Report on the Punjab Rao Memorial Discussion

On 27th June, the Punjab Rao Memorial Discussion was organized by the All India Kissan Mazdoor Sabha (AIKMS), honoring the death anniversary of the Naxilite communist activist Punjab Rao. The subject of the discussion was ‘Zameen Prapti Sangharsh Committee's (ZPSC) Movement in Punjab and the Dalit Question’. Savitri Rao Curzon, comrade of the AIKMS and partner of the late Punjab Rao, delivered the inaugurative comments. In an accent blending Rajvangshi and Bengali, she described how Punjab Rao—hailing from Maharashtra and once a military officer—who traveled to Naxalbari, having left his job to come to Siliguri and become a Communist Party worker, had unwavering faith in the militant leftist politics of Naxalbari throughout his life. Punjab Rao, who was one of the leaders of the armed struggle in Naxalbari on May 24, 1967, and later the revolutionary struggle of Magurjan, broke out of prison and was arrested by the police the day before his death while participating in the movement. At that time, he was the state vice-president of the militant leftist farmers' organization AIKMS. 

The Punjab Rao Memorial Discussion was attended by more than two hundred comrades from many corners of West Bengal - North and South 24 Parganas, Howrah, Hooghly. Nadia, Paschim Bardhman, Bankura, Siliguri, Jalpaiguri, and Kolkata. The session was chaired by AIKMS State President Sushanta Jha. Alongside him were AIKMS State Secretary Shubhranshu Mukhopadhyay and Co-President Amal Ray (Rabi). The introductory speech of the event was given by Sushanta Jha.

The Punjab Rao Memorial Discussion was attended by more than two hundred comrades from many corners of West Bengal.

The main speaker for the discussion was Mukesh Malaudh, the Zonal President of the ZPSC, a Punjabi Leftist Organization. Comrade Mukesh let us know that the Punjabi Land Reform Movement was considered by its stakeholders to be in continuation with the aims and objectives of Naxalbari. According to the Punjab Village Common Land Regulation Act 1954, one-third of the cultivated lands under the aegis of the Panchayat had to be reserved in the name of Dalits. In practice, this is not what happened. The big landowners, who were predominantly upper-caste Jats, often registered land under the name of those Dalits who had been forced to work under them, reaping the benefits of the land which was, legally, the property of others. In 2014, a group of left-wing progressive-democratic student youths, witnessing the condition of Dalits in the Malwa region, during their work for the Gram Chalo Initiative, decided to take up the issue of land and to help mobilize the Dalit population. The initiative to organize for the cause of this claim to land and the remarkable participation of Dalits in this drive led to the establishment of the Zameen Prapti Sangharsh Committee (ZPSC) — named thus by the protesting Dalits themselves. The ZPSC conducted a field survey and created a census of the Dalit population and the total land that was available. In 2014, the Committee’s organizer spent two months in jail on account of false charges of attempting to kill their comrades. In 2017, the parents of a ZPSC comrade were killed by the State’s police personnel.

According to the Punjab Land Reforms Act 1972, surplus land was to be distributed among landless peasants and agricultural laborers, almost all of whom were either Dalit or from the Scheduled Tribe. The State Government failed to implement this. As a result, politically active peasants started the struggle for land by themselves, independently. The movement gathered unity and momentum after pushback from upper-caste Jat samantas in the village of Badrikalan. Despite the efforts of feudal overlords in sowing discord among the aforementioned lower caste population, the peasants and laborers, increasingly more aware of their rights as a result of the ZPSC’s movement, disregarded their feudal mandates. When the feudal lords’ vote-mongering goons came to villages to ask for votes, the villagers vocally argued for their claims over land, driving out the goons. The Dalits had only a few livestock and no land that they could call their own property. As a result, it was necessary for them to take the cattle to the lands of upper-caste land-owning farmers to have them fed. In this process, they were subjected to humiliation from the latter, and sometimes even became victims of sexual exploitation.

In continuation with the land reclamation movement, the ZPSC, on 20th May of this year, gave a call to start a programme for the possession of land in the ‘Bir Aishwan’ (Bechirag) village in Sangrur District. The main demand of the programme in Sangrur was that the 927 acres of  State-owned land, which had previously been under the purview of the Jind royal family and currently had no heir, should be distributed amongst landless Dalits. The ZPSC had brought up these demands to the State Government; but it had turned a deaf ear to them. On 28th February, under the leadership of the ZPSC, thousands of Dalit protesters marched on the aforementioned land and even lit ‘chirags’ (lamps). On account of no response from the State Government, under the leadership of ZPSC, the Dalit Community took on the responsibility of occupying the land on 20th May.  

However, the Punjab Police began raids — on the houses of ZPSC leaders and workers, and arrests two days before, on the 18th and 19th of May.  On the 20th itself, the police tried to stifle the protests through barricading and cornering the 850 protesters who had taken to the streets on a march. 450 of these protesters were arrested and locked up in the jails of Sangrur, Nobha, Patiala, Ludhiana, Bathinda and Muktsar. Among the protesters who had been arrested, a large number were women. Not even the elderly could evade manhandling or arrest. Despite the State Government's reassurances that it was willing to come into conversation with the ZPSC, no such attempt for discussion or conversation was made. The Government was forced later on, under pressure from protesting groups, to free the dissenters it had arrested. Consequently, the heirless land previously under the purview of the Jind royal family was proposed to be formed into a Dalit settlement called ‘Begampura’ - the name taken from the utopian society that animates the formulations of Sant Ravidas, a progenitor and pioneer of the Dalit Mukti movement. The ‘Begampura’ of Sant Ravidas’ dreams is sustained as that haven for the humiliated Dalit, where they suffer no longer, on which land landless peasants will find their rights and claims. Where they won’t face humiliation in even merely trying to feed their cattle. Comrade Mukesh speaks of Begampura, and the landless peasant and laboring families from Rahr, Siliguri and Jalpaiguri, who have traveled overnight to Kolkata to attend this very meeting listen intently. Mukesh reminded everyone present that just like the Fascist BJP at the center, the AAP-rule Punjab government also sent police to attack and violently stifle protests and lodge false cases against the protesters. Mukesh also made clear that even if all strands of leftist opinion were in solidarity with the initiative of the Dalit community, the vote-mongering BSP — who claim to be the Dalit Party — has not stepped up on the initiative. Instead, they have gone against the landless Dalit community and collaborated with the AAP-ruled State Government.

Mukesh Malod, the Zonal President of the ZPSC, a Punjabi Leftist Organization, speaking during the event.

Comrade Mukesh’s speech, unpacking this turbulent history, was delivered with a mix of Hindi and Punjabi, and was translated into Bengali for the audience by a long-time ally of the movement, Pramod Gupta. The event was interspersed in between by music from long-time Gonobiggyan-Gonoswasthyo movement ally Deepak Chakraborty and Rai Chattopadhyay. The concluding remarks were made by Amal Roy (Rabi).

Strolling the streets after exiting the hall, I was reminded of Ravidas’ line, ‘Begampura Shahr Ko Nao, Dukhu-Anduhu Nahi Tahi Khao’. I keep humming to myself Hemango Biswas’ lyrics upon returning from socialist China, ‘ Aami Je Dekhechi Shei Desh/ Desh Ujjwol Shurjo Rongin…’.

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This report was prepared by Apurba Roy for Frontier Web, and translated to English from the original Bangla by Arka Sen Chakraborty