Transforming Margins Through Resistance,Articulation and Politics

Musahar Community: The Background

The Musahar community lives in small and scattered hamlets alongside the banks of the river Gandak in eastern Uttar Pradesh. This Musahar belt extends from the neighbouring state of Bihar where they have a noticeable presence. In Uttar Pradesh, their population is densely concentrated in Kushinagar, Maharajganj, Deoria and Gorakhpur districts where they constitute the majority of scheduled caste population. ⁴

According to Risley (1891), Musahars are an offshoot of the Bhuyia Tribe in Chotanagpur. John C Niesfield (1888b: 20) claims that they belong to the Kol or Kolarian stock. John C Niesfield (1888a: 1) gives the following description of the Musahars of Central and Upper India:

Scattered about in the eastern half of the great Gangetic plain may be seen the tiny fragments of the Mushera tribe; living in mud hovels in the corners of jungle, or in caves and sheltered nooks under the shade of trees; disowned by Hindus, and not permitted to dwell amongst them, except in the outskirts of some of their villages; dotted at wide intervals apart from each other, and always in very small groups or hamlets at a time.

The situation has not changed much since then, at the edge of villages, near forests, distant from other Dalit households; huts of Musahars can be seen with no roads around to connect them with the mainland. They have been working almost as bonded labourers on their own land to repay the loan taken from local landlords in distress months. The most striking feature of this entire transaction is that indebtedness provided them a kind of job security. Though they are underpaid ⁷

The historical account of Musahar’s life in the region was difficult to dig out as their presence resided in their absence. People have heard of them but where they live and how they live was not accorded any significance. People had a sense that they reside in the neighbourhood but that neighbourhood was not part of the civilised boundaries of the village life. The faceless Musahar was only remembered as a rat-eater or more recently as a reluctant labourer. Musahars are perceived as lazy by nature who are not interested to look for work until their last penny is spent. These socially constructed images in a way justify their exclusion and marginalisation from the mainstream society. But at the same time, they can and will be used as appendages in the village society for menial works. Their work is not sufficient enough to integrate them into the village society and economy. Though flesh-eating is popular in the area, flesh of a rat induces stigma. The regular practice is that Musahars collect the leftover grain scattered in the field after the harvest. In the field rats are their only competitors and they are compelled at times to follow field rodents and glean grains from their burrows.

The oral history or Musahar’s predicament, as passed from one generation to the other, is reflexive of their own marginality in the region. They informed that during colonial period, this area was covered with dense forest and was used by some British officials for hunting. This is especially true for the Sohagi Barwa and Shikarpur Gram Sabha of the Nichlaul block where they constitute the majority of the population. ⁸

The general perception of the Musahar community in this area (which is also relatively less influenced by the intervention due to its remoteness) is that the land being fertile and the population of Musahars settled in the area being small, there was enough for everyone to eat unless hit by natural calamity. Other forests produce also supplemented the diet. Though they were poor, certainly they had greater control over their lives. Slowly this fertile land attracted people from the neighbouring areas and those by giving petty allurements (a piece of cloth or so) to Musahars acquired large chunks of land. With the passage of time ownership of landholdings became more and more concentrated in the favour of the upper caste/class. Some of them left their traditional abode along the riverbank to settle wherever the local land/estate owner allowed them to stay in exchange of begari. The Musahar, the native of this place, stood transformed into a landless agricultural labourer. Whatever small amount of land was left in their hand was mortgaged due to their increased vulnerability to tragedy and disaster. This area is prone to flood. It is worth mentioning that Musahars were never expert in agricultural techniques. ⁹

At present, the landownership among them is negligible. Whatever ancestral land they had, has been kept on mortgage for small sums of money. Land is the only tradable asset on which they fall back upon in case of emergencies like death and illness. Marriage is the other most important event in which they spend lavishly at the cost of their land. In fact, land determines the probability of leading a normal life. Once it is mortgaged, and then starts the struggle to retain the ownership and often the entire life is spent on the hope that one day ‘my’ land will be freed. To attain this, they work almost as bonded labourers on their own land. Next to land, it is only labour which they can trade to repay the loan taken from local landlords in distress months.

Though at the time of Mayawati government (2002), some land pattas were distributed in the villages, fertile lands were cornered by other Dalit castes (chamars) and in their share came infertile, waterlogged and disputed land.

