11.06.2025.UT Daily NewS.A collection of SC.ST.Buddhist,Adivasi,reservation atrocity news of India.by Team Sivaji.9444917060.asivaji1962@gmail.com
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State cabinet OKs granting of statutory status for Scheduled Caste Commission
Woman booked under SC/ST Act for assaulting pharmacy attendant
Published - June 10, 2025 10:00 pm IST - MANGALURU
The Kundapura Rural police on Tuesday arrested a woman for allegedly assaulting and abusing a woman attendant at a pharmacy, who belongs to Scheduled Caste, at Gulvadi village.
The accused has been identified as Yasmin, 32, wife of Moneef Haneef Saheb, resident of Karkunje-Mavinakatte in Kundapura taluk, the Udupi district police said.
Dalit candidates in general seats rarely win. Can Chirag Paswan prove an exception?
Bihar Assembly election 2025: Data since 2004, when EC began publishing caste or tribal status of candidates, shows that only 1% of SC/STs contesting from general seats win. Bihar ranks low, NE high
Chirag Paswan, who is currently a Union minister, said: “My contest will only ensure a better strike rate for my party, which would help the NDA." (Source: ANI)
At a rally in Bihar’s Arrah on Sunday, Lok Janshakti Party (Ram Vilas) chief and Union Minister Chirag Paswan confirmed his intention to contest the forthcoming Assembly polls. The Dalit leader has also indicated that he wants to contest from an unreserved Assembly seat, which is being seen as a move to expand his and his party’s reach beyond the Scheduled Castes.
Asked if this also indicated his chief ministerial ambitions, Paswan, who is currently a Union minister, said: “My contest will only ensure a better strike rate for my party, which would help the NDA.”
If he contests from a general seat, it would be a first for Paswan. He has also never contested an Assembly election earlier, having won twice earlier from the Jamui Lok Sabha seat (2014 and 2019), and once from Hajipur (2024).
Poll data since 2004, when the Election Commission (EC) began specifying the caste or tribal status of each candidate, shows, though, that while Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) candidates frequently contest from general seats, their chances of victory are small. In Bihar, for example, in the past 20 years since the EC started maintaining the data, SC/ST candidates have won only five times from a general seat, and never in a Lok Sabha poll.
Notably, the undivided LJP, which has always fielded a high number of SC/ST candidates from general seat.
SC/ST Students Sidelined? GGSIPU's Round-3 Counselling Allegedly Shuts Out Reserved Candidates Prematurely
New Delhi- The admission process of Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University (GGSIPU) has come under scrutiny after the Dr Baba Sahab Ambedkar Association of Engineers (BANAE) flagged several anomalies in the university’s Admission Brochure for Bachelor’s Programme 2025-26, alleging systemic exclusion of Scheduled Caste (SC) and Scheduled Tribe (ST) students. In a strongly-worded letter to the Vice Chancellor, BANAE’s Legal Advisor, Advocate S.L. Vishal, demanded immediate corrective measures to ensure fair representation and equitable opportunities for marginalized students.
The letter highlights glaring discrepancies in GGSIPU’s reservation policy, scholarship provisions, and counselling process, which allegedly disadvantage SC/ST candidates. Despite the university’s vision of promoting “equity, excellence, and welfare for all,” BANAE claims that the current admission framework contradicts constitutional mandates and existing welfare schemes meant for marginalized communities.
In this connection a delegation of BANAE members are expected to meet the Vice Chancellor on June 10.
Key Anomalies in Admission Process
One of the major concerns raised is the premature elimination of SC/ST candidates from the counselling process. The Round-3 counselling flow chart allows reserved category seats to be converted into general category seats if left vacant, effectively shutting out eligible SC/ST candidates before the final spot round. BANAE argues that this violates Clause 6.1.1 of the admission brochure, which permits conversion of unfilled reserved seats only after the last counselling session, not necessarily the third round. The association has demanded that at least one dedicated spot round be conducted exclusively for SC/ST candidates before any seat conversion takes place.
