THE Tamil Nadu government has decided to take up the decade-old challenge from casteist forces of four panchayats in Madurai and Virudhunagar districts to the statutory empowerment of Dalits, with all the seriousness that it deserves.
The Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam government will exempt these panchayats from dereservation for the elections to the local bodies scheduled for October. Almost all political parties in the State, particularly the Dalit parties, have welcomed the move. But misgivings about the process being taken to its logical conclusion, unlike in previous years, remain.
Chief Minister M. Karunanidhi's strident call in the State Assembly for cooperation from all political parties to make Dalit empowerment a reality in these panchayats indicated his government's resolve to beat the caste-Hindu resistance. Caste Hindus of 12 villages covered by these panchayats, together accounting for less than 30,000 people, have succeeded for 10 years in stalling the election of Dalits to the posts of presidents reserved for them under the rotational system of reservation under the Tamil Nadu Panchayats Act, 1994.
Two rounds of elections were held Statewide between 1996 and 2006 to fill 1.17 lakh positions in the three-tier panchayati raj institutions (and about 15,000 posts in municipal and corporation councils). There were 15 byelections and also "casual elections" to fill the posts that became vacant subsequent to these. Still the electoral process could not be completed in the real sense of the term in these four panchayats, with no Dalit being allowed to file his/her nomination, or with the successful candidate, if one managed to contest, resigning the post subsequently under pressure from caste Hindus or as part of a prior understanding with them (Frontline, May 24, 2002).
Since the second half of 1996, when the State government identified about 2,250 of the 12,609 panchayats, in which the post of president would be reserved for Dalits in proportion to their percentage in the population, hostile caste-Hindu groups began mounting protests in many parts of the State. The resistance was particularly intense in the southern districts, the heartland of caste-related violence.
In the beginning the administration sought to create an impression that although the electoral process was set in motion in these panchayats with the necessary security arrangements, Dalits were mostly not willing to contest, ignoring the resentment among caste Hindus, on whose lands they worked as labourers. But the use of force by caste Hindus to prevent Dalits from contesting or campaigning and the helplessness of the administration could not be concealed for long. In two panchayats in Madurai district, Pappapatti and Keeripatti, and in Kottakatchiyendal in Virudhunagar district, no nominations were filed and so no elections were held. At Melavalavu panchayat, reserved for Dalits, in Madurai district, caste Hindus let loose a reign of terror when two persons managed to file nominations with police protection. As a result this election was countermanded. In the re-election held two months later, Murugesan, who contested again, emerged successful. Although he braved all impediments from caste Hindus to his functioning as the panchayat president, he and five of his supporters were murdered in less than a year. Since then the "Melavalavu massacre" has been used by caste Hindus to cow down prospective Dalit candidates. In several places where Dalits are in a minority and are at the mercy of caste-Hindu groups as they depend on them for their livelihood, the informal "oor panchayats" dominated by caste-Hindu groups would nominate Dalits of their own choice for the election, help them win and keep them under their stranglehold. A similar tactic was followed in Pappapatti and Keeripatti for the byelections but with a difference: the elected Dalits were forced to quit their posts as soon as they assumed charge. (The only Dalit president who refused to oblige lost the post after a case of alleged misappropriation of funds was filed against him.) Nattarmangalam, which had an elected Dalit panchayat president between 1996 and 2001, joined the "rebel" panchayats in 2001.
Although the Dalit parties and the major Left parties, besides numerous non-governmental organisations, have been protesting against successive governments' failure to put down this organised subversion of the mandatory elections, nothing much was done to correct the situation. Those who managed to contest the elections complained at a National Public Hearing on the rebel panchayats' defiance, organised by the Dalit Panthers of India (DPI) and the Madurai-based People's Watch, Tamil Nadu, among others, that their appeals to the district administration to provide them police protection went unheeded. One of them said that although the government often complained of lack of support from Dalit organisations, it did not allow DPI leader Thol Thirumavalavan to campaign for a candidate of his choice. Even a high-level committee appointed by the previous Jayalalithaa government could not make any meaningful contribution to alter the situation. The attitude of the DMK government before that was no different. There were also complaints that the ruling parties did not have the required political will to find a remedy and the administration was reluctant to treat this planned attack on the electoral system as a form of atrocity against Dalits and take action under the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act.
Studies have revealed that Dalits in the villages that come under the four panchayats are landless agricultural workers who depend on caste-Hindu landholders for their livelihood and have been subjected to untouchability in its varied forms. Unless these root causes are removed no lasting solution can be found, the reports observe.
Describing the government's decision on the reservation status of the four panchayats as a "bold step in the right direction", G. Palanithurai, who heads the Rajiv Gandhi Chair for Panchayati Raj Studies in the Gandhigram Deemed University, said that it should be followed up with effective steps to force the "rebel" panchayats to fall in line. Suggesting a multi-pronged approach to the problem, he said the government should stop grants to the panchayats that refused to have elected bodies and functionaries. All parties should be asked to commit themselves to changing the situation and an all-party team should be sent to these villages to discuss the issue with Piranmalai Kallars, the principal caste-Hindu group in the region, Palanithurai said. Another suggestion was that party-based elections to local bodies could also help ensure empowerment of Dalits in a better manner.
S. ViswanathanCOMMents
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