The First Struggle

Musahars in the 1980s in Kushinagar district of Uttar Pradesh were fighting against their marginalised status. They engaged in small, episodic bloody encounters with the local landlords for a piece of homestead land under the influence of left ideology propagated by a local low caste (Noniya) ¹¹

The struggle started from the village of Dhuria-bhat (which at present lies in the Kushinagar district and is only about 3 kms from the town area). Musahars constitute one-fourth of its population, Yadav, Kurmi, Kumhar and Bhumihar are the other caste groups in the village. Bhumihars who are the smallest group with only 22 households (out of approx. 500) own about 70 per cent of the land. Musahars here had to fight to get hold of homestead land. In this fight, some bhumihars (Ramji and Bhola babu) of the village sided with Musahars as they had a rivalry against the bhumihars of the neighbouring village (Mahendra and Kapil Dev Babu of Denapatti village) who had some land in this area. This land was covered with dense shrubs and trees. Aahutiji shared,

We decided to start our struggle from this village as it was near to the town area and so easy to register in the public eye and also because the village had substantial number of Musahars who are the poorest among the poor in this area. We motivated Musahars to refuse to sit on floors in front of the upper caste patrons, refuse honour to them by not greeting them and to claim the surplus barren land in their village.

Musahars of this village responded enthusiastically to this call for dignity and control over resources for survival. They cleared the plot and build their huts on it. The move was severely opposed by the Mahendra and Kapil Dev who occupied this forest land. They resorted to verbal abuse, physical assault and misbehaviour with the Musahar womenfolk. Musahars were able to withstand all this as Vibhutiji’s supporters from different villages stood by their side constantly pushing their limit and spirit to endure retaliatory violence. Musahars decided not to give up the land and finally dragged the matter to court where the case went on for 20 years and the verdict came in their favour. While winning the legal battle would not have been possible without the support of the local influential bhumihar friends, the immediate desire to hold on the ground and retaliate violently with bows, arrows and canes was the contribution of Vibhutiji’s movement.

Another successful resistance was of Shivrajpur of Kushinagar district where there were just 50 Musahar households. The local landlords here were extremely exploitative and all the Musahars of this village worked as bonded labourers on their field. Unlike other places, they were not even provided land to build their abode. They were living under tree shades or kept wandering from one place to the other. With no money in hand, they were completely dependent on their patrons for each single meal. The work scenario was again very uncertain as average landholding size in this area, in general, was very small. The demand for wage labour in fields was less and there were only two to three families who employed labourers, rest relied on household labour supply Duniya ¹²

Now when I visited this hamlet in January 2010, I found that this was the only village where every Musahar family had a pucca house. These houses were given by the government 10 years ago under the Indira Awas Yojana after that fateful violent struggle which changed the lives of these families. Though they still have no land to cultivate in this village, they are proud owners of this land and house. A group of old women who gathered around me could not hold on the excitement to narrate the story of their courage. They greeted me with ‘Lal Salam’ which showed that the memory of the struggle is still alive. They told me how things turned ugly and it almost became a matter of life and death when on the call of Aahutiji they occupied this land. Whatever little work was made available to them was also taken away as Buniya ¹³

While these successful cases constituted the backbone of the struggle, there were important issues that were taken up to strengthen the mobilisational streak. Low caste participants of the struggle were asked to defy the social norms by refusing to greet the upper caste people of their village, refusing to get down from charpoys as a mark of respect when faced with higher caste residents and refusing to sit on the floor when masters chose to sit on a heightened platform. These attitudinal changes that were being advocated by the struggle were very revolutionary for the village society. It is difficult to assess the extent of its actual realisation especially because the community slipped back to the state of hibernated resistance as and when the active struggle fizzled out.

This battle created much fervour among the Musahar of the neighbouring villages who were living under similar conditions of deprivation. Under the banner of ‘Lal Salam’ Musahars, Kushwahas, Nishads, Yadavs, Chamars and Musalmans joined hands and fought for land rights in this area. All the slogans that on could hear during this period were for securing land rights of the poor like ‘Zo zamin ko jote boae, wo zamin ka malik huwe’ (the land belongs to the tillers); ‘dharti nahi dhanwano ki, hai mazdoor kisano ki’ (land is not of the rich but belongs to the labourers and farmers); ‘Lal kile par lal nishan, mang raha mazdoor kisan’ (the labouring farmer is demanding red mark on the red fort). But the struggle here remained fragmented, localised and limited. During this period, Vibhutiji was jailed five times on various charges of taking law in his hand and instigating violence in 1980, 1982, 1984, 1987 and 1991, respectively. Because of organisational weaknesses and singular command, the movement petered out but not without some material gains.

Pay-Offs/Important Learnings: Though the struggle remained fragmented, the message that it spread was significant. The first message that went down was that life without dignity is not worth living and that dignity can be established by struggle. As Aahutiji puts it,

They understood that person without dignity can have no ownership, cannot enjoy rights … that ownership comes only when you believe in the dignity of your existence as human being … and above all they won’t give until you demand … and if they do not give, you will have to snatch it.

He further says,

Their eyes were serving, their hands were serving, their legs were serving, their minds were serving, they were complete slaves … they could not imagine their lives without it … that struggle gave them a dream … at that time dalit issue was one, it was a fight of justice, injustice and dignity (nyay, anayay aur samman ki ladai), it was a matter of bread and butter (roti aur boti ki ladai).

