The meeting of the legislative committee on Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes held its meeting on 4 January which was presided by Bihar CM Nitish Kumar. The meeting was attended by CPIML MLAs Satydev Ram, Gopal Ravidas and Manoj Manzil who raised the bulldozing of houses and shanties of the poor in the name of Jal Jeevan Hariyali Scheme in different districts of Bihar.
CPIML MLAs demanded no displacement or eviction to take place without complete rehabilitation of evictees, which is also a promise made by the Mahagathbandhan government. They complained that in almost all the places where evictions are being done forcibly, none has been rehabilitated in spite of repeated reminders and widespread protests.
The CPIML has demanded that no eviction notice should be given to people without prior and comprehensive survey of residents and rehabilitation before the evictions.
CPIML has asked for the enactment of a Right to Housing law in the Bihar Assembly.
The CPIML has submitted to the Chief Minister a list of affected families who had been forcibly evicted without rehabilitation in districts of Purnea, Darbhanga, Buxar, East Champaran, Nawada, Muzaffarpur, Danapur, Araria and other places. The CM assured to conduct a review of displacements already taking place and to provide houses to the displaced people.
Gopal Ravidas also raised many incidents of dalit oppression and custodial deaths happened of late in the state. He said that police attacked a dalit hamlet in Masaurhi on the pretext of Prohibition law where a dalit woman was killed. A dalit girl was raped and murdered in Satanpur of Samastipur district. There was an incident of dalit oppression in Begusarai and a custodial killing in Jahanabad. Comrade Gopal demanded punishment to the perpetrators in all the above incidents.
Gopal Ravidas also asked the Chief Minister to produce an updated report on action taken so far regarding massacres of dalits that took place in places like Laxmanpur-Bathe, Bathani Tola, and Naagri and other places during 90s and early 2010s.
CPIML MLAs also raised the long pending issue of releasing activists who have been in jails under the draconian TADA. There were 14 TADA victims lodged in Arwal jail who have now even completed their sentence of 20 years but many of them are still languishing inside jail. Those who are not released include Shyam Choudhary, Madhav Choudhary and Arvind Choudhary. The party demanded their immediate release and rehabilitation,
Manoj Manzil informed the legislative committee of dalit hostels in Arrah and Patna. He also demanded monetary compensation to dalit families surviving through piggery who lost their pigs due to diseases as well as building of approach roads up to Mahadalit hamlets in villages. He gave a separate memorandum to the CM in this regard.