Additionally, BANAE pointed out the omission of critical scholarship schemes for SC/ST students in the admission brochure. While the document mentions financial assistance under the Directorate of Students’ Welfare (DSW), it fails to include Centrally Sponsored Schemes (CSS) like the Post-Matric Scholarship (PMS) for SC/ST students and the Top-Class Education Scholarship (TCS). Shockingly, the brochure only lists the PMS-OBC (for OBC students), raising questions about deliberate exclusion. The letter also highlights the absence of Delhi government schemes such as the Dr. B.R. Ambedkar Scholarship for Toppers, which could significantly ease financial burdens for meritorious SC/ST students.
BANAE has urged the VC to intervene in the matter to include the various centrally sponsored schemes, PMS for SC and STs, freeship cards, financial assistance/ fee concessions schemes of government and additional measures to avoid discrimination, promote larger participation by SC/ST students and fill all reserved seats without converting to unreserved seats and ensure clarity in the admission processes during current sessions and future sessions to increase the enrolment of SC, ST students in GGSIPU.
To lead a state, you need hard work, intent, not necessarily experience: Odisha CM
Mohan Charan Majhi, Odisha's first BJP chief minister, reflects on his year in office, achievements, challenges, and vision for a prosperous Odisha by 2036.
From the head of a Panchayat to four-time MLA to, finally, Odisha’s first BJP chief minister, Mohan Charan Majhi’s journey has been an interesting one. Majhi, who completes a year in office on June 12 spoke about the perceived lack of experience of his government, its achievements over the past 12 months, and his vision for “Samruddha Odisha”, a vision document for a prosperous and empowered Odisha by Odisha’s centenary year 2036, by 2036. Edited excerpts from an interview
From a sarpanch to Odisha’s first BJP Chief Minister, you have come a long way. What has been your government’s most significant achievement in the last 12 months?
There is a long list of achievements. It is very difficult to pick any one because each of the programmes is aimed at some section of society. How do you expect me to choose which one is better, Subhadra Yojana (a credit scheme aimed at poor women) or providing enhanced procurement price for paddy or for that matter Godavarish Mishra Adarsha Prathamik Vidyalaya (an effort to transform primary education) or the implementation of Ayushman Bharat (the Union government’s health insurance scheme). Each programme is important.
You replaced Naveen Patnaik, who governed for 24 years. Is your government facing challenges of inexperience and administrative unfamiliarity?
Experience is a welcome qualification, but not an essential one. There are so many chief ministers who never held a ministerial position (before becoming CM). For us our inspiration is our Prime Minister who became the chief minister in Gujarat when he was not even an MLA but went to give a wonderful administration to the state with the famed Gujarat Model. For leading the state, you need hard work and intent, not necessarily experience. I have got plenty of both.
You have just raised the upper age limit for government jobs from 32 to 42 years. Don’t you thinkthis is to the disadvantage of the younger population?
These days children are taking much longer time in completing their education, which includes additional professional knowledge and skill. Increase in age is aimed at extending the chances of residents getting a government job. I don’t think younger talented people will lose. The best talent should come to serve. With an increase in age limit, we actually increase their probability (of getting a government job). Also, government jobs are only a minuscule proportion of the total jobs market and there is no question of an increase in unemployment of younger people.
As a tribal CM, what transformative changes for the community have you initiated?
There are many development programmes for tribals by both the central and the state government. We are also doing very fine work under the Aspirational districts and blocks programme. Twenty-five blocks of Odisha have secured top positions in Niti Aayog’s Delta rankings (which rate blocks on incremental improvements in areas like health and nutrition, education, agriculture, and infrastructure)) . One block (Rayagada) has achieved first rank. Our government has started ‘Sahid Madho Singh Haath Kharch Yojana’ to reduce dropout rates among school going children which will boost tribal education. In the current budget, a record ₹68,881 crore was provisioned under TASP (tribal area sub plan) and SCSP (scheduled caste sub plan) components.