There was an urgency and spontaneity in the struggle. Most of the times the course of action was not pre-planned and the mob used to take over the conflict leading to violence and also defeat. But each time the spirit came out undefeated, the more wounds and injuries they received, the more blood they lost, the more pain they endured, the more strengthened their agitation got. The spirit of do or die was instilled by this struggle in the community. It was neither money nor power which was the propelling motive or allurements, but sheer urgency to get over hunger and misery.

It was a direct conflict between the dominant and the marginalised group with no room for negotiation and persuasion. The exploited became the violators of laws illegally occupying land, resorting to violence on resistance for maintaining the status quo and only later the judiciary was moved to legalise the claim. Immediate redressal was attempted without any support from the state agency. In fact, the volatility of situation compelled State actors to get involved, they could no longer remain indifferent.

Again the challenge was quintessentially societal in nature questioning the moral order of the society, the norms of behaviour and the codes of conduct. The struggle also questioned society with regard to something ‘else’ and that was the question of who decides on codes of conduct, who establishes rules of normality for social and economic behaviour? Here the struggle shared some features of the New Social Movement. NSMs as seen by Melucci (1995: 811) voice particularistic point of view starting from a specific condition or location, but they speak to whole society (see Melucci 1995: 811). They generate a public debate about matters of public morality and in the process contest the norms by which we live our lives (Crossley 2004). While this struggle did not attempt to generate this public debate but it questioned the norms in its own ways. How and why this emphasis on changing the moral codes of conduct was side-lined is to be seen in the later phases of struggle.

The Second Struggle

A decade later, high number of hunger deaths from the community opened the entry gate for the civil society organisation. This organisation with its ‘civilising mission’ told them about their Rights. Under the leadership of same person (Aahuti Chauhan) who had by now renounced the left ideology of caste indifference, Musahars entered a phase of agency mobilisation directing their energies to secure state given entitlements within the democratic framework of ‘Rights’. The introduction of the rights-based approach by the agency, helped to define state authorities and agencies as the primary duty-bearers in protecting and promoting rights, and emphasised individual citizens (here Musahars) as rights-holders. The visibility and possibility of measuring successful individual claims and implementation of state obligations shifted the target of struggle from society to state and the objectives of the struggle less radical. Now in place of questioning the norms of the society, the mobilisation was questioning the legitimacy of state structures. To establish the violation of right to life became the paramount task and hunger deaths were strategically publicised to gain material entitlements from the State.

When asked about the initiative, the project coordinator ¹⁴

There was a step by step initiation into an organised mobilisation with specified target and planned operations. In December 2002, the agency started its interaction with the Musahars of Maharajganj and Kushinagar district marked them as a vulnerable community in its plan outlay. A long-term engagement of seven years in two phases (2002–2009) to build the capacity of the community to fight for its rights especially the ‘right to food and livelihood’ was designed. The team members of the ActionAid field office in Nichlaul shared with the researcher the following information:

Musahars as the stakeholders were invited to be part of the team in order to take charge of the initiative at the very outset. Community was exposed to the developmental process in order to generate demand for learning skills so as to approach the state with their problems. This helped to bring confidence in Musahars, and prepared them to initiate their collective struggle.

That the community exposed to the development process can be seen as the first implication of shifting the locus of struggle from the local centres of power to the general centre of power, i.e., the State. The understanding of being capable of becoming a stakeholder in the development propagated by the State while remaining at the social margins of the society was induced in the consciousness of Musahars. While this shift was taking place, the strategy was to put up a public front of self-analysis, in order to construct a natural but planned reaction of community against the government machinery which till recently was too distant and hence not in the picture.

Project coordinator ¹⁵

The subtle communication of agency’s own understanding of the ‘antim vyakti’ the last person took over community’s self-perception of marginalisation ad landlessness and paucity of work in the market.

The monthly meetings of the Manch to review and discuss the progress made by the community in its struggle to eradicate poverty were seen as a new beginning. The strategy for action was decided by consensus and members are entrusted with responsibility for action and follow up. There are set procedures for resolving the problems of the community through the Manch. The Manch sits together and discusses the issues (ek sath baith kar panchayat karte hai), through discussion problem areas are identified and then collectively they pursue the concerned officials in the local area. If the matter does not settle down at this level then the members of the Manch take the issue to their district-level federation, which then starts pursuing officials at the district level.

Now, what are the issues which are taken up in these meetings? In the initial period, seven objectives were identified by the organisation which included addressing immediate poverty needs, community institution building, conscientisation of non-Musahars, policy advocacy, liasioning with the government, community capacity building and research and media advocacy. The issues are addressed to the State and the capacity building is for enabling the community to demand from the State. The Slogans of the struggle are like ‘Jo zamin sarkari hai wo zamin hamari hai’ (the government land is our land); ‘Jo dalito ki baat kare wo delhi pe raaj kare’ (Delhi will be ruled by him who talks of Dalits); ‘hum apana adhikar magnate, nahi kisi se bheekh mangte’ (We demand rights not alms).

