Talk:Bhumi Sena

Doubts regarding the content

Hi, I have some doubts regarding the content of the article.

1. The opening paragraph says that the group operated between the late 1970s to mid 1990s however, the cited news article mentions the time span of late 70s to mid 90s as the time period when dozens of private militias appeared and disappeared, not the time period when bhumi sena was active.

2. The ″History″ section mentions – ′The growing consciousness among landless labourers about their rights and the mobilization of these people by Communists as well as Shoshit Samaj Dal (SSP) of Jagdeo Prasad led to rise of Dalit leadership under Singhwa′, however, the cited reference mentions that the organization of poor and landless peasants (not just dalits) under the leadership of Singhwa was rather spontaneous . This does not seem to be influenced by the campaigns started by the communists and SSP as Singhwa had never been to school and did not have any association with any political party, left or right.

3. The ″History″ section mentions that the Bhumi sena was formed by Mahavir Mahto however, the reference doesn't seem to make the claim of sena being formed by Mahavir. The only mention of bhoomi sena in the book occurs at page 267. Other references cited in the wiki article give contradicting dates for sena's formation like the frontline article mentions the formation date as 1978 and ″Windows into a Revolution″ book mentions 1982 as the formation date.

4. There is a line added which says – ′ Later, Indira Gandhi visited and met Dalits which helped her return to power in centre due to wide sympathy of Dalits with her′ .The part of statement in italics is not only irrelevant to the topic but also highly contentious given that Mrs. Gandhi did visit the place and her party did score a victory in the national elections in 1980 but the Congress(I) party led by her lost at Nalanda(constituency where belcchi is located) during 1980s elections (Congress Candidate Ram Sharan Prasad Singh came third) . If one looks at the win map of various parties in the 1980s elections on this page 1980 Loksabha election then one notices that Congress(I) and its allies actually fared worse in Bihar compared to other states. Indira also seemed to have got back the support of upper castes, who had voted against her during 1977 elections in anger over her authoritarianism and pro-dalit actions during the emergency, during 1980 election as mentioned here https://books.google.co.in/books?id=rT2xWp_iTCYC&pg=PA108#v=onepage&q&f=false. So, it seems that it was the upper caste support in north india that helped her return to power.

5. The ″Mass Killing″ section mentions a line ′including 4 of our Party members (one being a fighter of an armed squad)′ . One wonders why is ′our′ - a first person pronoun, used in the paragraph ? There is no mention of the party whose members got killed but perhaps, the party might be CPI-ML. Perhaps, the person who added this statement in the article might be a member of that party but nevertheless, this line doesn't seem to be mentioned in the cited reference.

@Swadge2: Can you please look into the above ?

--Piyushkumar911 (talk) 05:04, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi Piyushkumar911. You raise a number of excellent points, and I absolutely agree that these are all quite significant problems with the article as it is now. In my recent edit, I aimed to fix some of these issues, but it has since been reverted. I will see if I can reach a consensus with the editor who reverted my edit, and hopefully through that I'll be able to address at least some of the problems you raise.

Regarding the second part of your point 3, about the founding date, I found this to be a problem as well. I can't seem to find any reason for this inconsistency between sources, but I agree that it's an issue, though unfortunately one I was unable to find a good solution to.

Thank you for your interest, and I will try to discuss the reversion, and through this hopefully make some progress in correcting these problems that you raise. Thanks, Swadge2 (talk) 09:22, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Hello again Piyushkumar911. I have done some more editing to the article, and have tried to address the points you made. Thank you for raising this; I think that the article is in much better shape as a result of it. Thanks, Swadge2 (talk) 09:37, 20 November 2020 (UTC).

Thanks @Swadge2: for making the article more concise and consistent. I have one last question. In one of the article's statements, ″...with a series of attacks on Dalits and Maoist sympathisers″ , do you think it would be ok to include that bhumi sena's victims among the Maoist sympathizers also included Kurmis as mentioned explicitly in George Kunnath's article – ' It targeted not only Dalit labourers but also members of the Kurmi caste who were part of the Maoist movement' ( implying that bhumi sena didn't refrain from killing their own Jaati members if they supported the Maoists ) ? --Piyushkumar911 (talk) 13:54, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

Piyushkumar911, good point, I’ll add that now. Swadge2 (talk) 23:03, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

