Patna: The Communist Party of India (Marxist-Leninist) Liberation (CPI(ML)-Liberation), a key component of the ruling Mahagathbandhan in Bihar, has asked chief minister Nitish Kumar to investigate a possible “political link” in the recent illicit liquor tragedy in Saran district that took 50 lives.

Suggesting that gangsters patronised by the Sangh parivar might have been responsible for the tragedy, the party made this demand against the backdrop of at least two past instances in the state when members of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) were involved in cases related to liquor. In one of these cases, in 2018, a large cache of liquor bottles was seized from the house of Shivji Singh, the brother of the former BJP member of the legislative assembly (MLA) from Gopalganj, the late Subhas Singh. In the other case, in November 2021, the police charged 12 persons, mostly linked to the RSS-BJP, in connection with the illicit liquor tragedy in Gopalganj in which 20 lives were lost.

Gopalganj is part of Saran district and is in the neighbourhood of Masrakh, the epicentre of the current illicit liquor tragedy. Since the discovery of the Masrakh tragedy, the BJP has continuously stalled the proceedings of the assembly.

A Sangh parivar brew?

“It is like chor machaye shor (a killer crying murder),” remarked Kunal, the Liberation’s Bihar secretary, recalling the deaths of about 100 persons (the official figure is 50) who had consumed spurious liquor in the Botad, Bhavnagar and Ahmedabad districts of Gujarat on July 21 this year.

The Liberation claims to have gathered evidence suggesting that “Mafiosi linked to the RSS-BJP  are using their ‘Thakur’ connections among the police in BJP-ruled Uttar Pradesh to smuggle liquor into the Gopalganj and West Champaran districts of Bihar through the river Gandak”.

During a ruckus created by BJP members in the assembly on Thursday, Nitish Kumar had shouted, “Tumhi log pila rahe ho (You members of the BJP are getting people drunk).” Also in the assembly, Tejashwi Yadav, Bihar’s deputy chief minister, had said that such tragedies were also occurring with alarming regularity in Gujarat, a prohibition state like Bihar.

“One might question Nitishji’s manners, but he was right in what he said. So was Tejashwi Yadav,” said Kunal. He added, “The Mafiosi linked to the RSS are involved in liquor smuggling in a big way. They get their ‘knowhow’ in the illicit trade from their counterparts in Gujarat.”

Saffron bikini and other tales

In the estimation of the Liberation, a party with 12 MLAs and a strong presence at the grassroots level in the Saran, Bhojpur, Patna, Jehanabad, Muzaffarpur and Champaran regions of Bihar, the BJP has camouflaged three monumental failures on its part by using the following narratives in the media.

1. The discourse on actress Deepika Padukone dancing in a saffron bikini to cover up the security lapse in the Tawang sector  of Arunachal Pradesh where Indian and Chinese troops recently clashed. The Sangh Parivar’s targeting of Paduokone’s bikini is actually aimed at her co-star Shah Rukh Khan, a Muslim.

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2. The illicit liquor tragedy in Bihar to divert attention from the steady rise of fuel prices, despite the fact that India buys crude oil from Russia at the world’s cheapest rate of USD 60 per barrel. With the Mahagathbandhan in power now, Bihar has emerged as the BJP’s strongest inquisitor on genuine issues such as price rise, unemployment and the politics of hate.

3. The illicit liquor tragedy in Bihar again to paint Nitish Kumar as the country’s “biggest villain” in light of the Lok Sabha elections due in 2024. Nitish leads the Mahagathbandhan, a coalition of parties including the Rashtriya Janata Dal (RJD), the Janata Dal (United), the Congress and the Left parties, which is a microcosm of the formation he aims to construct at the national level to challenge Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The Liberation’s estimation of the BJP’s strategies is not based on hearsay. It is the only Left party in Bihar equipped with trained cadres and with effective presence at the grassroots level. Kunal had been going through reports based on studies on “ground realities” carried out by his party cadres when I called on him at the Liberation office. Of all the parties in the Mahagathbandhan, it is the cadres of the Liberation who confront the RSS in the villages. That is why clashes between the Liberation and the RSS have escalated lately.