An effective strategy for the realisation of rights mentioned above was organisation of various interface camps in different tolas ¹⁶

By organising various rallies, demonstrations and interface camps, attempts have been made to bring Musahars, hitherto unheard and unseen, at the forefront of public domain, and also to make government machinery responsive and accountable towards them. The basic premise of a rights-based approach like this is that the state is primarily responsible for providing all basic amenities. The project coordinator ¹⁷

Going by the logic of democracy the projection of this fight is community vs. the State. Musahar Manch being the public face of the community undersigns each campaign and activity. The Manch leads dharnas, rallies, etc., and all slogans are always given in the name of Musahar Manch (rallies me musahar manch zindabad karte hai). Elaborating on the logic of this strategy, the project officer ¹⁸

In its maiden rally, Musahar Vikas Pahal (MVP) organised a tractor procession. The Musahar anaaj kosh tractor yatra ¹⁹

These local-level lobbying efforts yielded in the release of several Government Orders instructing the line departments to accord high priority to Musahar dominated villages for all kinds of development assistance. Block offices were directed to carry out a survey to assess the access of Musahars to have a stake in various government schemes. District Magistrate appointed a Nodal Officer to oversee implementation of government-run schemes/programmes in Musahar hamlets in 2004. The motive behind appointing a nodal officer was to establish a link between private and government authorities. A coordination committee at the tehsil level (Nichalaul) was set up with heads of health, education, rural development and forestry and Anganwadi departments as its member, to coordinate and monitor the efforts for Musahar empowerment by government support. This success was achieved by adopting judicious mix of confrontational and collaborative style of functioning. On the strategic front, it resembles Gandhian ‘struggle-truce-struggle’ mode of working.

We had two options as far as mode of functioning was concerned. Either we could have worked with the government in confrontational mode in a collaborative mode. We decided to collaborate where we can afford and to confront where the need requires … we moved forward with this philosophy in mind, if we can make things easier and better for the people by working as a secretariat for the government agencies we will do that. On the other hand when we will feel that injustice is being done to poor people, there confrontational mode would be adopted.

The issue of erecting an alternative to state structure was avoided except as a backup plan, as was the case with grain bank and Self-Help-Groups (SHGs). There were 49 grain banks fully managed by the Manch at the tola level. Community itself had contributed nearly 5,889 kgs of wheat and 4,300 kgs of rice in it. ActionAid had contributed 38,200 kgs of wheat and 11,770 kgs of rice in this. The average requirement of a family is 3–4 kgs of grains daily. Given stock, the grain bank could provide food security for one week or so. The target was to make provision for two months assuming that two months can be managed by government-run schemes and migration.

Similarly, SHGs in each tola were formed to encourage entrepreneurial skills and to make them self-sufficient for day-to-day needs. Each member of the SHG is supposed to pay Rs. 5 to Rs. 10 monthly in order to build the base for the revolving fund. Thirty-four SHGs got the first grading done from the bank. There were at least 3–4 beneficiaries in each tola who had started small businesses like vegetable selling, goat rearing and grocery shops. The ActionAid project provided livelihood support to SHG members on priority basis. Last person or the ‘antim vyakti’ have been identified in each tola so that benefits can reach the poorest of the poor. In Sohagi Barwa, Musahar Manch of all the 16 tolas and SHGs of these tolas invested fund to start crusher plants. It went on successfully for few years. In the first and second years, there was annual saving of approximately Rs. 15,000. In this crusher plant, 6–8 labourers of the Musahar community used to work daily and earn Rs. 50 per day. The project had also provided a sum of approximately Rs. 4.3 lakhs to 148 persons for the release of their mortgaged land.

Pay-Offs/Important Learnings: The major contribution of mobilisation was that it enabled Musahars to register their presence with substantial confidence in the public space that otherwise never belonged to them. Intervention gave a public face to these communities and their political struggle. In the first struggle, this public image was never sought as issues were prior to the community identity as such. The separate identity of being a Musahar went on to narrow and sharpen the focus of struggle and made it more manageable. On the negative side, this crystallisation deepened the fissures in the social fabric, jeopardising the popular support to the struggle in this stage.

The subaltern public sphere that was erected by this mobilisation brought issues of autonomy and identity of Musahar to the forefront which was opposed to the first stage combined front strategy. The dual character of subaltern counter-publics of withdrawal and regroupment, while simultaneously acting as centre for empowerment, was manifested via reinterpretation of identity (Nancy Fraser 1992: 123–4). The specific realisation of powerlessness owing to different identities was instilled in the consciousness of the community. Again this specific identity was used by them to take the struggle forward.