Back in 2015, the then Odisha government issued an order granting 38.75% reservation for SC-ST students in technical and professional education, yet currently, only 20% reservation is being implemented, 8% for SC and 12% for ST, despite these communities comprising nearly 40% of Odisha’s population. What concrete steps are you taking to ensure that the promised 38.75% reservation is realised?
This issue is under consideration. We will definitely take a judicious decision at the appropriate time.
The Opposition have accused your government of short changing SEBCs (socially and economically backward classes) by offering only 11.25% reservation instead of 27%. What do you say to that?
There is a cap on the maximum percentage of reservation. The BJD also knows it. They didn’t even consider 11.25% reservation for SEBCs in their long years in government.
If reservation quotas are raised, will your government commit to proportionally increasing the total number of seats in colleges to ensure that open category students are not disadvantaged?
When the situation arises, we will definitely take a judicious decision.
The Subhadra scheme, providing financial assistance to over 9.8 million women, is a major initiative of your government. Can you elaborate on its tangible outcomes?
We have roped in over 10 million women under the Subhadra Yojana. We have already created close to 1.7 million Lakhpati Didis (a member of a self-help group earning in excess of ₹1 lakh a year; the scheme is one of the Union government’s flagship ones for poor women), which is the highest among all states. We are helping our women to become financially independent, create their own identity, by generating income through small businesses. We have earmarked ₹89,861 crores which will be exclusively spent for women in various developmental programmes.
Odisha is seeing rising crimes against women; what steps are being taken to make Odisha safer for women?
Have you made a comparative study on crimes against women during our period vis-ร -vis the previous year. You should have studied that first . In fact, there has been a dip. I have personally asked, time and again, the police administration to be extremely alert, active and do everything to punish the perpetrators of crimes against women. Under the new criminal laws, conviction rates are rising. During the previous regime conviction rate of crimes against women was a minuscule 9.4% if I am not wrong. We have set up special courts to try violence against women. We are determined to increase this conviction rate at least to achieve the national average in the next few years.
The BJD has accused your government of rebranding its schemes like “Ama Odisha” and “Naveen Odisha” and changing the colour of the buildings from green to orange. How do you respond to these accusations?
It’s a mindless criticism. Speaking about colours, then who painted schools, police stations, buses and hospitals ‘green’ in the first place? Painting and denting are part of routine maintenance. We have introduced over 30 new schemes for the current financial year 2025-26. After careful assessment, old schemes will be implemented with or without modifications if necessary and are continuing. Those not necessary will be replaced with newer ideas. Every government does it. So, what is the fuss about?
Your government opened all four entrance gates of the Jagannath Temple in Puri and approved a ₹500 crore corpus fund. Yet the experience of devotees to the temple has not improved. How do you plan to improve pilgrim experience, and what additional reforms are under consideration?
Improving pilgrim experience is a top priority. Pilgrims will be facilitated with all possible support. We are developing Puri as a religious and spiritual hotspot in the country. Lots of infrastructure, entertainment facilities based on Jagannath Culture are being planned so that pilgrims have a memorable time while staying at Jagannath Dham.
Your government has organised high-profile events like the Utkarsh Odisha -Make in Odisha Conclave 2025 and Pravasi Bharatiya Divas 2025. What’s the impact been?
A. Big events create big optics, and that’s good. I have already briefed about positive outcomes after Utkarsh Odisha. The success of Pravasi Bharatiya Divas speaks volume about our capacity to organise such events. We are working towards roping in Non Resident Indians and Odias, in specific, to be partners in our journey of growth and development.
Your proposed Bhubaneswar-Cuttack-Puri metropolitan region sounds ambitious. How will you fund it without neglecting Odisha’s 80% rural population?
We have enough funds. Urbanisation is one-way traffic, you cannot reverse it. The capital city of Bhubaneswar was originally planned for about 40,000 people in the 1950s. Look at the present. We should be prepared for the next 30 to 40 years by creating facilities from now on. Otherwise, things will be unmanageable later. In this light the Development of the Metropolitan region will complement the growth of rural areas, not otherwise.
