Some Lessons

Patna’s Jagdeo Path became a battlefield last 5-6 April 2011. The people of Musahar Toli not only taught a lesson to the rifle-wielding musclemen patronised by JD (U), they even put up an effective challenge to the police force. With this struggle, the poor established a new example of a brave protest in Patna in recent times.

This movement by the urban mahadalits received tremendous support and posed a challenge to Nitish’s much-touted claims of concern for the mahadalits. Even the Nitish-struck media could neither discredit the movement nor make it disappear from the newspapers.

Our party needs to undertake an in-depth analysis of this movement and draw lessons from it. On 5 April, in the presence of the police force of as many as four thanas, the musclemen of builder Amit Poddar tried to take control of the cemeteries of Jagdeo Path and Modmusahar Toli in Siddharth Nagar. The musclemen were armed with rifles. Battling against random firing the women, men and the youth got hold of the builders and beat them up severely; they were rescued by the police. 25 year old Butti Devi lost her life in the protest struggle and 5 others were injured. After crushing the attempts of land grab, the people kept the Bailey Road jammed for several hours. This cycle of events continued the next day.

In a protest against this incident on 8 April 2011 in Patna, the effigy of Nitish Kumar was burnt in offices of 8 blocks of the district and a protest march was taken out on 9 April. On that day it was also announced that a Pledge Meeting would be held on 26 April on the location of the incident. Earlier, on 7 April, the party’s Bihar state committee sent a fact finding team to the place where the incident took place and they met the victims and their families.

After 1980, this is the first incidence of this kind of protest by the urban poor. In the beginning of the 1980s while the poor and the landless peasants were contending with feudal forces in the rural areas, IPF was being formed and the party was establishing connection with the urban poor. In January 1980, the CPI MLC, Ramesh Singh called musclemen from Mokama and Begusarai to uproot the slum dwellings in Lohanipur. In those days, the party was involved in underground work in Lohanipur. The people living in the slums gave a determined fight and were able to send the musclemen packing. A few leaders of the party made their abode in the slums itself to carry forward the struggle. This slum in Lohanipur is present even today. Here, besides other castes, people belonging to the Mushahar group were present in large numbers.

Immediately after this incident, the poor living in the slums of Naya Tola and Mussalhapur were also involved in brave battles against destruction of their slum dwellings. In Naya Tola, a 20 year youth was martyred against which a 3 day bandh was declared in Patna. During the bandh all the shops and markets remained closed at the local level. The poor of the Maila Tanki and the homeless also soon joined the struggle.

In Mahmudichak (Rajendra Nagar) also, the poor fought against the musclemen bravely. In the days to follow, Shaheed Bhagat Singh colony in Kankadbaagh became the new site of the struggle. A statue of Shaheed-e-azam Bhagat Singh was also established here which was inaugurated by Anjali Dutt, wife of martyr Batukeshwar Dutt. The fight continued from 1983 to 1985. In 1983, during the protest, Com. Seetaram Paswan was martyred by a police bullet. In the leadership of the party, a demonstration was organized outside the civil court carrying the body of slain martyr.

Slowly several slum dwellings of Patna got associated with the party and the movement of the urban poor created a new identity. In 1985-89, several planned assaults on urban poor were carried out by the then Bindeshwari Dubey’s Congress government. First, several slums located in the land currently for officer’s flats in Bailey Road were uprooted. Immediately the police destroyed the slums in Rajvanshi Nagar and Harding Park. In the process of destruction in Harding Park, a three year old girl lost her life. Our party was not active in these areas. In absence of an organized protest, the government was successful in creating an atmosphere of fear and the final assault in this series was launched in Bhagat Singh colony where our base was also present. One severely cold winter night an attack was launched that took people unawares, and the slums were destroyed. Despite being uprooted, people organized themselves into groups in several areas since along with them some belonging to the leadership had also been displaced. It is these leaders who by staying with the displaced masses, got them together slowly and tried to re-establish them and met with some success.

The party’s work is still continuing among the people in Kankadbagh’s RMS colony, Ashok Nagar, Ravidas Toli and Rajendra Nagar Sabzi Mandi. Even though the movement by the slum dwellers left a mark in Patna, and in several settlements male and female leaders and activists also emerged, this historic and determined movement that continued for five years eventually petered out. Slowly the party activists’ and leaders’ discipline of centring in these settlements began to weaken. Earlier several leaders used to stay there and were a part of their everyday struggles, braving repression and even jail. However, slowly the culture of make fleeting visits became more pronounced.

For the urban poor, the question of ‘home’ is one of life and death. Only those organizations can provide leadership whose leaders maintain a ‘fish and water’ type of relation with the masses. In the absence of such strong association, the movement is bound to become a victim of tokenism and legalism.

In a district like Patna which is not a factory-centred industrial enclave, the urban poor have a close connect with the rural areas. Instead of focusing our attention and efforts on bringing the movement among them back to life, our analysis has been limited to the fact that our slogan for the urban poor was overstated and a victim of left deviation. Naturally this analysis has led to a defensive attitude which has weakened the development of a determined struggle of the urban poor. Our slogan of the earlier period was, “the land on which we are settled is our land”. This was changed to “Arrange permanent residence for the urban poor”. The demand for permanent residence is not wrong in itself. However, the essence of ‘right to residence’ which is evident in the first slogan is missing in the second one.

For Jagdeo Path Mushahari it is the first slogan that seems more appropriate. Government and builders eye this land which is worth crores today. Struggles of the urban poor have taken place all over Patna, and many of them are now stuck in court cases. But the people of Jagdeo Path Mushahar Toli have once again blazed a path of militant struggle.

In the coming days it is likely that moves to uproot the poor will intensify with the rising cost of the land. The party organization will have to work towards building struggles on the Jagdeo Path model. Legal possibilities must be utilised and government policies exposed in a planned manner. The experience of our struggles in the 1980s suggests that the struggle must be taken out of the legal domain. However it is not possible to achieve this objective by the way of temporary, disconnected, fleeting visits. The party, especially the leaders will have to make shelters in the slums. Among the urban poor, special emphasis would have to be paid on the Musahar Toli, because from the time of party’s origin, this community has remained in the forefront in the revolutionary struggles and despite Nitish’s tactics targeting Mahadalits, this community has stood steadfast with our party.

It is by developing the movement of the urban poor that we can prepare a committed mass base in cities and effectively expose the Nitish government’s development slogan.