In August 2023, 18 year old Dalit youth, Nitin Ahirwar, was lynched by the dominant "lambardars" (upper caste, landed elites - in this case, Thakurs) of Barodiya Naunagir in Sagar, MP. When his mother tried to save him, she too was beaten, her hand was broken and her sari was stripped off. Their home was smashed as was that of Nitin’s uncle Rajendra Ahirwar. Just 9 months after Nitin's murder, his uncle, 26 year old Rajendra Ahirwar, a key witness in his murder was also murdered on 25 May, 2024.
The next day, Nitin's sister, 20 year old Anjana Ahirwar who was leading the family's relentless pursuit for justice died in highly suspicious circumstances while she was accompanying Rajendra's body back to Barodiya Naunagir, reportedly after “falling out” of the hearse. This terrible chain of events prompted concerned citizens of Madhya Pradesh to constitute a fact-finding team to understand the matter.
After meeting the affected families, police and administrative personnel as well as several others and studying the relevant documents, the team is now releasing a Report of their findings.
Perhaps due to widespread media scrutiny, Nitin’s murder was followed by several arrests, but there are many lacunae in the investigation . Anjana Ahirwar’s several complaints to senior officials that the family was being pressured to “compromise,” and that the police were protecting a local politician and were delaying the investigation, were ignored.
Some of the main accused are active in the ruling party and have close ties with local political bigwigs. Sagar is an important political centre of Madhya Pradesh -- as is evidenced by the urgency with which both opposition leaders and the leaders of the ruling party, including Chief Minister, Dr. Mohan Yadav himself visited the area and met the affected family.
However, the affected families continue to live in fear, there are several gaps in the investigation of Nitin’s murder, 11 persons named by the family as involved in Rajendra's murder have not been arrested. Police personnel were accompanying Anjana when she died. But more than one and a half months after her death, the police remain tight lipped about it, claiming that the investigation is still ongoing. The only official version so far of her falling or jumping out of the hearse is completely unbelievable.
All circumstances of Anjana's death point towards a conspiracy. Anjana, a second year undergraduate student, was at the forefront of her family's struggle for justice. Be it with dealing with the administration or meeting political leaders. Anjana was forced into this role at the age of 15, when she first fought to file an FIR against local "lambardars" for harassing and beating her -- since then she was subject to constant pressure to drop the matter but refused to do so.
Anjana was the complainant and the chief witness in her brother Nitin's murder as well as the murder of Rajendra Ahirwar, who named his attackers to Anjana on a phone call just before his death.
She documented the pressure against her family made by the influential lambardars and the prejudiced nature of investigation by the police in the numerous complaints she made to district authorities. Anjana opposed the bail plea of those accused in Nitin's murder in High Court, and was planning to oppose their bail pleas in Supreme Court before her "accidental death".
This matter requires a thorough and objective investigation - one that the local police is neither equipped for, nor can be trusted to undertake with any objectivity. In our interaction with concerned police officials we found that they are highly biased against the affected families. We recommend that this investigation be undertaken by the CBI, as has been the demand from the affected family since the very beginning.
In doing so, he deliberately ignored the undeniable facts of the case one of atrocities against Dalits by influential "lambardars", the harassment of a minor girl, the deaths of three Dalit youths, the disrobing and assault on a Dalit woman, and attacks on the home of the affected Dalit family. It is to be noted here that three of the main accused - Komal Thakur and his two sons are BJP leaders and functionaries.
The police are quick to cite the criminal records of Rajendra, Nitin and his brother, Vishnu claiming that the family is being 'used' by another faction opposed to the local 'lambardars'. The fact that the victims may or may not have received assistance from such a faction does not detract from the fact of brutal murders and the continuous harassment faced by the affected family. This points to clear prejudice and bias against the victims, and is deeply worrying.
The root cause of this violence has been the fact that a family of Dalit labourers dared to file FIRs against local 'lambardars', and did not succumb to pressure and threats to drop cases against them - actions which directly threatened the dominance and supremacy of the lambardars. Families of Nitin, Anjana and Rajendra repeatedly expressed their feelings of insecurity, of being vulnerable to further attacks by the village lambardars.
Senior leaders of both the opposition parties and the ruling party are fully aware of the matter. Even after the Chief Minister, Dr Mohan Yadav personally visited the family, as did former Chief Minister Shri Digvijay Singh and several senior Congress leaders, lacunae in the investigations remain and the affected families continue to be vulnerable and afraid .
We wish to emphasise that the Government of Madhya Pradesh government will be solely responsible for any further violence in the matter or any failures in action taken against the perpetrators.
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*This is the report of the citizens' fact-finding committee. Other members: Adv Aditya Rawat, Madhuri (People's Union for Civil Liberties), Anjali (All India Feminist Alliance), Neelu Dahiya (Eka Collective), Nitin (Jagrit Adivasi Dalit Sangathan) Rohit, Sadaf Khan (independent journalists)
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