November 16 - 30, December 1-15, 2006

With great anger, People’s Voice condemns the pre-meditated gruesome massacre of four members of a dalit family in Kherlanji village in Bhandara district near Nagpur, on September 29, by a gang of about 15 people, believed to be members of the local landlord class. While the mother and daughter were brutally raped, tortured and killed, the father and his two sons were severely beaten up and the sons were also murdered, following which the corpses were further mutilated. Relatives of the family as well as other eye witnesses who tried to come to their rescue were also subjected to intimidation and torture.

Despite the attempts of the police and the local administration to suppress news of the incident and cover up all evidence pointing to the guilty, angry people have come out in large numbers in Nagpur and across the state of Maharashtra, protesting against this ghastly massacre. From October 29 to November 6, protests and dharnas have been held in prominent places in Nagpur and a Nagpur bandh was called on November 10. Human rights organizations and people’s organizations all over India have condemned the massacre and demanded immediate arrest and punishment of the guilty. They have also demanded criminal prosecution of the policemen and doctors responsible for suppressing the truth about the incident.

In order to crush the mass protests and sentiments of the people against this ghastly atrocity, the police and state department as well as the Maharashtra government have launched a vicious campaign to vilify the protesters, labeling them as ‘naxalite-inspired’. Simultaneously, they have unleashed brutal state terror and repression, killing and arresting hundreds of protesters.

Atrocities against dalits, tribals, and other sections of the people, with the tacit support and protection of the state, remain a regular feature of Indian society. Capitalist growth in India has not only perpetuated but actively nurtured the worst kinds of feudal remnants in the society, such as caste and communal prejudices, the subjugation of people of ‘lower castes’, of specific communities, of women, and so on. All the most barbaric forms of torture and subjugation have been utilized by the ruling big bourgeoisie and its political parties, to keep the people divided and the oppressed sections super-exploited. To safeguard its parasitic rule based on loot and plunder of the toiling majority, and to ensure the super-profits of a tiny exploiting minority, political parties of the big bourgeoisie in power at the Centre or states organize, or give full sanction and state protection to the organizers of communal or caste-based pogroms and other forms of violence. Invariably, those opposing the atrocities and fighting for justice for the victims are persecuted, while the guilty go scot-free and are never punished.

PV vigorously denounces the Maharashtra government and the local police and administration for trying to suppress the truth and protect the guilty, while harassing and terrorizing those protesting against the Kherlanji massacre. As this and numerous such outrages against the dalits, minorities, tribals and other sections of the people show, this state of the big bourgeoisie can never be relied on to defend even the most basic right, the right to life, of the poor and oppressed people. PV calls upon the working class and all men and women of conscience to rise up as one against the brutal terror and repression unleashed by the ruling class and its agencies on any and every section of the toiling people. What is needed is to build and strengthen the organizations of the people, in order to resist the violence of the rulers, dislodge these criminals from the seats of power and usher in the rule of the workers, peasants and toiling people.