7 mnths and counting: Longest Silger protest retains its verve

SILGER (SUKMA): It is 10pm on a cold December night. A group of about 30 teenagers is gathered around bonfires under a tamarind tree in Silger village. The light from the fires cuts through the darkness, the silhouette of the forests flickering in the shadows. The gathering at this hour, in this part of Chhattisgarh, is unusual. For Silger is in the forested heart of south Bastar, the epicentre of a deadly, decadeslong battle between security forces and Maoist insurgents. A battle where many have been caught in the crossfire.

On a usual day, Silger would have been pitch black, and eerily quiet. But voices suddenly pierce the night air. The teenagers have started singing. The chorus has the words “O adivasi re...jaago re”(Awake, O Adivasi). They start singing the verse, “tere saamne tere bhai ko goli maara re...tere saamne tere ghar dwaar cheen liya re (they shot your brother in front of you, they stole your home in front of you).”

It is a song of protest.

Around the singers, there’s movement in the makeshift tarpaulin tents, and scores of protesters emerge and join in. Thousands of kilometres away, farmer collectives may have won their battle with the government and left for home in joyous victory marches, but in the Chhattisgarh hinterland, a protest, now the longest in Bastar’s history, has been going on for the past seven months. A protest that has all the markings of the region’s macabre and complicated history – protest against a security camp, four deaths, a typical government response centred on calling the dead and protesters Maoists or sympathisers, and a long impasse that has gone on into winter without any constructive intervention.

Meanwhile, the Maoists were planning to destabilise this camp to protect their corridor. So the Naxals mobilised their frontal organisation members and militia cadres from the surrounding area and sent them to Silger on May 17 with a conspiracy to instigate violence and launch an attack on the security forces BASTAR POLICE CHIEF

Beginning of the protest On May 12, residents of Silger began protests against a new camp of the Central Reserve Police Force. For four days, the number of protesters swelled. The villagers argued there was no permission for the camp, and that it would only bring more harassment to residents. The security agencies argued that it was the villagers who had asked for the camp, that it was key to driving away Maoists and bringing any form of development, and that the protests were being pushed by Maoist cadre.

Five days later, as the number of protesters kept rising and more villages joined in, there was sudden gunfire. Chhattisgarh Police said it was an exchange of fire with Maoists in the crowd, but villagers alleged the forces unilaterally opened fire. Three people were brought dead to the hospital. A few days later, a fourth woman succumbed to her injuries.

“On the night of May 16, the protesters returned to their villages, but the next afternoon some people, including some Maoists of Jagargunda Area Committee, reached the camp and started firing. When the camp was attacked, the security personnel retaliated,” Sunderaj P, inspector general of police in Bastar, had said at the time.

A day later, Sunderaj said the three that died immediately were from “frontal organisations” of Maoists.“The deceased were identified as Uska Pandu, a Bhumkal commander from Timmapur village (Sukma); Kowasi Waga, DAKMS (Dandakaranya Adivasi Kisan Majdoor Sangthan) member from Chhutwahi; and Kursam Bhima, militia member from Gundem village (Bijapur),” he said.

But two weeks later, a twomember fact finding team comprised of noted economist and human rights activist Jean Dreze and lawyer activist Bela Bhatia visited the spot, and said they found no evidence that supported the police claim that an armed group of agitators took over the protest on May 17, and intended to burn down the CRPF camp, leaving the forces with no choice but to open fire.

The report said the camp was set up in the dead of night at around 3 am on May 12, without informing villagers, and about 40-50 of them were dispersed by force when they protested against the camp the next day.

“On May 14, about a thousand adivasis... People shouted slogans demanding the removal of the camp. Every day the police tried to disperse them, sometimes with lathis, sometimes with “mirchi pataka” or tear gas. Dozens of protestors sustained minor injuries... and returned to their villages for local treatment,” the activists said.

Witnesses alleged that by May 17, the number of protestors grew exponentially, perhaps touching 10,000, and some of them started pelting stones after a baton charge, and tear gas and bullets being fired into the air to control the crowds, Dreze and Bhatia said.

“Soon police firing started. Three protestors were killed on the spot (one of them, Uika Pandu of Timmapuram, who was hit in the head, was only 16 or 17 years old), at least another three had bullet injuries and as many as 40 were injured in one way or another,” they said.

Chhattisgarh Police maintained that the CRPF camp was established to facilitate construction of a road on the BasagudaJagargunda axis, as it was an important corridor for Maoists and a stronghold of the People’s Liberation Guerrilla Army Battalion number 1.

Sunderaj had then refuted claims made in the fact-finding report and said villagers were properly briefed about the nature of the camp on May 13.

“Meanwhile, the Maoists were planning to destabilise this camp to protect their corridor. So the Naxals mobilised their frontal organisation members and militia cadres from the surrounding area and sent them to Silger on May 17 with a conspiracy to instigate violence and launch an attack on the security forces,” the Bastar police chief said.

How has the protest run for seven months

On May 20, a group of protesters banded around the Mool-Vaasi Bachao Manch (platform to save indigenous people), the aim of which was to streamline the Silger protest. Raghu Madyami, 21, president of the Manch, has been leading the protest with 26 other office bearers since then.

In the middle of December, when HT reached the spot, there were about 20 small camps of protestors.

“Each camp belongs to a village taking part in this protest. Every five days, a group of villagers come here and reside in their village’s camp,” said Raghu, sitting outside the Timmapuram village camp in Silger.

A day starts at 7am, and protesters cook and eat by 10. They then march towards the camp to mark their protest and return by 2pm. Groups then begin to search for wood for fires that must burn at night. By 7, dinner is done, and from 8pm to midnight, they sing the winter away. Every day for the past seven months.