Request for discussion

Hello. I quite recently edited this article, changing information to reflect the cited sources, and removing information that was unsourced, extraneous, or repeated. This edit was reverted, with the reason given being that, "The book Nitish Kumar and rise of bihar explicitly contains the info..". I am unsure what info this is. If it is that about Indira Gandhi, I removed this as her visit to the region has little relation to Bhumi Sena, and as I see it, not enough to warrant mention in the article. If, on the other hand, the info is that about Singhwa and Mahavir Mahto, "Nitish Kumar and the Rise of Bihar" does not relate these figures to the formation of Bhumi Sena as the article does. On the contrary, on page 267 of the Google Books edition it is stated that it was mobilisation by Mazdoor Kisan Sangram Samiti (MKSS) that Bhumi Sena reacted against, rather than mobilisation by Singhwa, this being the reason for this change in my edit. I would be more than happy to discuss in further detail the reasons for the changes I made. So, I am looking to discuss with other editors how to move forward, and fix the issues that I see in the article. Thanks, Swadge2 (talk) 10:16, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

If I start reading out the incidents of genocides then it will have no end nor do I want to waste the precious time if the ... 14 Dalits were butchered in Belchhi, Patna in 1977 these Dalits were massacred by Bhumi Sena, Nitishji is not present here.

The third source says this.Heba Aisha (talk) 18:05, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Yes the Bhumi sena was perpetrator of that massacre. This is mentioned in another source and Singhwa and Mahavir Mahto are the characters whose collision led to belchhi massacre. You have to read whole chapter to understand that.Heba Aisha (talk) 18:02, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

References

Plz read this source .you may add accordingly the Kisan Suraksha samiti and past history.

• https://books.google.co.in/books?id=num2I4NFGqIC&pg=PA104&lpg=PA104&dq=mahavir+Mahto+formed+Bhumi+sena&source=bl&ots=RewMoR_tk2&sig=ACfU3U1NG1473xzNWEbONZ1ezFpDyHeKjw&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjc1urt2IztAhWL7HMBHQjXDPUQ6AEwBXoECAYQAQ#v=onepage&q=mahavir%20Mahto%20formed%20Bhumi%20sena&f=falseHeba Aisha (talk) 18:16, 18 November 2020 (UTC)

Page 104 of the above source 'Community Warriors' attributes belcchi incident to Mahavir Mahto, Inderdeo Choudhary and their supporters but there is no explicit mention of bhumi sena's involvement here . Page no 105 of the above source 'Community Warriors' says that

The formation of the Bhoomi sena is often traced to the agrarian crisis in the wake of severe drought of 1979 in Patna district

which is post 1977 as well. So, it seems that the editor has found mention of bhumi sena's involvement in one of the cited references and then inferred that it was formed by Mahavir Mahato, the prime accused in the Belchi incident, however, this information of bhumi sena being formed by Mahavir is not found in the above book . Apart from this, there are contradictions in formation dates across other sources cited in the article. Anyways, I have some more doubts regarding the content of the article. Can you please look into those five points which I raised in a separate section above in the talk page ? Thanks --Piyushkumar911 (talk) 04:43, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Hello Heba Aisha. Thank you very much for your response. I think that I better understand your point now. I am not convinced, however, that this has cleared my concerns about the article. As Piyushkumar911 mentions above, neither of these sources that you have provided say, as the article currently does that, "Bhumi sena was formed by Mahavir Mahto", nor do they explicitly relate Bhumi Sena to Singwha's organization of landless labourers in the area. I see that, as you mention, "Nitish Kumar and the Rise of Bihar" describes a massacre of the supporters of Singwha in Belchi, and that in the other source you quote, the "Lok Sabha Debates (despite my best attempts, I have unfortunately been unable to access this source) describes a massacre committed by Bhumi Sena at the same location, Belchi. But the problem remains that no provided sources explicitly link Bhumi Sena to Singwha's agitation, nor Mahavir Mahto. I can see that it would be a reasonable inference from these two sources, but using them in this way seems to me to be an issue of WP:SYNTH.

Additionally, as I believe I mention in my first message, "Windows into a Revolution: Ethnographies of Maoism in India and Nepal", which seems to be the only source currently cited in the article that deals specifically with Bhumi Sena's formation, says that the group formed in response to Maoist agitation among landless labourers, rather than that by Singwha. Another source I found, the article "Agrarian Movement in Jehanabad" from Economic and Political Weekly (available here on JSTOR [1]), similarly describes the formation of Bhumi Sena as being in response to Maoist agitation by the MKSS. I still believe that the article needs to be changed to reflect this, as as it stands, I am unconvinced that the history section accurately represents the history and formation of the group. Again, thank you very much for your response, and I look forward to further discussing this matter. Thanks, Swadge2 (talk) 09:55, 19 November 2020 (UTC).