The BJP came to power in Odisha talking of a double engine government. But statistics show, the central transfer in centrally-sponsored schemes have come down by 18% in 2024-25 compared to the previous year. Why did this happen?
A. Barring a few, we have received full central funds in most of the centrally-sponsored schemes. In some schemes, there are issues in identifying beneficiaries, which is a spillover issue. We are sorting out all technicalities. I don’t think there will be any such problem in the coming days.
Many state government corporations and statutory bodies like Lokayukta, State Women’s Commission are headless. What steps is your government taking to fill up the posts?
Talent hunt is going on. We will take right decision at the right time.
Is there a lack of synergy between your government and the party?
Absolutely not. BJP is a disciplined party. Both have one common goal, ‘welfare of people’ and work in tandem to achieve that. Both the Government and the party are in complete sync.
What are some of the unfinished tasks that you have set for yourself to finish in the next 4 years?
Development is a never-ending endeavor. We have just completed the first year of our governance which is a roaring success. We have another four years before the next election. We have already made a clear roadmap for the future, that is to achieve Samruddha Odisha by 2036. We have a goal of making Odisha a $500 billion economy (it is currently around $100 billion) and I and my entire team are preoccupied with this goal.
Tension in Mirzapur: Ambedkar statue vandalised in UP village; triggers protests by locals
Madhya Pradesh: Congress To Launch Public Movement To Install Dr Ambedkar Statue On HC Premises
The decision was taken at AICC office New Delhi, said leaders on Tuesday
ReporterUpdated: Wednesday, June 11, 2025, 01:39 AM IST
Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh): Congress has decided to launch a public movement in Madhya Pradesh to get Dr B R Ambedkar's statue installed on the premises of Gwalior High Court. The decision was taken at AICC office New Delhi, said leaders on Tuesday.
Congress state in-charge Harish Choudhary claimed, “The permission was granted and the process to install the statue of father of the Constitution Dr Bhimrao Ambedkar on the court’s premises had begun. However, the process has been stalled following the pressure of BJP-RSS; it is a direct attack on democracy and the Constitution.”
State president Jitu Patwari said that his party will launch a political movement to seek public consent for the installation of Dr Ambedkar's statue at the court campus. "Those opposed to the installation of the statue are BJP-RSS associated people (lawyers), and the Congress' will oppose their stance. Those who are opposing the installation of the statue should apologize and let it happen in the interest of the Constitution.
"Among all the sarsanghchalaks of the RSS till now, none has been a Dalit or a tribal. This exposes their hidden agenda. The aim of RSS and BJP is to create division in the society, whereas Congress believes in taking all sections along," said Leader of opposition Umang Singhar.
Narivetta’s partial image of Muthanga struggle: Adivasi fight for land drags on for 22 years
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The recently released Malayalam film Narivetta has reignited public discussions in Kerala regarding the historic Muthanga land struggle of 2003. The film attempts to portray Adivasis’ fight for land rights and the subsequent brutal police crackdown on them.
However, Narivetta presents an incomplete picture. The film’s focus is primarily on its dominant caste hero, while diminishing Adivasi struggles. It also fails to pin accountability on the political parties responsible for the continued oppression of Adivasi communities in the state.
Further, RTI responses from the state government reveal that spending of special funds for Adivasis and a promised allocation of land are both distressingly meagre.
A historic struggle for land
The Muthanga struggle broke out in February 2003 after the United Democratic Front (UDF) government failed to keep its promise of ending Adivasi landlessness by the end of 2002.
Earlier, in 2001, a 48-day protest, called kudil kettal samaram, took place in front of the Secretariat of Kerala. Protestors occupied the space in front of the Secretariat and built sheds. The Adivasi Gothra Maha Sabha (AGMS), who led the protests, demanded allocation of cultivable land to Scheduled Tribe (ST) communities after 32 Adivasis died of starvation in Wayanad district. This marked the inception of AGMS.
