It is the loneliness that kills him. Mahadev Kurre, 55, sits on the floor of his two-room unplastered home, constantly on the verge of tears. The room he sits in has utensils and clothes all over the floor. And in one corner, a box that has a sheaf of papers; it is a box he returns to often; a box that explains his anguish.
On February 24, 2020, just as the world began to acknowledge the severity of Covid 19, Kurre’s family was in a whirlwind. His daughter, 19-year-old Asuiya Kumari, a Dalit like him, went missing. Two days later, on February 26, the family filed a missing person’s complaint. Later that day, Kumari made a phone call to one of Kurre’s relatives and said she had married Hareshwar Sahu (26), from an other backwards class (OBC) community in the village, and had eloped with him to Jammu and Kashmir.
Kurre was glad that his daughter was alive, but filled with dread nonetheless. The inevitable happened. His village of Kiatha has 250 OBC families and around 100 Dalit families, and they rarely intermarry. On March 5, a meeting was called where Kurre was also present, and a penalty of ₹30,000 was levied on him, and a “traditional feast” for the village demanded.
A daily wage labourer, Kurre paid ₹5,000 in advance, but with work hard to come by, there was no way he could arrange for the rest.
The “community” was angered even further. Finally, in August, they held another meeting, and ordered that his entire family would be socially boycotted. Kurre’s home now has no visitors. Very few gather the courage to speak to him. Every day, he must travel 30 kilometre to the town of Sarangarh to find work, simply because nobody near his village will offer him any. “The loneliness is the worst. We live in a cage of silence,” he says.
On September 14, the Chhattisgarh High Court issued notices to the state government and some of the state’s senior bureaucrats, including the Chief and Home secretary, the director general of police, and the district collectors and superintendents of police of six districts after a PIL was filed on the “social boycott” of people across the state. Kurre’s plight was one of the 15 that formed the basis for the petition, which said that there have been around 30,000 cases of social boycott in Chhattisgarh in the past decade.
How boycotts work
The social boycott didn’t just affect Kurre’s livelihood, but that of his family too. His son, Jhuneshwar Kurre, 26, said that on September 11, his family was attacked by villagers, with his wife Arti suffering injuries. “I was sitting somewhere when a group of people came and began to abuse me. The next day again, I was attacked near my house. My wife, who came to my rescue, fell to the ground after being pushed. Her brother, who runs a small grocery store, ran to her and offered her water. Now the community wants to boycott him too,” he said.
Jhuneshwar’s two sons, both below 10 years of age, have been left to their own devices too, both in the community and at school. “In the school and at the anganwadi centre, except for the teacher, nobody talks to them. This is a fate no child should ever have to face,” said Arti Kurre.
When HT reached out to Mahesh Ram Kurre, a “community leader” who Kurre says was present at the meeting that decided to boycott Kurre, he claimed the allegations are baseless. “I am a government employee and I was not present in any meeting. They have no evidence to prove that I have boycotted them. We wanted to sort out the misunderstanding with the family and recently called a meeting, but the family refused to come,” said Mahesh Ram Kurre, a government teacher.
Ruffling through the paperwork in his home, Kurre shows a written complaint to the Bhilaigarh police station written on October 6, 2021, asking them to take cognizance of the social boycott. Then, on February 10 this year, he even wrote a letter addressed to Chhattisgarh chief minister Bhupesh Baghel, submitting it to the district collector.
There was no response, and nothing was done.
Vichintan Sahu, SHO, Bhilaigarh police station said that they had found no evidence of a social boycott. “There was another scuffle around 15 days ago after which Mahadev and his son filed another complaint. I and the local magistrate visited the village and preventive actions were taken.”
Around 70km from Kiatha, 30-year-old Rampratap Manhare, of the Satnami community has also been banished to the margins of Godda village in Baloda Bazar district. On November 1, 2019, Manhare was fishing in the village pond. He was spotted, and summoned by the senior representatives of the Satnami community. Satnam is a sect founded by Guru Ghasidas in the 1800s, influenced by the teachings of Ravidas and Kabir, through Kabirpanthis in Chhattisgarh.
