14.05.24.Untouchables News.Chennai.India.by Team Sivaji.CEO.
Haryana’s Dalit and Non-Jat Powers Vie for Influence Amid Absence of Jat Stalwarts
The political scene in Haryana has been dominated by four prominent families: Devi Lal, Bhajan Lal, Bansi Lal, and the Hoodas. However, this time, the descendants of Bansi Lal and Bhajan Lal have been sidelined. The Devi Lal family has a strong presence, with three members contesting the Hisar seat. Deepender Singh Hooda, son of former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda, is running from Rohtak. Shruti Choudhary, granddaughter of Bansi Lal, was denied a ticket from the Bhiwani-Mahendragarh seat. Kuldeep Bishnoi and his son Bhavya Bishnoi, sons of Bhajan Lal, are also not contesting on BJP tickets this time.
Ever since Haryana was carved out as a separate state way back in 1966, its politics has revolved around four prominent political families — Devi Lal, Bhajan Lal, Bansi Lal and the Hoodas.
Earlier, Haryana’s three famous ‘Lals’ — Devi Lal, Bansi Lal and Bhajan Lal — ruled the state by turn for decades. Before the BJP came to power on its own strength in 2014, it was the Hooda family which called the shots.
The kin of the two famous Lals — former chief ministers Bansi Lal and Bhajan Lal — who over the years had been entering the fray during the parliamentary polls, have this time been sidelined and have not got the ticket from their respective parties.
However, four members of the family of former deputy prime minister Devi Lal, popularly known as ‘Tau’ Devi Lal, have entered the contest from the Hisar and Kurukshetra seats.
Interestingly, three members of the Devi Lal family — Lal’s son Ranjit Singh Chautala, an Independent MLA who switched over to the BJP recently; JJP MLA Naina Chautala (57), who is wife of JJP chief and Devi Lal’s grandson Ajay Singh Chautala; and Sunaina Chautala (47), wife of INLD leader Abhay Singh Chautala’s cousin Ravi Chautala — are contesting against each other from the Hisar parliamentary seat. Ravi is the son of Devi Lal’s son late Partap Singh Chautala.
INLD leader Abhay Singh Chautala is contesting from the Kurukshetra seat. However, Shruti Choudhary, grand daughter of former chief minister Bansi Lal, has been denied the Congress ticket from the Bhiwani-Mahendragarh seat.
The ruling BJP too did not consider fielding Kuldeep Bishnoi or his son Bhavya Bishnoi from the Hisar seat. Kuldeep is former chief minister Bhajan Lal’s younger son. The Congress has fielded sitting MLA Rao Dan Singh from Bhiwani-Mahendragarh while the BJP went with Ranjit Singh Chautala from Hisar.
Shruti Choudhry was elected MP from Bhiwani-Mahendergarh in 2009, but BJP’s Dharambir Singh defeated her in the 2014 and 2019 Lok Sabha polls. Earlier, her late father Surender Singh and grandfather Bansi Lal held the Bhiwani seat on multiple occasions.
In 2009, Bhajan Lal was elected from Hisar as a candidate of his own outfit Haryana Janhit Congress (BL). After his demise, his son Kuldeep Bishnoi won the seat in the 2011 bypolls.
In 2019, Kuldeep’s son Bhavya Bishnoi unsuccessfully contested the Hisar seat when he was in the Congress. He was defeated by former Union minister Birender Singh’s son, a bureaucrat-turned-politician Brijendra, a BJP candidate.
Now, Kuldeep and Bhavya are in the BJP while Birender Singh and Brijendra Singh left the BJP recently to join the Congress.
From Rohtak, former chief minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda’s son Deepender Singh Hooda, at present a Rajya Sabha MP, has entered the contest from the family stronghold.
Deepender is a three-time former MP from Rohtak and in 2019 he lost to BJP’s Arvind Sharma, against whom he is pitted again this time.
A few days ago, when Kuldeep Bishnoi was asked by reporters that his supporters were upset after the BJP did not consider him as a candidate from Hisar, he had quipped, ”The workers have feelings… when any leader does not get a ticket, it is the human nature that they are disappointed. But that does not turn into opposition.
”Through you (media), I appeal to all the workers that now is the time to work hard and strengthen the hands of Prime Minister Modi. We have to again form the BJP government at the Centre,” Bishnoi had said.