At the time, the protestors were promised 1 to 5 acres of land under the Tribal Resettlement and Development Mission (TRDM) scheme.
In 2003, after the state government failed to keep its promise, AGMS coordinators CK Janu and K Geethanandan led hundreds of Adivasi people to the Muthanga forest in Wayanad district. They pitched tents here in another act of protest.
On February 19, police entered the settlement. They set fire to tents and brutally assaulted the protestors. Two people, an Adivasi man named Jogi and a Dalit police constable identified as Vinod, died during the ambush. Janu, Geethanandan and many others were arrested and allegedly tortured in police custody.
Narivetta’s incomplete picture
Like many recent politically charged Malayalam films such as Malik (2021) and Pada (2022), Narivetta shies away from references to political parties. The film hesitates to engage with the long history of land struggles that laid the groundwork for Muthanga or the concept of an Adivasi self-governed area that the protestors demanded.
Toeing the line of Malayalam cinema’s conventions, Adivasis are pushed to the background. Instead, the film is set largely from the perspective of a savarna Christian police officer Varghese Peter (Tovino Thomas). Narivetta tries hard to evoke empathy for Varghese who is shown to participate in the violence at Muthanga only due to his economic circumstances and his own ignorance.
Ultimately, Adivasis and their demands for land and self-determination are sidelined in the rush to set up Varghese as a hero as he goes from hot-headed constable to rebel.
Notwithstanding the fact that many of the Muthanga protesters have died of old age, endlessly visiting courtrooms and with no resolution in sight, Narivetta portrays the judiciary in a friendly role. Further, no proof is provided for the film’s claim that more than two people died on February 19.
Meanwhile, members of the ruling Left Democratic Front (LDF) have been using the film to attack the UDF. This glosses over the fact that many Adivasi leaders, including Janu, have repeatedly pointed out how both coalitions have sabotaged the Adivasi land question.
In 2016, Janu launched the Janadhipathya Rashtriya Party (JRP) and contested the Assembly elections. She was backed by the National Democratic Alliance (NDA). She quit the NDA in 2018, but rejoined the alliance in 2021, ahead of Assembly elections in the state. Her choice to ally with the NDA can be directly attributed to the apathy of both the UDF and the LDF.
Her alliance with the NDA has struck a blow to the Adivasi land rights movement in Kerala. The disregard of the UDF and the LDF is also paving the way for the intrusion of Hindu fundamentalists in Adivasi settlements. Hindutva groups have attempted to co-opt Adivasi demands for land through rallies of their own. There has also been an observable shift towards Brahmanical rituals in place of traditional Adivasi rituals.
Land distribution today
The Kerala Scheduled Tribes (Restriction on Transfer of Lands and Restoration of Alienated Lands) Act, also known as the KST Act, was passed in 1975. As the name suggests, the Act promised the total restoration of the lands Adivasis in the state had been evicted from. However, the move faced stiff opposition from dominant caste landowners.
The KST Act was repealed in 1999 and replaced with The Kerala Restriction on Transfer by and Restoration of Lands to Scheduled Tribes Act. This 1999 Act is highly inadequate, but has become the only available legal framework for distributing land to Adivasis as the Forest Rights Act (FRA) does not have a provision for the distribution of new land.
For now, Adivasis demanding land are dependent on the 1999 Act and other agreements reached with the state government through protests such as the 2001 kudil kettal samaram and the 2014 nilpu samaram (standing agitation).
The Left has been in power for the last ten years in Kerala. Despite their mockery of the UDF in the wake of Narivetta’s release, data received through an RTI application shows that land distribution is barely moving forward. The RTI application asked the state’s Scheduled Tribe Development Department for the TRDM budgets from 2020 to 2025, with a breakdown of costs, the number of families allocated land, and the extent of land provided.
According to the data received from the Scheduled Tribe Development Department, a provision of Rs 45 crore was made in 2023-24 for implementing the TRDM scheme. However, only Rs 26 crore (57.84%) was spent. In 2024-25, Rs 37 crore was provisioned and only Rs 11.4 crore (30.94%) was spent.