The community members asked him why he was fishing during “Gaddi puja”, a nine-day celebration of “Satnami Guru” where the community attempts to restrict the consumption of meat. Manhare told them fishing was his source of livelihood, and he did not believe in the concept of “purity”. Angered by the insolence, a boycott was announced against him and his family. Their grocery shop had to be shut down, and his old parents left Godda village, ashamed of what was happening to them.
Manhare decided to stay and fight. “My parents went to Maharashtra because of the harassment but I will stay and fight. I will never bow before these decisions. But yes, nobody in the village talks to me.”
Public interest litigation
On September 1, two social organisations from Chhattisgarh, the Guru Ghasidas Sevadar Sangh and the Kanooni Margdarshan Kendra, filed a PIL before the Chhattisgarh High Court, asking for a specific law to tackle the rampant problem of boycotts in the state.
Dinesh Mishra, who has tracked cases of social boycott for the last two decades said that Chhattisgarh has witnessed more than 30,000 cases of social boycott in the last decade. “Several other cases just never come to light. It is one of the biggest problems in Chhattisgarh,” said Mishra, an activist who provides legal help and raises issues of social boycott in the state.
Specifically, the petition mentioned 15 cases across six districts that have seen no action from district authorities. These calls were issued because of issues ranging from inter-caste marriages to religious differences to personal disputes. Issued largely by “caste-based panchayats”, the punishments include complete ex-communication, payment of penalty or other sentences.
Thus far, the petition argued, only Maharashtra has a law which bans social boycott, called the Maharashtra Protection of People from Social Boycott (Prevention, Prohibition and Redressal) Act, 2016.
On September 14, the division bench of chief justice Arup Kumar Goswami and justice Deepak Kumar Tiwari issued notices to the state chief secretary, home secretary, director general of police (DGP), legal services authority, collectors and superintendents of Police (SPs) of six districts, and station house officers (SHOs) of the concerned police stations, seeking their reply within 10 weeks.
In the PIL, the petitioners urged the court to lay down guidelines on prevention and control, criminal proceedings and rehabilitation of victims in all social boycott cases. “We have mentioned only those cases in which the victim is in contact with us. There are cases in almost every village in Chhattisgarh’s plains, and no attempt has been made to contain it. We expect a law from the state government after this petition and hope that things will change due to the intervention of the court,” said Ranji Soren, advocate for the petitioners.
Activists say that most known cases of social boycott in Chhattisgarh are reported from the plains where caste divisions run high. “Leaders that give these decrees are from the majority in their particular villages, and they dictate their archaic rules to the rest of the residents,” said Mishra.
Retired director general of police RK Vij said, “These cases violate human rights. Though criminal action can be taken in appropriate cases, civil action in the form of penalties and compensation against the guilty should be given. Legal awareness also needs to be increased in affected areas.”
The private members bill
The issues surrounding social boycotts have also caught the recent attention of Chhattisgarh’s lawmakers. In December 2021, senior Congress MLA Satyanarayan Sharma, introduced a private members bill titled the ‘Chhattisgarh Social Ostracism (Prevention, Prohibition, Redressal) Bill 2021’.
The bill says that Article 21 of the Constitution of India protects the right to life and personal liberty but when a person or a group of people are socially ostracized, it insinuates a gross violation of human rights. The bill further suggests the appointment of a Social Ostracism Prohibition Officer in every district headquarters and treating the act of social boycott as a criminal offence. The Bill also seeks to attach criminal liability to all such members of a “Jaati Panchayat” who vote for the purpose of social ostracism of any member in a meeting. The state authorities will have the power to remove any obstruction to prevent any kind of social ostracism, the bill says.
“The Speaker has given his nod for the discussion on the bill in the next session of the assembly. I felt the need because of an increase in the complaints I have been receiving. This bill aims to safeguard the rights of weaker sections in society,” said Sharma.
For Mahadev Kurre, forsaken by his village, the PIL in court, and the bill in the assembly present a sliver of hope. Besides, it gives him the chance to talk to advocates, other litigants and the media; simply people outside his own family, a joy he has long since lost.
“I live in a cage of silence. I want to be free, to walk, talk, and live without shame again.”