Again it was this public image that legitimised their claim on the State. The main thrust of the intervening agency was to get policies in place through monitoring and pressurising state agencies. The language of negotiation and persuasion introduced by the agency equipped them to harness concessions and entitlements from the state. In the first struggle also, the last leg of the struggle, in each independent case, was to legalise the claim through the judgement of law court or to force the government to accommodate the demand, but the state was not the direct target. In the first struggle, more fundamental changes on the ground were sought and the role of the State was limited to removing the obstacles in their way by legalising their claim. The first struggle was also more risky and results were always uncertain as the State was open to arm-twisting by the other side as well, who were often more influential. In the second struggle, by projecting the exceptionality of the Musahar condition, the agency was able to strike a deal with the State without touching upon the issue of fundamental structural change and moral order of the society (Mencher 1999). The State also reciprocated in its own standardised scheme oriented mode of poverty alleviation. This self-limited radicalised mode of struggle simplified and smoothened the exchange between the State and the community. ²²

Again the increased assertiveness of hitherto marginalised groups in the public realm not only redefined the meaning of public by throwing new issues like identity for deliberation, but also deconstructed the notion of general interest to which the State must respond. ²³

The Third Struggle

The third radical turn which changed the fate of the community both in terms of visibility and the ability to manoeuvre developmental advantages was of making inroads in the local institutional politics. The seeds for this were sown during the agency phase when the collective strength of the community was realised for various purposes through the platform of Musahar Manch. I am marking it as the third struggle as the political participation was never aimed at by the agency. The target in the second struggle was only to negotiate access to state-run schemes and distribution of some surplus land amongst the community members, but it was also the period when the identity politics acquired roots. The aspiration to gain political power at the local level as a mode to cross the margin and join the mainstream enabled the community to surpass the limits of project-based agency intervention.

After a successful mobilisation, the subsequent exit of agency once again changed the balance of power for them in the region. The management of public space became difficult with the dispersal of the mobilising cadres in the absence of financial support. With a new self-respect and a much deeper and assertive group identity, it is not possible for them to go back to earlier modes of living. While they have moved ahead in terms of consciousness, the larger society remains embedded in old patterns of dominance, giving rise to new frictions, antagonism and retaliations coming from both sides. Musahars have once again started taking up issues against the age-old exploitative social structures like freedom to vote, increase in wages, refusing to work on lower wages, refusing to tolerate abusive language and violence of the dominant upper caste. Champa said, ²⁴

The higher caste people are finding it difficult to digest. But unlike past, they are now afraid to use force or other pressure techniques against them. The realisation that any unjust action against Musahars will be soon publicised and will be taken up by the authorities under public pressure is there. The resentment against the use of populist measures by the community is much evident in the statement of Shambhu ²⁵

After the exit of the intervening agency, the involvement in the village politics through participation in village panchayats proved crucial. This readiness to make an entry into the political power structure on their own is a sign of political empowerment of the community. In the initial phase when I visited the field in my discussion with the community on their political behaviour, I found that voting was considered by the community as a compulsory routine exercise in order to maintain the citizenship. People were afraid that if they won’t go to cast their vote, their names would be deleted from the voter list or what they called the ‘sarkari kagaz’ (government paper) and in effect would cancel their entitlement for any government assistance at the time of crisis. A better understanding of the system has now led them to realise the real significance of the ballot. Now they know that it is an opportunity to decide their own fate. While earlier also they could see the same happening in case of chamars they could not imagine it for themselves. Musahar’s own understanding of chamar’s strong position has always been that chamars on account of being more educated manage to get the best out of state’s provisioning. Further that Musahars were also Dalit or harijan was not known to them. This was confessed by many community members and even aguwas of the Manch.

Again the exposure to the actual election process through the election of Executive Council of Musahar Manch every year led to better understanding of the purpose of election itself. Familiarity with the village-level governance led to increasing desire among the community member to send their own member in the panchayat at all three levels. Working with panchayats was not in the mandate of the intervening agency as they believed in dealing through the administrative machine. The community members on their own decided to take part in the panchayat elections as candidates for various posts. The money from the corpus of Musahar Manch was used for campaigning and filing nominations.

Ramsaware whose wife Girija Devi ²⁶

Again Musahar women, as opposed to other low and even high caste women, are now more articulate in these villages, so the reservation of women in panchayat is going to help Musahars come to power. With Musahar Manch in place, the community now operates as a group so Musahar’s usually field only one candidate from their community in one constituency unlike other low caste community members. Musahar women in some of the tolas like Ledi have even left chamar women behind in terms of their ability to assert their voice precisely because they move and function in group.

