CC_India

SECTION III:
KANDHAMAL:
THE AFTERMATH OF COMMUNAL VIOLENCE
Kandhamal is one of the two poorest districts in Odisha and has a high percentage
of two marginalised ethnic groups, Panasan oppressed Dalit caste comprising
17% of the population and Kandhas a tribal Adivasi group making up 51%.
The Panas are poorer than the Kandhas as they
have substantially less access to resources,
and hold barely 9% of the cultivable land. Over
90% of the Panasare Christians. The Kandhas
are animists and have been targets of religious conversion,
both by Christian missionaries and Hindutva
forces. Over the last three decades the Hindutva forces
have intensified their religio-cultural proselytised of
Dalits and Adivasis especially after the arrival of Swami
LakshmanandanSaraswati. Tension was building up.
The Swami’s murder in August 2008 unleashed a brutal
onslaught against the Christian minority community
of Dalits and Adivasis, and those ‘social workers’
(Hindus and Christians) who had been working for their
upliftment. Over five months, from August – December
2008, violence instigated by the politicised Hindu right
or Hindutva organisations savagely killed 39 persons,
women were sexually assaulted, properties looted
and burnt, churches raxed, and nearly 30,000 people
uprooted, and who remain displaced. While the Odisha
government has projected the violence as ethnic — two
communities Dalits and Adivasis fighting over land, the
National Commission for Minorities as well as independent
fact finding teams have emphasised its communal
nature and the role of the Hindutva organisations.
Saumya Uma visited Kandhmal five years after the violence
to document women victim/survivors’ experience
of the aftermath — their continuing insecurities amidst
a hostile majority community that socially and economically
ostracises them; their coping strategies amidst
systemic corruption and indifferent state institutions;
their struggle for justice despite a threat to their lives
and the lives of their family members, and a hostile law
and order system. Saumya tries to break the silence
around the targeted use of sexual violence during the
communal attacks to destroy and humiliate the women
of the ‘other’ community. Despite witnesses attesting
to it being rampant, it is barely visible in the official narrative,
and few, if any, cases have been registered and
pending prosecution in courts. Women wanting to testifying
are subjected to extreme intimidation and threats
by many, including local government officials. The study
also demystifies the belief that Christian women believe
in forgiveness, and not punishing the attackers. Of the
300 women who are part of the study’s listening space
across 14 villages and resettlement sites, effort was
determinedly made to reach out to women and girls,
young and old, across the religious community divide.
UNEQUAL CITIZENS: Women’s Narratives of Resistance, Militarisation, Corruption and Security
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