It is useful to look at granular data from the tribal development offices (TDO) and the Integrated Tribal Development Project (ITDP) offices from across the state to understand the spending closely. Information was received from 14 of these 18 offices.
Wayanad, the district where the Muthanga struggle took place and where Narivetta is set, has two TDOs. One in Sulthan Bathery and the other in Mananthavady. The district’s ITDP office is in Kalpetta where only 14.21 acres of land have been newly distributed in the past five years.
Meanwhile, a lot of money is being spent under a ‘land bank survey’: Rs 63.72 lakh in 2024-25 alone. More than Rs 8 lakh go every year into the salary of a ‘site manager’, paid from the TRDM funds instead of from the state government.
Although the survey claims to identify land for distribution to Adivasis, such land is often found in locations that are isolated and away from sources of daily wage work.
Under the Sulthan Bathery TDO, 118 families received a total of 14.96 acres of land between 2021 and 2025. This is a mere 0.13 acre per family, against the promise of 1-5 acres of land. A total of Rs 5.74 crore was spent on this. Meanwhile, under Mananthavady TDO, 47 families were given a total of 4.27 acres, receiving just 0.09 acres per family, on average.
This reveals a peculiar trend of allocating paltry portions of land as charitable gestures instead of implementing true restorative justice. The original exclusion of Adivasis from land reform measures of the 1970s continues to be unresolved.
Chinnakkanal, under the Adimali TDO in Idukki district, is another resettlement site. In the past five years, no new land has been allotted. All budgetary allocations have gone into salaries of staff in TRDM project offices across the state and in some years, to the FRA. It is not clear what community forest rights were granted through the funds allocated to the FRA. In Velakku hamlet, under the same TDO, the RTI response reveals that only four of the 68 families have stayed on.
Such land abandonment, triggered by the absence of basic civic amenities and protection from wildlife attacks, is true of many resettlement sites. In the settlement called 301 in Chinnakkanal, those who stayed away from their plots faced the threat of encroachment by the land mafia. Landless Adivasis in the area, meanwhile, are planning to start a fresh struggle, demanding the allotment of the 822 acres that the state has been reluctant to distribute.
Aralam in Kannur district is yet another resettlement site where data shows that around Rs 30 lakh was spent in 2023-24 and Rs 24 lakh in 2024-25 on office expenses. In both years, the payments were made from the TRDM funds and not the government’s salary heads. A whopping Rs 1.5 crore was spent on wages at the adjacent Aralam Farming Corporation (Kerala) Limited in 2023-24.
However, it is unclear how many of these workers were the resettled Adivasis. Although Rs 5.31 lakh was spent in 2023-24 on ‘elephant walls’, there have been several elephant attacks even after these barriers were set up. Earlier this year an Adivasi couple were killed in one such attack.
Of the 3,000-odd families that were resettled in Aralam, with an acre of land to each family, close to half the families have abandoned the plots, unable to make a living while facing constant threats from elephants. However, there is pressure from officials to return to these lands. This is done through a ‘welfare fix’: a showering of benefits in the form of breakfasts, ration and allowances, though the Adivasis seek land that provides dignity.
Smokescreen tactics
To distract attention from the land question, the LDF government has devised new measures. The state government has sought to rename the segregationist practice of ‘colonies’, where Dalits and Adivasis live, and ‘oorus’ or the main town or village where the dominant communities live. Adivasi settlements are now to be referred to as ‘unnathi’ (peak), ‘nagar’ (town) or ‘prakrithi’ (nature). This has even been lauded as a “progressive” move by some.
Although the term ‘colony’ carries pejorative connotations, it has also served as a historical register of how savarna Malayali society made Adivasis landless, including through slavery in Wayanad. ‘Ooru’, meanwhile, has strong roots in Adivasis’ association with land, especially in Attappadi and in regions further south.