“Two investigating agencies – the National Investigation Agency (NIA) and the Enforcement Directorate (ED) – have been more active in Bihar of late. Based on feedback from RSS operatives they (the NIA and the ED) selectively target the cadres of the Liberation, primarily the Muslims and the Dalits, implicating them in cases under various sections of anti-terrorism Acts. While the NIA arrests our cadres on trumped up charges, the ED picks up Muslims based on false evidence to interrogate them on their connections with the Popular Front of India and Students’ Islamic Movement of India,” Kunal alleged.

The RSS modus operandi

The Liberation’s reports on the Sangh parivar can be summed up as follows:

1. Since Narendra Modi came to power in 2014, the RSS has intensified its operations in the hinterlands. The number of yagyas (religious events involving the congregation of a huge number of devotees andsadhus), kalash yatras(processions mainly of women carrying earthen pitchers on their heads)  and Shiv charchas (discussions on Shiva as a Guru) have increased manifold and Ramnavami processions have been taken out in areas which had never seen such events in the past. The cardinal feature of these events is young men brandishing swords and shouting ‘Jai Shri Ram’.

2. Most participants of the Shiv charchasand kalash yatrasare women belonging to marginalised castes. These RSS-sponsored events have belittled the importance of the local deities that have been worshipped by various communities since time immemorial. For example the Dusadhs (Paswans) traditionally functioned as priests of the ‘Dih’. Every village had its own ‘Dih’ who was regarded as the chief of all the ghosts of the village. Similarly, every village had its own ‘Kali-Mai’ and ‘Baram Baba’. The marginalised castes had access to these deities, even though they were denied access to Shiva or Vishnu temples.  The RSS exploited the feeling of “segregation” amongst the marginalised castes against the ‘upper’ and intermediary castes and involved them in Sangh Parivar activities. In doing so, the RSS detached them from the deities that fostered their community life and ‘indoctrinated’ them against Muslims.

3. While Nitish is the BJP’s target at the top level, the NIA and ED are targeting Liberation cadres at the grassroots level. For example, the NIA picked up Liberation cadre Aftab Alam on the day bombs exploded at Narendra Modi’s meeting at Gandhi Maidan in 2014. “Aftab was on his way to Delhi on the day of Modi’s Patna visit. The NIA began questioning him and harassing him without any evidence,” a Liberation report said.

Kunal explained, “Even after seven years, the NIA summons Aftab for interrogation. It has asked him to report to the local police station on a weekly basis. But it has not so far submitted any concrete evidence in the court against Aftab.”

4. The RSS has also escalated the activities of its activist outfits, such as the Ram Sena, the Bajrang Dal, the Gau Raksha Sena and others to target mainly Liberation cadres. They also provoke intermediary castes like the Yadavs, Koiris and Kurmis against Muslims by saying that these castes “will be the beneficiaries of the lands and properties of the Muslims once the latter are driven out”. In fact, Liberation’s observations match the observation of RJD president Lalu Prasad Yadav in his autobiography, Gopalganj to Raisina: My Political Journey, which he co-authored with me.

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Liberation’s counter offensive

To counter the NIA’s falsehoods, Liberation has made Aftab Alam the president of the Insaf Morcha – the party’s attempt to protect the minorities from the RSS onslaught.

“The NIA seize our reports and describe them as incriminating documents or red literature and the media lap up their description without examining the documents,” Kunal said.

The Liberation has also formed the Inquabli Navjawan Sabha (INS) whose cadres attend religious and social events and confront RSS operatives at those events. In the process, INS cadres earn the wrath of the RSS-BJP as well as the police.

“The NIA has picked up 186 Muslims from Bihar Sharif and Muzaffarpur without any evidence. It has implicated them in cases under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Amendment Act and other such Acts. The NIA has targeted the Imarat-e-Sharia headquartered at Phulwari Sharif in a big way,” a Liberation report said.

Nalin Verma is a senior journalist, media educator and independent researcher in social anthropology.