Aadikanta Daliya, a 45 year old political worker, was burnt and turned into a ball of fire in the presence of his wife, and children, a girl aged 16 and a boy aged 14. It happened on May 22 last, few weeks back. The place was Birsa Munda Chowk, part of Sasra Gram Panchayat in West Midnapore district in Bengal. This Bengal district borders Orissa. Aadikanta Daliya a resident of Jhargram, a village nearby, was a dalit and a BJP worker. His wife, on religious fasting, did not cook at home on that day. So Daliya came to the Chowk, which was nearby, for food at a wayside food shop. As he began to eat, a violent group testified by witnesses to be CPM workers set upon him. He ran and sought took in a cloth shop. The Chowk is a BJP strong hold. The attackers soon swelled into a mob, baying for Daliya's blood. It began to loot, set fire to the shops numbering some 50. As news reached Daliya's house nearby, his wife and two children reached the spot. Daliya's village peers also arrived and so did his brother. But hugely outnumbered they could do nothing as the mob did what it had decided to.
They pulled Daliya out of the shop, brought him to the street, and set fire to him. Soon he was a ball of flame and ashes amid harrowing cries in front of his horrified and sobbing wife and children, and in the presence of his villagers and the people of the Chowk.
Who were among the spectators to this cruel drama? The Bengal Police! In front of them Daliya became a heap of ashes. Imagine the living death experience of Daliya's wife. Her ordeal did not stop at that. She had to struggle for a week with the authorities to secure the charred remains of Daliya. The original sin of the people of Sarsa Gram Panchayat was that they had elected the BJP between 1998 and 2003. How could they dare do it in the last residue of Marxism in the world? The simmering anger had its final provocation. Ardhendu Satpathy, a well-known extortionist of the area and a CPM activist, was found murdered that very morning. So the CPM got the chance they had been waiting for. Did the Marxist-controlled police, who had come to investigate the murder of Satpathy, feel justified in allowing the gruesome torching as an inevitable retaliation? Did any one in the country ever hear of this gruesome news? The local newspapers did carry it. Not a word in any national newspaper. For the multitude of TV channels it was of course a non-event. At that very moment the media was full of news on West Midnapore. About whether there were hunger deaths in the district or not, with the CPM vehemently denying any. Why did a national media fully aware that Daliya was reduced to ashes in the presence of his wife and children and with the Bengal police as eye witness turn a blind eye to it? Want to know the answer? Ask another question. What would the media have done had Aadikanta Daliya not been a Hindu? This is the clue to the media's silence. Recall Graham Stains being burnt in Orissa five years back? Rightly the media highlighted and condemned this gruesome murder, even though the way they over did that destroyed the image of India in the western world.
Even now the media keeps the nation reminded about the shameful crime. But what is the difference between Stains and Daliya? Graham Stains was not a Hindu and more, he was a Whiteman. In contrast Daliya, though a dalit, was still a Hindu, and worse still 'a communal Hindu' in the eyes of the media.
That is why it makes no news even if Daliya was burnt most cruelly in broad daylight? Or is it because such news would hurt the image of CPM, the guardian of secularism in India? Why did the media black out torching Daliya? Will they explain?
Writer's email: comment@gurumurthy.net.