The state government’s tactics have a long history. The UDF government had initiated a land scheme under the catchy title ‘Aashikkum Bhoomi Adivasikku’ (land desired by Adivasis, for Adivasis). This was, in fact, a market-based scheme, matching a willing seller to a willing buyer. Meanwhile, the state’s crooked imagination of Adivasis was finally exposed by the inauguration of En Ooru in 2022—an ethno-tourism project that essentially functions as a living museum to showcase ‘Adivasi culture’.
The state must realise that resolving the Adivasi land question, with the care that it requires, is important to not only address a livelihood issue, but also newer threats from Hindutva infiltration and ecological disasters of the kind that hit Wayanad last year.
RC Sudheesh is an assistant professor of social sciences at the National Law School of India University, Bengaluru. He teaches courses in sociology and land politics. Views expressed here are the author’s own.
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The Kilvenmani massacre: When 44 Dalits were burned alive in one of independent India’s earliest caste-based atrocities
In 1968, 44 Dalits were burned alive in Kilvenmani village in present-day Nagapattinam district in Tamil Nadu following a labourers’ movement demanding higher wages.
7 min read
Image for representational purposes only (Edited by Abhishek Mitra)During a field visit to Kilvenmani in 2020, a thirsty Deivendra Kumar A recalls asking an elderly woman for drinking water. Her response stayed with him. “Neenga enna aalunga, neenga enga kitta thanni kudippeegala? (What caste are you? Will you take water from us?)” the woman asked. The question struck Kumar, then a Master’s student at a nearby university, for multiple reasons, but mainly because this Tamil Nadu village was the site of one of independent India’s earliest and most severe instances of caste-based violence.
More than half a century after that fateful day in 1968 when 44 Dalits were burned alive in Kilvenmani, Kumar A realised that little had changed in the remote village in the agriculturally rich Nagapattinam (earlier part of Thanjavur) district on the east coast of Tamil Nadu.
In his 2023 article in the journal Economic and Political Weekly, titled ‘In Memory of a Charred Village’, Kumar A evokes powerful imagery of a hut which has been turned into a memorial. Adjacent to it is a new memorial called Manimandapam, with 44 carved pillars and raised fists representing the martyrs, he notes.
But what happened in 1968? Who were the 44 victims of caste-based violence? Why was caste discrimination still prevalent in a newly independent India? And what was the aftermath of the violence?
Thanjavur and its skewed land ownership
In the 1960s, landlord oppression was prevalent in Thanjavur. Among most districts in Tamil Nadu, Thanjavur had the most skewed land ownership trend at the time. A 1973 article in the Economic and Political Weekly, titled the ‘Gentlemen Killers of Kilvenmani’, notes that since 1961, 3.8 per cent of cultivating households in the district held more than 25.88 per cent of the cultivated area while 76 per cent held only 37 per cent of the area. Thanjavur reportedly had a high number of landless labourers: for every 10 cultivators, there were at least nine labourers. Among the landless, Harijans formed the bulk. “It was here that feudal serfdom had fully developed,” the article noted.
During the 1940s, the Communists became active in the village and associated themselves with the Dalits, as per the article. By the 1960s, the Communist Party of India (Marxist) had successfully mobilised them, most of them agricultural labourers in Kilvenmani, to demand higher wages and resist the oppression of the feudal, upper-caste landlords.
Author and academic Elisabeth B Armstrong, in her 2014 book Gender and Neoliberalism: The All India Democratic Women’s Association and Globalization Politics, highlights how women from Kilvenmani also joined the growing leftist women’s movement. Together, Dalit men and women challenged what she calls “established traditions of social oppression, labour exploitation, and sexual predation”.
However, in 1966, upper-caste landlords under the leadership of Gopala Krishna Naidu founded the Paddy Producers Association (PPA). Naidu was one of the most powerful landowners in the area and owned estates in Kilvenmani and several neighbouring villages. The PPA helped bring labourers from outside Kilvenmani, replacing local labourers who were demanding salaries above the minimum wage.
“The landlords’ pent up anger, frustration and inability to reconcile themselves to the Harijans’ new found identity found expression on December 25, 1968…,” notes the 1973 article.
