Life hasn’t changed much for residents of village where Indira arrived on elephant

Janaki Paswan, 82, will never forget the horrendous events of May 27, 1977. Hiding in his neighbour’s house to save his life, he witnessed the gruesome murder of 11 people—eight dalits and three members of the backward castes. They were shot dead after their hands were tied. Their bodies were then burnt on a common pyre. Paswan was too scared to make a sound. The perpetrators belonged to the land-owning Kurmi caste, and Paswan remembers in horror that the killers feasted, while the bodies burned.

Paswan is the lone surviving witness of the carnage, which came to be known as the Belchi massacre. Belchi is a remote village located 90km from Patna. Based on Paswan’s testimony, two of the accused were sentenced to death, while 11 others were given life sentences. But what made this massacre part of India’s political history was the extraordinary sight of former prime minister Indira Gandhi riding an elephant to reach the village to meet the victims’ families.

Indira was going through a political crisis at the time. She was ousted from office in March 1977, after opposition parties came together in the post-Emergency general elections. Indira herself lost Rae Bareli, her pocket borough. On hearing the news of the gruesome killing, she headed to Belchi. Since then, the visit is listed as a key event in the history of the Congress and in Indira’s political revival.

“The monsoon was particularly heavy that year. The fields were filled with water, and even the roads were submerged. We were told that she would come. We wondered how she would get here,” said Paswan.

Indira flew down to Patna and drove from there. She switched from her car to a Jeep, and then to a tractor as roads got worse. But even the tractor got stuck at one point. Someone then suggested that an elephant might be able to navigate the road ahead. An elephant named Moti was arranged locally from Harnaut, the ancestral village of Chief Minister Nitish Kumar. Indira rode Moti to reach Belchi on August 13, 1977.

“When she came, she did not speak much. The loss of power was weighing on her. She sat on the elephant, while her personal secretary took notes. She was here for nearly one and a half hours. We told her that the accused should be punished, and we should get some compensation,” said Paswan.

Indira’s visit meant that the case could no longer be ignored. It also led to the involvement of former chief minister Jagannath Mishra. “He used to listen to us patiently,” said Paswan.

The younger generation of Belchi still listens to Paswan when he speaks about the massacre and Indira’s visit. And he is always ready to oblige. With a stick in his hand, he walks barefoot around the village, looking for an audience who would listen to his tales from the past.

Unfortunately, nothing much has changed for Belchi. The biggest change after the massacre is that a police station and a school have come up. “The nearest police post was at Sakshora, three kilometres away. The policemen used to ask for bribes to listen to our complaints. After the killing, which took place at around 11am, we had informed the police. They came at 5:30pm. After the incident, the police camped here, and ultimately a police station was set up,” Paswan said. “I gave my land to set up the school.”

Paswan said the person responsible for the massacre was Mahavir Mahato, a Kurmi strongman, who was notorious for usurping land and harassing people. Things changed when Paswan’s brother’s son-in-law Sidheswar, known popularly as Singhwa, shifted base to Belchi. And the clashes between the two groups started becoming more frequent.

“On May 27, Mahato sent a message to Singhwa for rapprochement. When Singhwa and his associates came, Mahato’s hired men captured them. They were shot and then burnt. After watching this, I escaped, only to return the next day,” said Paswan. “It was a fight between the rich and the poor. The rich tried to control us.”

Paswan became a key witness in the case. “As I feared for my life, I asked for security,” he said. “They tried to frame me, too. Two false murder cases were registered against me, but nothing came of it.”

Ram Swarath Singh, a Kurmi from Belchi, too, remembers Indira’s visit. He said the massacre was the result of the fight between two criminal groups. “The area had a history of criminal gangs and dacoits. The rivalry between the two gangs led to the killing. There was no caste angle to it,” said Singh, sitting at the hardware shop run by his son. “Even I was once waylaid at night by the Mahato group.” Singh somehow managed to escape, and went later to Bombay, where he tried his hand in acting. “I started with small roles, then started getting character roles, often that of a policeman. I was fondly called Ranna ji,” he said.

Singh recalled that when Indira came, local politicians had arranged food for her. “But she did not eat anything,” he said. “She sat on the elephant, listening to the complaints of the victims. Since then our area got a makeover. We got electricity, a police station, and a block office. And, our area was no longer dacoit infested.”

For the Paswans, not much has changed. They have to wade through slush to reach their homes. “The only people who got better are the Kurmis. It is a Kurmistan,” said Paswan, alleging that Nitish, who is a Kurmi, cares only for his caste. “We Paswans rely on places like Delhi and Chennai, where our brethren have gone for work.”

As we made our way through the slush to reach the site of the massacre, Paswan came face to face with Mahato’s daughter-in-law. She taunted him: “Why do you want to go there? We will build a temple there.”