As Musahars do not command majority in most of the villages, it was difficult to win in most of the cases. Further, the chamars were giving them tough competition in every reserved constituency. To turn the village dynamics in their favour is an uphill task and requires time and strategic alliances. It is here that the experience of earlier mobilisation proved to be an asset for garnering support from other backward communities. The fact that Musahars were able to secure entitlement from the State helped Shambhu who was earlier part of the Musahar Manch to get elected as Pradhan of his village panchayat. Musahars here have sizable population and Shambhu’s activism as member of the Manch where he made effort to take up general issue of quality education in the government school, the implementation of the mid-day meal programme and activity at the Integrated Child Development Service (ICDS) centre (Anganwadi Kendra) helped him to gain popularity. His candidature was supported by other Dalit caste communities. Winning of their own candidate has boosted their confidence and has given them a new hope of change, as Shanker ²⁷

Things have already started changing Shanker proudly narrates one such incidence:

Midday meal programme got started in the neighbouring government school in the session of 2004–05. In the beginning children used to get kichari with just a handful of lentil in it (kam dal wali khichari). Hum logo ne milkar dabav dala to panch mahine se halwa, dal, chawal, sabji aur khir bhi milne lagi (but when the community pressurized they started giving halwa, pulses, rice, vegetables and kheer also from last five months.

These government schools are attended by children from other Dalit and backward communities and by insisting on the proper functioning of schools Sambhu has been able to target them. So far, the community has succeeded in sending some members to the BDC (Block Development Committee) and elected few pradhans in various panchayats. During the 2004 election, as many as 20 Musahars contested for various posts of pradhans and BDC. Out of these six won the election, four became pradhans and two won the BDC seat. The elected pradhans from the community are the icons of empowerment for others. Interestingly there are also few women pradhans from the community who function on their own unlike other women pradhans from upper caste who are the only proxy to their male counterparts.

In order to sustain the participation in village politics, Musahars have now started reaching out to other marginal Dalit communities across the district. Musahar Manch organises sammelans to pull the crowd in the name of Dalit solidarity. Interestingly there is no deliberate attempt to keep chamars out of these sammelans but chamars show little interest in these gatherings. With established networks in the existing political structure, chamars either keep themselves detached from Musahar’s activism or in some places push them to come out presuming that eventually in the long run that would lead to the strengthening of Dalit constituency.

The nature of ‘Musahar’ identity as different from the Dalit identity is gaining strength. While this difference has not found clear articulation among the Musahars yet certain schism can be noticed/are in evidence. The identity politics has led Musahars to look for their origin and in my recent visit, I found some new stories of origin in the community. Musahar considers themselves originating from the same lineage as Bhumihars who are the dominant landowning caste in the villages. This description is similar to that delineated by Niesfield mentioned in the beginning. In their view, this is supported by the fact that Musahars face mild form of untouchability as compared to chamars. The story behind this goes on like this:

There was a king who was blessed with two sons. One was fair in complexion and the other was dark skinned. The King ordered his sepoys to leave the dark skinned son in the forest. The fair one who grew up in village and inherited the prestige and wealth of the King were later called the bhumihars, while the dark one left in the forest, became the dispossessed Musahar with only mother earth to take care of him.

The reason why Musahars never thought of themselves as Dalit earlier can also be linked with their claimed closeness to bhumihars. It is only now that they have started invoking SC Act in various cases like chamars and other Dalit communities. Another sign of redefining the Musahar identity and countering stigma was evident in Durgawati’s ²⁸

The search for root and attempts to purge their identity of stigma is being used not to assert difference but to forge linkage with the mainstream village society. This is necessitated by the spatial limitation of their politics. The distinct identity of Musahars here negotiates with the claims of equality.

For the village-level politics, the Musahar Manch has decided to keep itself away from the party politics. Raju who is a young member of the Manch executive says,

we need to be very cautious as we cannot afford to antagonize any party … in politics nothing is certain today you have Mayawati’s BSP in power tomorrow you may see SP or Congress … if we blindly show our allegiance and solidarity to BSP now what will happen if a Congress MLA gets elected from our constituency in the next election.

It is not just Raju’s take on the politics and its uncertainty, this has been adopted as policy in the Manch. Kaushalya who was the President of Manch supported the BSP (Bahujan Samaj Party) campaign in the assembly elections and later she was impeached by other members of the executive. As of now, the Musahar Manch can manage without any overt party allegiance as their target is to make an entry into the panchayat structure only. On the broader platform, they project themselves as part of the larger Dalit group in the State. This is the reason why they are able to maintain amicable relation with chamars in the village who are ready to give some space to Musahar in the village politics with the hope of getting support in the assembly and parliamentary elections. How will Musahars manage the pulls and push of the State Dalit politics is yet to be seen but they can certainly not be ignored at the village-level politics.

How they conceive of politics and current leaders is best explained in the following song. The song is a satire on the politics of the day and reveals that Musahars now understand the system too well to be carried away by false revolutionary potentials. But there is an underlying desire to use the system strategically in their favour without any ideological commitment like all others which explains their ambivalent political allegiance towards existing Dalit parties. The song is a call of females to their spouses who now claim politics to be of higher value than ‘naukari’ (paid service) which is a marker of prestige in the village. The song may also be interpreted as an expression of their helplessness to gain such larger benefits from politics as there is a spatial limit to their political gain due to scattered presence and limited population.

