The burning of a Dalit house has put Sunpedh on tenterhooks, and overenthusiastic politicians and activists aren't helping matters. Akshat Kaushal reports.
In the days following the death of two children after their house was set on fire, the village of Sunpedh has become a hub for politicians, activists, social workers and religious leaders. Accompanied by their followers, many of them have stationed themselves in different parts of this small village located in Haryana's Faridabad district, around 45 km from Delhi.
Sitting by the side of one of the inner roads of the village, a set of men who claim to be preachers are giving villagers a lesson in religion and caste.
In another part of the village, a lawyer, with affiliations to a political party, has arrived with his retinue of men. He heads straight to meet the family of the victims, who belong to the Dalit community, and promises to fight their case.
After some time, members of the family hand him documents related to the case.
Sunpedh has the look of a modern village -- even a small city. Multi-storey houses are common and almost every house has a motorcycle. The roads are cemented. And, from inside most houses, television news anchors can be heard hysterically analysing the latest developments in the case.
The village has around 80 Dalit houses, while around 600 houses belong to members of the upper castes, mainly Rajputs. The upper castes are the land-owning community, while the Dalits mostly work as daily labourers.
On the surface, caste divisions do not seem to exist here.
The houses of the Dalits are as big as those of the upper castes. Upper caste men can be seen seated next to those from the Dalit community. If at all, the caste divisions are visible in how the houses are located, with people from different castes occupying different sections of the village. But there is no restriction on movement inside the village.
Tension, however had been simmering below the surface -- at least between two families, one of them Dalit and the other Rajput.
This tension flared up on the night of October 20 when some people associated with the upper caste family allegedly set the house of Jitender, a Dalit, on fire. In the blaze, Jitender's two children, daughter aged nine and son aged three, lost their lives, while his wife, Rekha, sustained serious burn injuries.
The incident has suddenly brought caste equations in the village into focus.
One of the policemen who was suspended after the incident has said that he had written twice to senior police officials asking for more security in the village -- an allegation senior officials deny.
Now, all day long, leaders from different political parties can be seen arriving here to "assess" the situation.
Some are welcomed by the policemen guarding the door of the house that was attacked and set on fire; others are sent away.
When a delegation of the Bharatiya Janata Party arrives, the policemen promptly oblige by opening the gates and escorting it into the house. That this courtesy is being extended because BJP is the ruling party in the state does not go unnoticed. None of the politicians, meanwhile, misses an opportunity to give a "bite" to the near dozen television news cameras that are now a fixture in the village.
While the case has been handed over to the Central Bureau of Investigation, the local policemen posted in the village do not hesitate to express their views, some of which smart of deep-seated prejudices.
"The media has unnecessarily created a fuss about the murders," says one policeman, posted next to victim's house. "Such murders keep happening," adds another.
Most of the policemen, however, are troubled by the discomfort this case has caused.
The role -- or lack of it -- of the police is under question.
According to the family of the victims, there should have been six policemen guarding them. But on the night of the incident, only two were present, one of whom, they allege, was asleep.
The presence of the required number of policemen, they say, would have averted the tragedy.
Meanwhile, some senior officials of the civil administration arrive. They are not here to meet Jitender or his family. Barely interacting with them, they wait for Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar, who arrives a short while later. As soon as he leaves after meeting the family, they too exit.
A bitter rivalry
There are two versions of what triggered the incident on Tuesday night. There is the upper-caste version, which is dominant, and then there is the version of the Dalits.
The victims' family alleges that the house was set on fire by men belonging to the family of Balwant Singh, who lives nearby. Singh is a Thakur and the two families allegedly have had a long-running dispute.
Villagers say in October last year, three members of Singh's family were murdered in the dead of the night. Nine men of the Dalit community were arrested in connection with the murders, some of whom are cousins of Jitendra. While the cause of the murders is disputed, some villagers say they took place over a stolen mobile phone. The recent attack on the Dalit household, they add, could be to avenge the three murders last year.
Singh's family, however, denies that any of its members was involved in setting the Dalit house on fire.
"In today's environment, a lot happens even if you slap a Muslim or a Dalit. But no one does anything even if members of (upper-caste) families are killed," argues Singh. "We are glad the government has ordered a CBI probe into the matter."
A less-mentioned fact is the political rivalry between these two families.
One of the Dalit men arrested for the murder of the three men of the Thakur community last year was the village sarpanch. He had unseated Singh's family to claim the seat.
Sunpedh is a reserved seat and it is alleged that there was a rivalry over it between Jitendra's family and a candidate being backed by the Thakurs.
Whatever the reason, the village is now on tenterhooks.
The Dalits fear there could be retaliation once the focus shifts away from the village.
"These deaths have been caused because of the fight between these two families. I don't think it is a case of Dalits being targeted," says a woman who lives near the victims' house but does not wish to be named. "But, I fear that the upper caste people might now trouble us."
Data from the National Crime Records Bureau shows that incidents of crime against members of the Scheduled Castes in Haryana have increased by around 70 per cent between 2013 and 2014. The BJP formed the government in the state in October 2014, after 10 years of Congress rule.
During the same period, across India these incidents increased by around 20 per cent.
However, whether the rise in crimes against SCs is related to the coming of power of the BJP government is an open question, as the number of incidents in the state had jumped by 95 per cent between 2013 and 2014, when Congress was in power in the state.
Image: Jitendra after his house was set on fire by upper caste people of his village at Ballabgarh in Faridabad. Phtoograph: PTI Photo
