Nandabai sits outside her house stirring some pulses on a wood fire. On February 1, she and her family had to flee this village after the police came to raid “illegal” stocks of kerosene in her house. While the police claim the villagers attacked them, the people have a contrary story.
“They pulled my hair and some of it has still not grown back,” she said, pointing to a bald patch on her head. The police were targeting her husband Pannalal Rajput who heads the small Pardhi settlement about 28 km from Nagpur in Umred taluka. “We all fled, otherwise we would have been killed,” said Mr. Rajput.
The Pardhis, a nomadic tribe, were vilified for being a criminal tribe in the British days and still suffer from that stigma. This is one village which has settled down and partially got land rights. “Even now no one behaves with any humanity towards us,” Mr. Rajput remarked.
His lawyer J.M. Shamkuwar said a public interest litigation petition would be filed demanding action against erring officials and compensation. Complaints will also be filed in the magistrate's court against individual police officers. The police filed a charge sheet in May against 26 villagers, 19 of them women and accused them of attempted murder, assaulting police, and obstructing their work. Rajput is the prime accused and also has a case under the Essential Commodities Act.
The charge sheet said the police found two barrels of kerosene in Rajput's house and while they were doing the panchnama, Rajput, his wife and two sons tried to obstruct them and created a ruckus. They called for help and shouted to the village to attack the police with sticks and stones. About 50 to 60 women abused the police who were attacked with bricks, stones and lathis injuring sub- divisional police officer Sudhakar Palandurkar, inspector Madhukar Gite from Umred police station and 14 other policemen. One police constable accused Mr. Rajput of trying to kill him with an axe. Two police vehicles were attacked causing a loss of Rs. 50,000, the police said.
The people are upset that eight months after police ransacked the village, no action has been taken, and instead they have been accused of attempted murder. Mr. Rajput said he stocked kerosene for the whole village and the people had asked him to do it, after some instances of women being burnt to death in the village. “The people allow me to stock kerosene and in turn I give it to them when they need it. There is nothing illegal in this,” he said.
Even though people fled, police came after them. Sunita Pawar's three-year-old son Abhay was hit on the head. “I was at the hand pump filling water along with other women and the police came there and hit us. They chased us all over the place. After that we were taken to jail along with our children and abused in filthy terms,” she said.
“We were scared to go back,” said Sangita. The people have accused the police of breaking into their homes, opening steel cupboards and stealing gold and cash from at least 10 to 12 houses. “They destroyed food stocks, poured kerosene in food and perforated utensils so we could not cook. When we came back after 10 days there was no food to eat in a single house,” said Sunita. She is upset because she lost two gold ornaments which she bought after years of saving money.
Agyawanti Pawar, 65, sustained a severe hand injury and police did not allow any medical examination. Among those charge-sheeted is 60-year-old Kalavati Pawar whose teeth were broken in the attack.
The people did not dare file a complaint at Umred police station, till Anand Jammu of the All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC) supported them. However, this was not treated as a formal complaint.
Educated up to the seventh standard, Mr. Rajput is an Ambedkarite and a follower of Jyotiba Phule and Shahu Maharaj, whose ideas of social justice he tries to spread. He has done much by way of getting government schemes for his village and they have pucca houses. He also led a battle for caste certificates and land rights and 18 of the 40 families have land titles. The village sits on a small hillock off the main road and there is about 200 acres around it. He has been speaking up against police harassment of Pardhis and some articles were published in a Marathi daily last year by Pramod Kalbande, a Nagpur-based journalist. This angered the police who were waiting for a chance to take revenge and they got it when the government ordered a crackdown on the hoarding of kerosene after the incident of Additional Collector Yashwant Sonawane being burnt to death near Manmad in January 2011.
Sanjay Mungle, the primary school teacher in the village said on February 1, when he came to school at around 10 a.m., there was no one. None of the 11 students attended school for a while. “There was a lot of broken glass everywhere. I used to come here everyday and wait for the children,” he said. Due to Mr. Rajput's efforts most children are educated and his own son and daughter-in-law are studying law and there is one graduate in the settlement.
Villages neighbouring Rajulwadi are upset that the Pardhis have so much land. In the past they have claimed this as grazing land and once let loose their cattle when there was standing crop in the area, said Mr. Rajput.
“There have been attempts to evict us from here. In 1995-96 I publicly said I would convert to Islam, if my people didn't get land rights. That attracted a lot of attention,” he added.
A senior police official said the matter was under investigation but no policeman was suspended. The people did submit a complaint but it was not treated as a first information report.