Reacting to the Congress denying her ticket from Bhiwani-Mahendragarh, Shruti Choudhary said, ”I got a chance in 2009 and I worked with honesty and dedication for the area. As an opposition member, I continued to raise the issues of my people… earlier this constituency (Bhiwani) was nurtured by my grandfather and my father.” On not getting the ticket this time, she said the party’s decision has to be accepted.
”I want to tell my workers not to be disappointed,” she said. Congress leaders Shruti Choudhary and Kiran Choudhary also said they accept the party’s decision. Polling for all the 10 seats in Haryana will be held in the sixth of the seven-phase elections on May 25.
(This story has not been edited by Devdiscourse staff and is auto-generated from a syndicated feed.)
Courtesy : Devdiscourse
Chittorgarh News: A young man was displeased with a Dalit woman selling fodder in front of her house, he attacked her with a rod and broke her head.
Chittorgarh News: The youth was displeased with the Dalit woman selling fodder in front of her house. After which the young man attacked the woman with a rod and broke her head. The case is being investigated.
Chittorgarh News: In Chittorgarh, a Dalit woman sitting outside the Gopal Gaushala in Gandhinagar and selling green fodder to support her family was so displeased with her neighbor, a big businessman, that he attacked her with a rod and seriously injured her.
The woman has received 10 stitches on her head and is currently undergoing treatment at Chittorgarh District Hospital. The matter is of Chittorgarh CT Kotwali police station area. The woman’s husband says that for the last 12 years, his wife Meera used to sell green fodder to the servants coming to the cowshed by sitting under the tin installed by the Municipal Council in front of the cowshed. About two years ago, a person named Kamal Jain, who came to live in front of the cowshed, was unhappy with Meera selling fodder near his house and his shop.
The woman’s husband said that in such a situation he used to fight with the woman every day. Due to this malice, he attacked the woman on the head with a rod and seriously injured her. The family members took the woman to the district hospital in a bloody condition. Then accused Kamal Jain from behind used a bulldozer and uprooted the tin shed which was installed for the fodder sellers to sit. The woman’s husband says that the accused is an influential person of Kamal Jain, due to which he has not been arrested yet despite the fatal attack on his wife.
Sant Kabir Nagar News: Case registered against four for Dalit harassment
Money loss. Near Kathacha village of Mahuli police station area, the youth riding a bike were made to stop their bike and beaten with belts and sticks, leaving them bleeding. On Monday, the police registered a case against four people under various sections including Dalit harassment, assault and started investigating the incident.
According to the police, Deepak Kumar son of Hardev, resident of Tiltha village of the area, told in the complaint that on Sunday he was going to Khalilabad on bike with Vivek of Parsa village. Meanwhile, while moving ahead from Kathaicha village, opposition Jitendra Yadav arrived with his two other colleagues. Standing on the middle of the road, the bike was forcibly stopped. On objecting, Jitendra Yadav along with his associates seriously injured plaintiff Deepak by repeatedly attacking him with belts, sticks and pipes. On the basis of the complaint, efforts are being made to arrest the accused by registering a case against Jitendra Yadav, Sikandar Yadav, son of Subhash Yadav, Jitendra Kannaujiya, son of late Gharbharan and Vikram.
Dalit search for new political home
The Dalit identity politics that reigned supreme in UP in the 1990s was built around a Dalit-led political party. It is now giving way to broader demands for social justice and economic advancement, particularly among poorer non-Jatav Dalits. Disaffection with Mayawati, who many feel failed to fulfil their economic aspirations, underlies this Dalit search for a new political home.
Sudha Pai
BSP’s loss, whose gain? | BJP has been drawing large dividends from this disaffection. Its new redistributive politics, combined with promises of development and cultural recognition under the banner of subaltern Hindutva, which enable an upper caste party to mobilise lower classes, has been drawing in a growing number of Dalits.
A number of sub-regional Ambedkarite organisations, like Bhim Army led by a young Dalit, has also emerged as once-dominant BSP, which once consolidated UP’s Dalit movement, has become mired in an existential crisis.
Dalit assertion still remains strong. But it is now fissured along class, ideological and sub-regional lines, divided into Ambedkarite pro-BSP and Hindutvawadi pro-BJP Dalits, each further fragmented.
Azad’s limits | Bhim Army, formed in 2015 in western UP, and Azad Samaj Party, created in 2020 in Saharanpur district, are the most significant of the political fragments that disillusionment with BSP has created across the state.
Both were founded by Chandrashekhar Azad, a Jatav lawyer, human rights activist and Ambedkar devotee. He is a creature of the new Dalit politics in UP. Born in a village to a schoolteacher, he first made headlines in 2016, when he mounted ‘The Great Chamars of Ghadkhauli Welcome You’ board at his village’s entrance; then again, after his attempted murder in 2021.