Song 1:

Saiya naukari choar kari netagiri

Sabahi salam kari

Darling leave your job for netagiri,

public will salute you.

Pai-pai joile se na kaam chali

aeme daare paisa dheer

Paisa hawe upara se naam mili

tose hili pulice, thana, kachahria

Sabahi salam kari ho

Saiya naukari choar kari netagiri

Meticulous savings fall short,

in this, you have enormous money at hand,

and in addition you get fame.

Your name will fright police, thanas and courts.

Public will salute you,

darling leave job for netagiri.

goan-gaon ghare-ghare agara lagaiwa jab

chokha ke lute ke kahav

Sahu ke jagaiwa jab

tabe vote sabake paaeev ae sawariya

Sabahi salam kari ho

Saiya naukari choar kari netagiri

Going door-to-door making promises,

asking to rob the well-to-do,

and arousing sahukar from his deep slumber.

All this will fetch you votes.

Public will salute you,

darling leave job for netagiri.

Danga fasad jetana des me karaib jab piya

MP, MLA seat, lal baati pai jaiva sab

Baat-baat par sikhale netagiri

Sabahi salam kari ho

Saiya naukari choar kari netagiri

Go on organising roits and clashes,

this will give you MP, MLA seat,

you will get red light cars.

You are capable of netagiri on every issue.

Public will salute you,

Darling leave job for netagiri.

Farzi margseet sanad moar banwai dev

Khali naam likhe piya humke sikhai dev

Duno prani ke jagi tagderia

Duniya salam kari ho

Saiya naukari choar kari netagiri.

My brother in law will get my fake marksheets,

you only make me sign my name.

Our destiny will shine together.

Public will salute you,

darling leave job for netagiri

The song remarks on the accepted legitimate means of conducting politics. Organising riots, appropriating money, playing with popular rhetoric, use of propaganda and nepotism are being termed as the markers of success and progress in political career.

Now the NGO is gone and they are standing alone renewing old ties with feudal structure but with new aspirations. The everyday struggle under such circumstances is echoed in the cultural practice that defies power and subordination fuelling the imagination to achieve just order.

Song 2:

Gulamiya ab hum nahi bajaibo

Azadiya humor ke bhavela

Now we shall not be enslaved

Now we enjoy freedom

Jheeni-jheeni banavni chadaria lahre la tohare kanhe

Jab hum tan ke kapara mangi aave sipahiya banhe

Sipahiya se ab hum nahi darayibe

Azadiya hamro ke bhavela

Unfulrs on their shoulder,

the jheene-jheene sheet we wove.

We ask for a piece of cloth,

they tie us.

Now we fear not they (then),

Now we enjoy freedom

Kankar chuni-chuni mahal banawali hum, bhaini pardesi

Tohre kanuniya margal gaini katai na bhaile peshi

Kanuniya se ab nahi daraibe

Mahaliya hamra ke bhavela

We choose the pebel to build the palace,

to become stranger,

to be beaten, not to be heard by law.

Now we fear not the law,

Now we enjoy freedom.

Dinawa khadaniya se sonawa nikalani

Ratiya lagawani angutha

Sagro ziginiya karze me dubali

Kaile hisabwa jhotha

Ziganiya ab hum nahi dubaiwe

Akcharia humra ke bhawela

Digging gold from mines in day,

at night putting thumb mark.

Spending life in debt, all records are faked.

Now we ignore not the letters,

Now we enjoy freedom.

Hamare jagarva se dharti fulaile fulwa me khushbo bharela

Humke bandukiya se kaile bedakhlo

Tohare maliyayi chalela

Bandukiya se ab hum nahi daraibo

Bandukiya humor ke bhavela

Gulamiya ab nahi bajaibo

Azadiya humra ke bhavela

Our labour flowers the earth and the fragrance spreads,

when we claim this earth you expel us at gun point.

Now we fear not gun,

Now we adore the gun,

Now we enjoy freedom.

This song is a call to break away from the bondage of slavery. I heard this song when I visited one of their public gathering which was organised by the Manch in order to reach out to the other similarly placed communities within the Dalits. About 400 people from different Dalit communities of Uttar Pradesh like bansfoad, valamiki, pasi and musahar had gathered in Kushinagar to share their experiences. The above song says that the freedom, the letter, the big mansion and gun all attracts them now and they are ready to pay any price to get them. Freedom is sought from the old-age bondage, from the back-breaking labour as it fails to usher even the minimum reward. They also realise that the riches of the world are built on their labour and they have been denied the right to claim even a part of it. They can see no way but to embrace education and gain skills to counter repression. They are even ready to take law in their hand, to take up arms in order to secure freedom, wealth, land and dignity.

The changed scenario is missing from the song and it overplays the contradiction between the dominant and the dominated. The use of such songs is limited to their sammelans where they use it as a tool to reach out to other exploited communities invoking similarities between their existential experiences. The song is also a reminder to the community to remain active to avoid slipping back into the old stage.