You may change content according to the link of community warriors[2] book which contains full history of the organisation.That source is best for Bihar political history. Heba Aisha (talk) 11:01, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Immediately after its formation members of Bhumi Sena arrived in Dumri, where they garnered the support from members of Kurmi community. The Sena members made appeal to the Kurmi youths that their life, liberty and property are at stake and raised their war cry of:

Naksaliyon ki ek hi dawai Chhah inch chhota kr do bhai

By 1982, there witnessed mass exodus of the Dalits who were sympathisers of the Maoists and the poor Kurmis also who became sympathetic to the cause of Dalits. The Maoist organization also retaliated by killing the members of Bhumi Sena and inflicting the economic blockade on the Kurmi landlords who were sympathisers of the Sena cadres. Lastly in a meeting, the Kurmi landlords decided to not involve in the war with the Naxals and agreed to pay indemnity according to their level of association with the Sena.

This was removed by u last time. But its explicitly mentioned in source. So while editing plz take care that it shouldn't be removed inadvertently. Heba Aisha (talk) 11:03, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Piyushkumar911 Belchhi incident is very notable one and it ensured return of indira gandhi to power once again. Though I support ur points that discrepancy exist in formation date and leaders but I m damn sure that there couldn't be another incident at belchhi in which Bhumi sena was not involved. Both were same actually. So at this point I agree to the change in history of formation only.Heba Aisha (talk) 11:17, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Hi Heba Aisha, thank you again for your quick reply. Just to ensure that I understand your message to me that I "may change content according to the link of community warriors" and your message to Piyushkumar911, that you "agree to the change in history of formation only.", is this to say that you are happy if edits are made to the History section to reflect the information in "Community Warriors" and the other discussed sources regarding the circumstances in which the group was formed? Thank you again. Swadge2 (talk) 12:12, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

You may do justice urself thanks for giving time to this article.I just reversed ur edit as I saw this sourced content removed. Otherwise I don't have problem with ur edits. Heba Aisha (talk) 12:15, 19 November 2020 (UTC)

Heba Aisha, excellent, thank you very much. I'll get editing it soon. Swadge2 (talk) 03:54, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

@Heba Aisha: Thank you for the reply . Regarding – Belchhi incident is very notable one and

it ensured return of indira gandhi to power once again.

Now, while the belchi incident was indeed very notable but this claim of indira gandhi returning to power due to it seems very contentious as Congress(I) lost at Nalanda , which should have gone to Congress(I) & allies due to it being the constituency where Belcchi is located and Indira Gandhi's visit. CPI's Vijay Kumar Yadav, who was contesting against Congress(I), won at that seat. Congress(I) also came third in the neighboring Patna seat behind CPI and Janata Party(JNP). Please download volume I from here 1980 ECI data . Also, if looks at the results map of 1980 elections then one notices that performance of Congress(I) alliance was relatively worse in Bihar compared to other states. As per this source, ″ Indira seemed to have got back the support of upper castes during 1980, who had voted against her during 1977 elections in anger over her authoritarianism and pro-dalit actions during the emergency ″--Piyushkumar911 (talk) 05:02, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

In the ″Mass Killings″ section, there is mention of

including 4 of our Party members (one being a fighter of an armed squad)

. Why is our - a first person pronoun, used here ? There is no mention of the party whose members got killed but perhaps, the party might be CPI-ML. Perhaps, the person who added this statement in the article might be a member of that party and has sourced this information from that party's documents but this line doesn't seem to be mentioned in the cited reference as far I can see. Thanks --Piyushkumar911 (talk) 05:33, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

I mean to say....the Dalit saw her as their emancipator after the incident and congress fortune that was at ebb after emergency improved. But if it is contentious.... U can remove. Heba Aisha (talk) 09:17, 20 November 2020 (UTC)

Yes, I understood what you meant to say but my point was that their support for Mrs. Gandhi should have been maximum near the epicenter (Belcchi is at Nalanda) but this doesn't seem to be reflected in the elections results in Magadh-Bhojpur region. Thanks --Piyushkumar911 (talk) 11:18, 20 November 2020 (UTC)