Azad gained popularity among Jatav youth by fighting atrocities, holding cycle yatras to advance Ambedkar’s ideas and establishing schools for Dalit children. His movement has momentum and he has been named by Timemagazine as one of the world’s 100 emerging leaders. For now, however, his Bhim Army, which is not yet 10, remains confined to western UP.
Then there are Ambedkar Jan Morcha (run by Shravan Kumar Nirala in Poorvanchal) and Bahujan Mukti Party (under Daddu Prasad in Bundelkhand), two smaller BSP-breakaway organisations, led by former BSP leaders. These too have only a local presence.
: TOI
Dalit leader lodges FIR against ex-Min Jena
Former Minister cum-BJD observer of Kendrapada district, Pratap Jena, was embroiled in a controversy allegedly for giving casteist remarks against one Manas Sethy, the district secretary of Kendrapada BJD SC cell, at his residence in Bhubaneswar on May 7.
 Sethy filed a complaint at the Capital police station in Bhubaneswar online. Sethy (35) of Purusottampur under Kendrapada Sadar police station alleged in his complaint that he had gone to former Minister Jenas residence at Bhubaneswar for a ticket to contest from the Kendrapada Assembly seat since Jena is the observer of the district. But Jena got infuriated and scolded him by giving casteist remarks against him and the Dalit community.
  Jena also threatened to kill him and directed to leave his quarters. Even when he went to lodge a complaint at Bhubaneswar-based Capital police station, some anti- socials, who were the supporters of Jena, allegedly terrorised him by showing a cycle chain and revolver near the police station, complained Sethy.  As a result, anticipating a life threat, I returned from the police station without lodging an FIR.
On May 9, I filed an online complaint in this regard, he said.  He also brought the matter to the notice of district election coordinator of BJD Rajesh Das, but in vain.  I need justice. I am a great admirer of Naveen babu and would not leave the party. But I request Naveen babu to provide justice to me by taking action against Jena, Sethy said.  Jena, however, was not available for comments. When contacted, district election coordinator for BJD Das stated that Sethy had gone to the residence of Jena in order to extract money by hoodwinking him.
: NYOOOZ.
Caste violence-hit villages in Bihar battle for amenities
Aksheev Thakur
Patna, May 13
Cavalcades of politicians of various parties are making rounds of Bihar’s Laxmanpur-Bathe village, but the people are unmoved with signs of hope for justice and meeting daily needs, slowly dying.
In 1997, 58 Dalits were killed by members of the Ranvir Sena, a private militia of the Bhumihar community. Those killed included six girls in the age group of 3-12 years, nine boys, 26 women and 17 men. Of 26 women killed, eight were pregnant
Sitting outside an unplastered house, Aitraya Devi said she had lost hope for justice. “December 1, 1997, is an unforgettable day in our lives. None of us here have forgotten that night. We have lost the hope of getting justice and moved on with our lives. We have to fetch water from the Sone river as there is no water facility here. Every year, a number of promises are made, but none gets fulfilled,” she said.
Another villager Rajvanshi Devi said though her son got a government job, political parties never bothered about improving the village.
At Senari village in March 1999, Naxals killed 34 upper-caste villagers, all from the Bhumihar community to avenge the Dalit killings at Laxmanpur-Bathe. Here also, villagers lament the lack of proper roads, water facilities and hospitals.
“We have hardly 250-300 villagers here. The parties could not cater to us. I am least bothered about the tall promises that are made at the national level. What will the political class do to improve our lives here? Leaders, including Ram Vilas and George Fernandes, came and promised so much, but what do we have?” said Pawan Kumar Rai, who runs a tea stall here.
Another villager Abhay Sharma said, “I have shifted my family to Patna. I was 20 when my father was killed. I came here to meet my old friends. I do not want to discuss the day when I lost my father. Senari doesn’t even have a good road and a hospital.”
Both villages are in the Jahanabad constituency that goes to the polls on June 1.
Bloodshed in 1997, 1999
- In 1997, 58 Dalits were killed by the Ranvir Sena, a private militia of the Bhumihar community, at Laxmanpur-Bathe village. Those killed included six girls in the age group of 3-12 years
- In March 1999, Naxals killed 34 upper caste villagers at Senari village to avenge the Dalit killings at Laxmanpur-Bathe; all those killed were from the Bhumihar community
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