Another song which is generally used at the village-level meetings suggests a midway strategy of organisation and the use of collective strength to claim their legitimate rights. The use of the word ‘Dalit’ and invoking Ambedkar’s incomplete mission seems to be a deliberate attempt to display solidarity in order to optimise the political gain. While there is an attempt to identify with the other Dalit the leadership is retained by the Musahar Manch.

Pay-Offs/Important Learnings: While managing the created public space and consolidating the interventional gains the community-made inroads into institutional politics. It was an unplanned transference of aroused Musahar self in order to deal with the day-to-day conflictual situation with which the agency preferred to maintain a distance. It was only after the exit of the agency that the involvement in the village politics became the main-stay of Musahar Manch in terms of directing its agenda, strategies and programmes. The Manch continues to receive allegiance of the community due to its political activism at the village level. In doing so there appears to be continuity with some reversals in strategies, to amend the broken social ties, and thus we see the renunciation of exclusionary mode of functioning.

There is a clear move towards combined front strategy of the first struggle with the difference that the leadership is now of Musahars who have proved their skills of manoeuvring advantages from the State. New skills of negotiation and alliance learned during the second struggle are being used by the Manch to mobilise the support of the other similarly placed communities for political gains at the panchayat level.

Musahars know that their created political space will survive only if they succeed in maintaining their public visibility. In order to maintain this public visibility, they are now reaching out to other marginal Dalit communities across districts in the State by organising State-level Dalit mahasammelans. As they understand the spatial limit of their political gains due to limited presence in the State, there is no overt desire to come out of the larger Dalit community and its politics. This is visible in the use of Ambedkar’s photographs, and giving slogans in his name, in these sammelans. But at the same time, a separate space is being carved out at the village level to maximise political gains.

During the interventional experience, the marginalised group preferred the terminology and tools of negotiation in the public space, because their reality involved constantly negotiating and renegotiating their strategic interests and material conditions. They opted for persuasion and consensus-building more often than confrontation. Having registered their presence in public now they choose carefully the language and strategies of ‘claiming’, ‘demanding’ and ‘asserting’ depending upon the platform from which they are making a call. The above-quoted songs show that while in their sammelans they use aggressive language and express the desire to even embrace violence, at the village-level meetings attempt is made to arouse sympathies and appeal to rationality of other communities. This is a mid-way ground between enraged violent assertion of the first struggle and self-limiting radicalism of the second struggle.

Conclusion

Taking an overview of the three narrated struggle it may be concluded that their natures were different both in terms of strategy, posturing of the community’s predicament and the idea/issues of mobilisation itself. The first struggle tended to take the shape on social/class issues employing direct confrontational mode and questioning moral order of the society. In the second struggle, Musahar identity appeared more manifest and the locus of the struggle shifted from Community vs. Society to Community vs. State. In the third struggle, there was a return towards alliance centric mode of functioning as opposed to politics of difference of the second stage but these alliances were now being shaped keeping the created identity intact.

Each of these struggles was a combination of moral dissent from an elite-created social order and mobilisational tactics adopted by new agents of development (Scott 1976: 240). ²⁹

Tracing of Musahars story of struggle illustrates different avenues for countering violation from the margin. The story also reveals that for a marginal community facing structural violation, the struggle for change is beyond success and failure and there can be different points of success, within the failed and successful attempts to bring about change. The story highlights that there are no permanent solutions even in a fixed location. All strategies and indoctrinations are contingent. While the structural understanding may have been dominant in the first struggle, yet at another phase, even the small victory of obtaining a ration card (the second struggle) may define success. Even failed struggles did have a cumulative effect and determining effect on any future resistance.

Use of three different strategies at three different points of time, in the course of mobilisation, enabled the Musahars to move from the reality of poor livelihood options (lack of resources, skills and opportunities), reduced or restricted participation in public decision-making, limited use of public space and low self-esteem, to a condition of secured entitlements, enlarged public space and assertion. There is a clear progression from episodic encounters against dominant structures, to the creation of vibrant public sphere, to managing transformed free space awake to the challenge of facing and countering newer problem which may arise. The key to success lies in the community’s ability to skilfully manage the between trade-offs of divergent pay-offs at each stage. The continuities between the different phases of struggle were more than evident making intervention and the politics successful for them in the later struggles.

The story of the Musahars is a multilayered story and offers rich learnings. On one plane, it is a story of the struggle of a marginalised community attempting to counter violations to find its rightful place under the democratic sun as citizens. It is also a story of a successful assertion for inclusion against a callous state. On yet another plane it is a story of a subaltern group attempting to create its own identity. On yet another plane, it is a story of the Gramscian intellectuals assisting a subaltern group to emerge as a class for itself. Yet another layer highlights that the community-centric discourse carries greater meaning rather than a leader centric discourse. Perhaps we may term the process of mobilisation of the Musahar community itself as ‘the Musahar community in making’.