A Window To Perceptive Journalism

It was a very brief item in a national newspaper which caught my eye: "Hundreds surround field claiming teenager's body buried there". This was 1997. I was working with The Press Trust of India in Delhi, and news from Punjab usually was only about an odd ultra nabbed, or whether terrorism will return. Later, as I followed the case, the Kiranjit rape and murder saga emerged as an iconic fight against repression and for justice. Hats off to the dedicated band of social activists who fought for Kiranjit.

But since it is only an occasional shock which jolts us to see the harsh realities, here is one for you: Three of the activists who played a leading role in pursuing Kiranjit's case to its logical end and ensured that her tormenters got what they deserved – a life term in jail – are currently themselves in jail. Convicted in a murder case which is clearly a frame up. For more information, please visit www.kiranjit.com

A Poor, Raped, Murdered Girl
Is Up Against Wto, Fashion Shows

S P Singh

Mehal Kalan:

She was 17, going on 18. By any standards, she was an ordinary girl, daughter of a government school teacher. A villager. Then, she went through a metamorphosis. She was raped, murdered, buried, exhumed.

In Punjab now, she is an icon of a fight against repression, fight for assertion of marginal voices, fight to safeguard the great Punjabi culture and at times even the fight to oppose a local fashion show or a WTO policy.

Never in Punjab's history has a rape and murder case taken on the dimensions of such a strong and sustained people’s movement as happened in the case of Kiranjit. Perhaps nowhere in the country do the posters of a raped and murdered victim sold at melas to underline the fact that the war against repression has many battlefronts.

Kiranjit, the gutsy 17-year-old daughter of a school teacher, was killed four years ago after she was raped. But that story you will eventually know.

The region witnessed many a protest gatherings of over 50,000 people who used to converge at a single call of the action committee to pressurise a lethargic police set up to act against the accused.

Even when Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal expressed his wish to visit the family of the victim in September 1997, the activists set all kind of conditions and handed him a list of people whom they did not want to accompany him. These included the local Akali MLA, an SGPC leader and several Akali leaders. And when the CM came, villagers made sure the conditions were met.

When a senior CPI(M) leader was exposed trying to help the culprits, the entire party cadre shunned the leader and stood as one with the villagers.

There is something peculiar about the people of Mehal Kalan and scores of villages around it: you talk about the Kiranjit case and even the most illiterate man recalls the exact date on which the incident happened, when was her body found, when did the first dharna take place, when was it that the FIR was registered.

And then there is that mention of a lock of hair. The one defining image from the rape and murder episode.

"The lock of hair did it," a social activist explained the secret to me.

It is said that when Kiranjit’s body was found buried in the fields owned by one of the accused, in her fist was clenched a bunch of hair. And the activists exploited the fact to the hilt. "Kiranjit, though poor, did not submit meekly. She died fighting till the last moment pulling the beards of her aggressors and resisting tyranny. Like her we must all learn not to submit meekly," speaker after speaker told a gathering of thousands on August 12 this year to mark the day dedicated to her memory.

Poor, raped, long dead Kiranjit is fighting on. "Kiranjit was poor and her tormentors were rich and hand-in-glove with the powerful. Eh garib di ameer de khilaaf larrai hai, and WTO is a conspiracy to make the poor farmers still poorer," farmer Santokh Singh of village Pandori explained her contribution to me.

His wife said the movement has once again underlined the issue of respect for women. "People should now learn to stop killing daughters in the womb. They can be as brave as Kiranjit who died fighting," she said.

"The people were already seething with anger against the family of the accused who were always able to dodge the law thanks to the goonda-police-politician nexus, and in waging the fight in Kiranjit’s case, we not only cashed in on that anger but also weaved into the movement issues that were directly connected with the people," said Narain Dutt, one of the leading activists in the area.

Several villagers like Nihal Singh, small-time local scribe Pritam Dardi, school teachers Bhagwant Singh and Prem Kumar, Manjit Singh Dhaner, most of whom did not even know closely the family of the victim before the incident, became closely involved with the movement.

How well-entrenched is Kiranjit’s picture as a symbol of people’s struggle is evident from the fact that no one tears down the posters carrying her mug shot. So, while the villagers observed the fourth shardhanjali samaroh on August 12 this year, one could still see posters from the first three in the village. And of the nearly 15,000 handbills distributed, you would not find even one in torn condition. Many possess the list of 28 criminal cases registered against the culprits over a number of years. It was compiled by activists fighting the Kiranjit case.

Akhand paths in memory of Kiranjit even in villages tens of miles away from Mehal Kalan are a common thing. Many homes demand from organisers a copy of the poster because they want to put it up in their drawing room.

As news of today’s court judgement – all four accused sentenced to life imprisonment – reached the area, the refrain was the same die-hard spirit. "This is just one victory. Ours is long fight. Kiranjit is a symbol of resistance against repression and an unjust social order," said Tarsem Jodhan. 

The fight is against that unjust order. A dead Kiranjit is leading the fight, a bunch of hair clenched in her fist.■

August 16, 2001

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