No End to Discrimination

Discrimination even in death, yes that’s the reality. A lack of burial and cremation grounds in rural Maharashtra especially Marathwada region shows that there is no respite for Dalits, Muslims, and other marginalised communities even while performing last rites. Looking at the situation we can say that the downtrodden are being deprived of dignified death.

The recent incident at tehsildar’s office in Selu taluka of Parbhani district put the light on this gloomy reality. A dead body was brought to the administrative office for cremation. What transpired on that particular fateful day was a spontaneous act of protest against the unavailability of a crematorium in the project-affected and recently resettled village of Devla in Parbhani. The incident that transpired at Devla is only symptomatic of the struggles that over 17,000 villages of Maharashtra face due to lack of burial or cremation grounds. And, in addition to the government’s apathy, caste conflicts make things even worse, especially for the marginalised communities. Unlike the urban areas, where burial or cremation ground is accessible within the city limits and is mostly allotted as per religion, in rural parts, it is the caste identity that defines its accessibility.

The situation in villages in the state is precarious. The dominant communities having acres of land in the village are not impacted. They use their own land for the cremation as well as the rituals thereafter. Even if one does not have any land, his caste members in the village would generously make land available. But the landless Dalit families are badly affected and they suffer deeply. Desecration of a dead body, disallowing usage of grazing land to carry out the rituals and violent attacks on the marginalised communities are commonly seen in the rural Maharashtra.

While cremation ground remains a problem across Maharashtra, it is worse in the Marathwada region. Marathwada’s eight districts — Jalna, Aurangabad, Parbhani, Hingoli, Nanded, Latur, Osmanabad and Beed account for 16.84 percent of the state’s population. Among them, 14.96 percent belong to Scheduled Caste and nearly 4.01 percent are from the Scheduled Tribe category. Over 30 percent of Maharashtra’s Below Poverty Line (BPL) families live in this region. Even after many agitations, the administration overlooked the demand of allotting cremation ground.

Prior Devla another similar incident had come into the light In Walwad, a village in Barshi tehsil of Solapur district. After the death of a woman the family members requested other villagers for space to cremate the deceased women. The Maratha and Vanjari communities categorically denied. Due to which the family members became furious. Broken by this denial of dignity for the dead, they protested with a dead body in front of the Barshi city council office. After tehsildar’s intervention formality of cremation was completed. Pramila Zombade lost her sister-in-law, Anita Kamble is virtually struggling for a cremation ground for the Dalits of the area. Two years after the incident, the cremation ground for Dalits has yet to be built in the village.