Mansa, June 6
“The Dalits are being sold by the upper class in Dalel Singh Wala village in the district,” said Mr Jai Singh, national president of the Dalit Dasta Virodhi Andolan (DDVA). A farmer had given Rs 25,000 to a Dalit of the village and kept him as bonded labourer before further selling him to another farmer of the village.

Mr Jai Singh said it was common in Malwa to see bonded labourers being sold and bought. The situation in Dalel Singh Wala village is, perhaps the worst. On one side in the village, the Dalit women have refused to work as bonded labourers in the houses of the upper-caste farmers, while on the other, a large number of upper-caste farmers are amassing arms to stop the Dalits from entering their fields, even to answer the call of nature.

A huge police squad has been deployed in the village and Mr Kulwant Singh, Additional Deputy Commissioner Mansa; Mr G.P.S. Sahota, Subdivisional Magistrate; and Ms Saroj Aggarwal, Tehsildar, too have visited the village a number of times to defuse the situation. The situation has been worsening for the past about one week.

Mr Jai Singh, who has been camping at Mansa for the past 10 days, has held a number of meetings and rallies in nearly 200 villages of Mansa and Bathinda districts to make the Dalits aware of their rights. The Dalits also have the support of the Left parties.

Farmers of the village say that they pay the Dalits in advance for a year’s work, whereas, the Dalits say that they are being forced to work to recover the interest on the amount borrowed by their forefathers. Farmers of the village have constituted a 32-member committee to tackle the situation. If the situation prevails for some days more, it may lead to some untoward incident in the village.

The Dalits allege that the farmers have been charging them for the poppy husk and opium that the farmers gave them to get more work from them. In spite of the literacy move in the district, children of the Dalits are being forced to work in the fields by the farmers to recover the interest on the principal taken by their forefathers.