)

Shyam C. Tudu (concerned citizen)

Shyamsunder Hansda (concerned citizen)

Sibdas Baskey (assistant professor)

Siraj Dutta (concerned citizen)

Sneha Mundari (filmmaker)

Sokhen Tudu (concerned citizen)

Sovan Hazra (concerned citizen)

Sripati Tudu (concerned citizen)

Stan Swamy (Bagaicha)

Sudha Bharadwaj (lawyer)

Sujit Kumar Soren (academician)

Susil Mandi (concerned citizen)

Thalko Majhi (concerned citizen)

Vijay Kekan (concerned citizen)

Virendra Majhi (concerned citizen)

Virginius Xaxa (sociologist)

Vivek Sidam (research scholar)

Xavier Dias (former editor)

Wilfred Topno (president, Adivasi Sahitya Sabha, Assam)

Wilson Hansda (concerned citizen)

Zoba Hansdah (research scholar)

The Jharkhand Government Should Know, Banning a Book Makes It Immortal

If the people or government of Jharkhand disagree with Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar’s book, they should fight it with their own books and ideas, not with bans and burnings.

You may burn a book, but the smoke of words penetrates deep into the consciousness of people. Credit: PTI/Facebook

In conjunction with the increase in social intimidation and mob violence, which I think have an intentional common end, the Jharkhand government has decided to ban author Hansda Sowvendra Shekhar’s book The Adivasi Will Not Dance. The book, a collection of ten short stories, has been banned by the government for its ‘poor’ portrayal of Santhal Adivasi women, particularly in a story November is the Month of Migrations. We are told that protests were carried out by the locals in the town where Shekhar, a Santhal himself, practices medicine, and during these protests copies of his book were burned.

To violently protest the written word is the norm of the uncivilised and banning a book goes one step ahead into the darkness which awaits such a civilisation.

Welcome to the new India: democratic yes, but civilised?

Book burning, or tomecide as it is technically called, has a long and checkered history. It is essential that the common Indian of this new India understand this history and the consequences of the censorship of books. Right from the the burning of books in China’s Qin dynasty in 213 BC to the mass burning of Jewish books in Berlin by the Nazis in 1933, book burning has been the most ruthless form of censorship in the civilised world. Books have been burned because they were considered dangerous by tyrants, or even by societies of the times. In the words of George Bernard Shaw, “Censorship ends in logical completeness when nobody is allowed to read any books except the books that nobody reads.”

The reasons behind banning a book can be multiple. Appeasement of an ethnic group (like the banning of Satanic Verses in India) or silencing an anti-state or anti-cult stance (like the banning of Dr Zhivago in the erstwhile Soviet Union) are the classical motives behind the book bans across the globe. To put it a tad simplistically, books are banned by the state so that the narrative of the author does not find ground in the society it caters to, thereby not allowing people to think differently or to even get a feel of an idea which does not conform to their beliefs, faith, attitudes, likings or deep-rooted societal norms. It is thus a means to control people’s thoughts, not letting them wander beyond what is considered conventional. In a country like ours riddled with caste, religion, creed, region and tribe, it is beyond imagination what the correct “conventional” can be. But surely leaving it to the state to construct a “conventional norm” is not only provocative but outright dangerous.

On the other hand, it is also important to see where authors like Shekhar draw their stories from. How are Adivasi woman characters like 20-year-old Talamai Kisku (who is compelled to have sex with a policeman for Rs 50 and two cold bread pakoras) born in Shekhar’s mind? Every character in a book is a representation of the times, past or present. Fictional characters do not represent people (though banning authorities often make this mistake), instead they represent the times and circumstances in which people live. So to believe that Talamai Kisku is a representation of Santhals in Jharkhand is a mistake, a blunder to say the least. She is a prototype used by Shekhar to depict the miserable and deplorable state of the Santhal Adivasis in that region. The focus therefore must be on their situation, not on them. We may hate the author for narrating the unsaid, but what other means does an author have at his or her disposal? Creativity is never completely realistic and it should never be. It is a combination of facts and fiction.

Also read: In Jharkhand’s Ban of Book on Adivasis, an Attempt to Deter Tribals From Dictating Their Future

Shekhar has been charged with depicting Santhal women in a negative light. On the contrary, reading the story of Talamai Kisku, I did not even for a fraction of a second think that she is represented in a poor light. Her situation is brimming with incalculable poignancy, making you empathise with her and immediately hate not her but the circumstances which brings misery to her being. She is the product of a beautiful creativity which adds life to her character. To believe that the author has shown Santhal women in a poor light is preposterous, to say the least.

Is banning books an effective weapon to silence the likes of Shekhar? Fortunately, it is not. Surprisingly, books (and authors) are the hardest to burn or ban. You may burn a book, but the smoke of words penetrates deep into the consciousness of people. People may be carried away momentarily by random, divisive opinions, as is the case with the populace against Shekhar, but in the end, there is a realisation of the truth. Books have an uncanny knack for surviving the brutal force of the state or the tyrants of their time. Like ideas, they keep growing, just like the winter jasmine which flowers in the severest of winters or the desert rose which blooms in the harshest of summers. Banning a book makes it immortal.

The idea of banning a book is also fundamental to the debate on freedom of expression. The concept of freedom of expression should be crystal clear. This freedom remains incomplete without dissent, criticism (of the powerful) and, to an extent, the ability to offend the sensibilities of common people. To say the unthinkable, to see what others overlook and to write what others avoid writing is what constructs this freedom. My friends argue that freedom of expression should have limitations as it can touch a raw nerve, and I completely agree with them. But what right does anyone have to burn books or ban them altogether, even if they go against the sensibilities of others? The answer to a book is a book. The answer to an idea is an idea. To be offended by a book should be a provocation strong enough to write a rebuttal. Civility calls for graciousness not barbarity, and burning books is the barbarity which has been unleashed by some of the most brutal rulers who have walked the face of the Earth.

In a free, democratic society, books should be debated, argued and academically discussed, even if they seem to hurt the sensibilities of a group of people. Dialogue is the only means to defeat an idea. Books can be dangerous and they should continue to be dangerous. They carry between their covers ideas which can change this world. We may not agree with that idea, but that does not give us the right to be the thought police. Books which offend the sensibilities of people are best left for the people to reject. Poorly-written books never travel long. The involvement of the state in deciding which book is to be read and which not is the worse form of domination, more so when we are living in oppressive times.

In the words of Salman Rushdie, “A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it; or offer your own version in return.”

Shah Alam Khan is a professor in the Department of Orthopaedics at AIIMS, New Delhi. Views are personal.