| |
Bihar: The privatization of
terror
By Sanjay K Jha
For
over two decades the State of Bihar has been home to one
of the most extraordinary social aberrations in the
history of independent India: the "private armies"
raised by upper-caste landowners to protect their feudal
privileges. Among the most powerful of a succession of
these private armies is the Ranvir Sena, which has
terrorized large areas of the state since its formation
in September 1994 at the Belaur village of Bhojpur
district.
On August 29, 2002, however, the
Ranvir Sena was effectively "decapitated" with the
arrest of its chief, Brahmeshwar Singh, at Patna. Singh
carried a reward of half a million Indian rupees
(US$10,300) on his head, and is accused in numerous
criminal cases, including those concerned with the
killing of some 200 persons. A founding member of the
Sena, he took over the leadership of the Ranvir Kisan
Sangharsh Samiti, an organization created to protect
landowner interests in Central Bihar in 1994, and turned
it into the one of the most lethal private armies in the
state. He first came into the limelight after the
massacre of 22 persons in Bathani Tola village of
Bhojpur district on July 11, 1996.
Singh's
arrest is not the first setback for the Sena in recent
times. On August 24, 2002, three of its front-ranking
leaders were killed by left-wing extremists - Naxalites
- of the People's War Group (PWG) in Pariyari village in
Arwal district, once considered to be a bastion of the
Ranvir Sena.
Reports indicate that the Ranvir
Sena has been at the receiving end for some time now,
and has lost much of its earlier influence among upper
caste landowners. One of the reasons is the increasing
criminalization of the outfit. A large number of
unemployed lumpen youth and criminals joined the Sena
after the Miyapur massacre of 34 persons on June 16,
2000, the last major massacre executed by the Ranvir
Sena. Extortion from their own caste men, initially for
the purchase of arms and ammunition, became rampant
after this point, and those who refused to pay were
subjected to reprisals.
Factional rivalry also
increased within an increasingly undisciplined and
criminalized cadre, as Brahmeshwar Singh began to lose
control. Violence committed by the Ranvir Sena against
its supporting caste men alienated a large number of
upper caste landlords, and, over time, intra-caste
rivalry and warring area chiefs began to dominate the
Ranvir Sena's trajectory.
Though armed gangs
have been part of feudal history of rural India, Bihar
is the only state in post-independence India where
private armies of landowners exist. Most of these
private armies emerged in the late 1970s and 1980s as a
feudal response to the growth of various left-wing
extremist - Naxalite - movements in the central and the
southern (now known as the state of Jharkhand) parts of
Bihar. Over the past two decades, an estimated 15
private armies have existed at various points of time in
the state, including prominently: the Kuer Sena, the
Bhumi Sena, Lorik Sena, Sunlight Sena, Bramharshi Sena,
Kisan Sangh, Gram Suraksha Parishad and the Ranvir Sena.
Clashes between these outfits and various left-wing
extremist groups have left hundreds dead and many more
maimed over the past two decades.
Among all of
these the Ranvir Sena emerged as the most dreaded and
ruthless group as it battled the rising strength of
left-wing extremist groups, especially the Communist
Party of India, Marxist-Leninist (CPI-ML) (Liberation).
The forerunners of the Ranvir Sena in Bhojpur were the
Bramharshi Sena, Kuer Sena, Kisan Morcha and Ganga Sena.
These groups, however, with a limited cadre strength and
area of operation, could not sustain their existence for
long and eventually withered away. Over the years, the
Ranvir Sena extended its influence to the Jehanabad,
Patna, Rohtas, Aurangabad, Gaya, Bhabhua and Buxur
districts, mobilizing the landed caste groups in these
districts against the various left-wing extremist
organizations.
Proscribed by the state
government since August 1995, the Ranvir Sena is highly
organized and its cadres are reportedly better paid than
any of the private armies in the past. Landowners in
central Bihar finance the Ranvir Sena through generous
subscriptions. The Sena also runs a front organization,
the Ranvir Kisan Maha Sangh and a women's wing, whose
members are trained in the use of arms.
Over the
years, the Ranvir Sena has carried out a number of
massacres in central Bihar. On June 16, 2000, its cadres
killed 34 persons at Miapur village, Aurangabad
district. On April 21, 1999, 12 persons were killed at
Sendani village, Gaya district. On February 20, 1999, 11
persons were killed at Narayanpur village, Jehanabad
district. On January 25, 1999, 23 persons were massacred
in Sankarbigha village, Jehanabad district. On December
1, 1997, 58 persons were massacred at Lakshmanpur-Bathe
village, Jehanabad district. On April 10, 1997, 10
persons were killed at Ekbari village, Jehanabad. And on
March 23, 1997, Ranvir Sena cadres killed 10 persons at
Habispur village, Patna district. The Sena's victims, by
and large, have been landless and poor peasants of the
most backward castes.
The state government, on
its part, failed to contain the activities of the Ranvir
Sena, at least in some measure, because of the Sena's
strong links with the political structure and
administration. The context of the Sena's activities has
been conditioned by an extreme polarization of state
politics and the bureaucracy on the basis of caste. This
polarization deepened in the 1980s, when the dalits were
mobilized by the left-wing extremists and increasingly
stereotyped as Naxalites by the upper castes who banded
together. The result was a closing of ranks, not only
among the richer and landowners, but also along caste
lines that embraced every rung of the social ladder,
down to the poorest of the castemen. It was through
these alliances that the Ranvir Sena emerged,
representing the same forces that dominate the state's
structures of power.
The Ranvir Sena's success
was also owed in part to the degeneration that had crept
into the left-wing extremism. The Naxalite movement,
which once challenged the authority of historically
entrenched classes, had also gradually become caught up
in the same vortex of caste politics, and the
confrontation at the grassroots level is now molded by
caste factors and not by class ideology.
This
pattern of politics remains intact in Bihar, and the
succession of recent shocks to the Ranvir Sena are not
symptomatic of any fundamental transformations. The
forces that gave rise to the Ranvir Sena are still in
control of the socio-political and administrative
structures in Bihar, and these will reassert themselves,
either through a resurgence of the Ranvir Sena, or the
emergence and consolidation of another private army on
the already violent canvas of state politics.
Sanjay K Jha, Research Associate,
Institute for Conflict Management, a non-profit society
set up in 1997 in New Delhi committed to the evaluation
and resolution of problems of internal security in South
Asia
Published with permission from the
South Asia Intelligence Review of the South Asia Terrorism
Portal
|
| |
|
|
 |
|
