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 •  Contact the author Inquiry outcome awaited : Yatra attack
Reetika Khera

27 June 2005

The Rozgar Adhikar Yatra (employment guarantee campaign) that took off from Delhi on 13 May was brutally attacked and lathi-charged on 4 June in Balrampur village of Surguja district, Chhatisgarh, by a group of AK-47 armed policemen in civilian clothes. The Yatra is under way to consolidate the campaign for a full-fledged, universal and irreversible Employment Guarantee Act (EGA).

Following widespread protest and condemnation of the incident, the Home Ministry promised to set up a two-member independent inquiry. Instead, the state government of Chhatisgarh has setup a one member inquiry committee, headed by Sunil Kumar Khadjur, Secretary Women and Child Welfare. The Committee was set up around 10 June and was to report back to the Home Secretary of Chhattisgarh in 15 days. Khadjur has asked for statements from the yatris regarding the incident and was to visit Balrampur in person soon after that. He was to record the statements of the locals who were present at the Yatra meeting as well as the local organizers.

On the day of the attack, the Yatra had reached Balrampur around 8:30 p.m. and a public meeting began, much like any of the other peaceful gatherings that have taken place on the Yatra's route. Within a few minutes, two policemen in civilian clothes reached the spot on motorcycles and told all the yatris to meet the tehsildar immediately. The yatris politely told them that they would prefer to continue the meeting since we were late by more than five hours.

The policemen left in anger and returned within fifteen minutes with three or four other men, also on motorcycles, in civilian clothes, armed with lathis and guns. Without any warning, they disrupted the meeting and loaded their guns. The local villagers and the yatris began running towards their tractor and bus respectively. The men started shouting at those gathered there, abusing them using foul language. Initially they were just kicking chairs, breaking the lights and the mike, but then they started hitting the bus, the yatris and villagers with their lathis. They also pointed a loaded gun at the driver, forced him into the bus, and ordered him to get going. The policemen also hit the bus as it was leaving and broke a window as well as the left-turn indicator glass.

Several women on the bus were bruised including Naziya, a student of social work from Mumbai who is working with Mazdoor Kisan Shakti Sangathan, and Zulekha a freelance journalist from Chhattisgarh. As I was making my way to the bus, I was hit by a lathi on my legs. One of the men tried to stop this and said, "Don't hit her – it's a lady". But this did not stop his colleague who proceeded to hit my arm. Kaustav, a PhD student from Jawarharlal Nehru University was hit on the head and his cheek was bleeding. Samar, an activist from Progressive Students Union, was hit on the knee. Purnaram from Tilonia village in Rajasthan was also hit on his waist.

Jean Drèze (economist and a lead coordinator of the Yatra) was hit the most. He was making a phone call across the road while this was happening. On hearing the noise and screams he made a dash for the venue of the meeting. But as soon as he arrived, he was surrounded by four of these men and beaten with lathis. The yatris were lucky to escape without any major injury but the fate of the local residents is still unclear. We are all deeply concerned about their safety.

According to local residents, this incident is typical of the arbitrary exercise of police power in the area. Most of them seem to live in deep fear of state authorities. Even making a phone call from the next village after the incident proved extremely difficult as local residents were very scared of being targeted if they offered us any assistance.

On 5 June some of us went to Ambikapur town to file a FIR with the police authorities. We were able to meet the Inspector General of Police (IG), A N Upadhyay, after three trips to his office. While the IG accepted that this was a "very unfortunate incident", he did not give us any assurance that action would be taken against those responsible for it. The SP (Balrampur), B P Kalluri, was also present for a short while at the meeting and shockingly, he denied that any lathi-charge had taken place. He also stated that for the police, "every outsider is a suspected Naxalite, until proved otherwise".

The press release issued by the police authorities was even more shocking. It contained many inaccurate statements and lies. For instance, the yatris were allegedly raising slogans such as "tehsildar haay-haay" and "police prashaasan murdabad", which is untrue. Secondly, it claimed that the yatris tried to block the road when they were asked to leave. This is also untrue – once lathi-charged the yatris barely had enough time to scramble to the safety of the bus. In any case there was absolutely no traffic on the road at that time of the evening and it would have been pointless to block it. Thirdly, the police press release stated that among the yatris were "young Nepali-looking" girls, which led the police to suspect that they were Naxalites. Finally, this press release claimed that the yatris were put on the bus "with respect" (sammanjanak tareeke se) towards Ramanujganj, where their next programme had been scheduled.

It is hard to know what to make of a police statement which says that the visitors were suspected Naxalites and proceeds to claim that these suspected Naxalites were "sent off respectfully" for their next programme!

The outcome of the Chhatisgarh government's inquiry is awaited.

Reetika Khera
27 Jun 2005

This is an eye-witness account. Reetika Khera is a PhD student at the Delhi School of Economics and is a campaigner with the Yatra. Further information on the Yatra, including the full itinerary, is available at the special section on "Rozgar Adhikar Yatra" at www.righttofoodindia.org. The Yatra is reachable at rozgar@gmail.com or +91-09868888127.

Citizen Direct is India Together's channel for publishing reports from citizens who have detailed information about specific civil society concerns and matters, by virtue of their participation, association, or independent observation. These reports are therefore as witnessed and understood by the authors themselves; India Together accepts no liability or responsibility for them.   More

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