What happened on December 25, 1968
On December 25, 1968, a landlord in Kilvenmani hired labour supplied by the PPA to punish local labourers, who had gone on strike multiple times demanding higher wages. The atmosphere was quite tense. Eyewitness accounts record that on the same evening, a tea-shop owner was kidnapped by the landlords and beaten up for refusing to advise the labourers to join the PPA. Enraged, the labourers forced the release of the man. In the conflict, an agent of one of the landlords was killed.
The mirasdars (large landowners), according to Armstrong, sought revenge. At 10 pm that night, the landlords and their men arrived in police lorries and surrounded the Dalit neighbourhood from three sides, cutting all escape routes, she says. “They shot at the Harijans with guns, attacked them with sickles and sticks and set fire to their huts. Several Harijans were hurt, two very seriously. Some women, children and old men ran and took refuge in one of the huts. The murderers immediately surrounded the hut, and set fire to it,” she cites.
The next morning, 44 bodies were recovered.
In her 1999 book Caste, Society and Politics in India from the Eighteenth Century to the Modern Age, UK historian Susan Bayly noted that all the Kilvenmani victims were rural labourers belonging to the Harijan community. In contrast, among the 200 attackers reportedly involved in the violence were some of the richest landowners of the area.
While mainstream media portrayed the incident as a wage dispute, according to Armstrong, locals suggested that the violence was fuelled by upper-caste anxiety over the growing militancy of the agricultural workers and their defiance of caste-based practices. “The suggestion that it was simply the wage issue…was meant to cover up the underlying cause of the agrarian trouble that had attracted even judicial notice,” noted the 1973 article.
In his 2017 book, Dalit Women: Vanguard of an Alternative Politics in India, scholar and writer Anand Teltumbde notes: “These atrocities were unleashed by collectives of the dominating castes on collectives of the Dalit in a celebratory mode, not as punishment for specific contraventions of the caste code…”
The aftermath of the tragedy
“The role of the left women’s movement was as critical in Kilvenmani,” notes Armstrong. Women’s committees in the Communist Party of India produced some powerful women leaders, as seen in the protests that followed the Kilvenmani massacre, she says.
“These same Dalit women active in the agricultural workers’ union of the Thanjuvar district created the backbone for the Tamil Nadu Democratic Women’s Association (DWA) when it formed in 1974,” says Armstrong. In the founding convention of the Tamil Nadu DWA in 1974, she further notes, Dalit women activists from Thanjavur constituted half of its membership of 27,000 women.
However, with the 25 accused in the murder case, including Naidu, being acquitted, the alleged role of the bureaucracy and local administration in refusing to act against the upper castes had become increasingly evident.
According to Teltumbde, the “extreme caste-class prejudices of India’s judges” had been apparent since the Kilvenmani massacre. According to the 1973 Economic and Political Weekly article, “The evidence did not enable Their Lordships to identify and punish the guilty”.
The ‘Gentlemen Killers of Kilvenmani’ article notes how the (Madras) High Court ruled that it was beneath the dignity of the landlords to stain their hands with the blood of the lowly; such an act, they reasoned, was inconsistent with their social standing. A man who owned “extensive lands,” and “a car,” the court opined, could not possibly be so insensitive. “In brief, gentlemen farmers will also be gentlemen killers,” the article reads.
Although relegated to the pages of history, the Kilvenmani massacre remains one of independent India’s first and harshest caste-based violence. The memorial at the village honours the lives lost and also stands as testimony to how justice was denied to the victims.
Ironically, not much has changed in Kilvenmani even today. “Kilvenmani is caught in a time capsule, where most of the villagers are landless,” Kumar A notes in his article.
Nikita writes for the Research Section of IndianExpress.com, focusing on the intersections between colonial history and contemporary issues, especially in gender, culture, and sport. For suggestions, feedback, or an insider’s guide to exploring Calcutta, feel free to reach out to her at nikita.mohta@indianexpress.com
The end।
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