‘Give me the space to live’: trauma, casted land and the search for restitution among the Meghwal survivors of the Dangawas massacre

ABSTRACT

May 2015 witnessed the Dangawas massacre in Rajasthan’s Nagaur district, one of the most brutal caste atrocities in recent Indian history, which resulted in the death of five Dalits of the Meghwal caste at the hands of a Jat mob. Across Rajasthan, the violence of Dangawas, which marked the culmination of a decades-long land conflict, has become synonymous with the continuing reality of caste-based violence and the law that is meant to address it: The 1989 SC/ST Prevention of Atrocities Act. However, Meghwal survivors in Dangawas often articulate scepticism about the ability of law to provide them with a true sense of restitution. Emphasising a desire for social space (jagah), which they map onto the land at the root of the bloodshed, Dangawas’ Meghwal survivors are caught in a post-traumatic moment marked by fear of further suffering. The memory of inconceivable violence, which has left them alienated in a divided village, has not only made renewed attempts of assertion, and demands for radical justice temporarily inconceivable, but has also led Dangawas’ survivors to ask questions about their own agency and the meaning of sociality in an environment where members of a dominant caste still see themselves as guarantors of economic and social belonging.

KEYWORDS:

• Rajasthan
• land
• trauma
• space and recognition
• caste atrocity

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 Official sources cite different death toll numbers for Dangawas. Some claim that four Meghwals lost their lives in the attack, while others mention five or even six deaths. The number I cite here is based on my own conversations in Dangawas. I was told that three Meghwals died during the attack, while two others later passed away in the hospital.

2 I thank the Wenner Gren Foundation for sponsoring 18 months of PhD fieldwork in Rajasthan from Nov. 2016–April 2018 and the Leverhulme Foundation for awarding me a PhD scholarship.

3 All names, apart from that of the deceased Ratna Ram Meghwal, have been changed for purposes of anonymity. Moreover, in an attempt to prevent easy identification of individuals, I have left out specific kinship or relationship designators. I want to ensure that statements made in confidence will remain protected.

4 According to the Indian Express, 1 June 2015 ‘Nagaur is one of the two seats in north India that was won by the Congress even in its abysmal performance in 1977 thanks to its Jat sympathizers.’

5 The sections of the 1989 SC/ST Prevention of Atrocities Act listed above refer to the original version of the act before its first amendment, which came into effect in 2016.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the LSE Leverhulme Doctoral Scholarship and the Wenner-Gren Foundation.

Notes on contributors

Sandhya Fuchs

Sandhya Fuchs is a Leverhulme Trust PhD scholar based in the department of anthropology at the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) and is affiliated with LSE's International Inequalities Institute. Sandhya's research explores legal approaches to historically entrenched forms of structural violence and analyses the material, socio-economic, cultural and emotional dynamics that shape engagement with anti-discrimination legislation. In her PhD Sandhya analyses how Dalit (former ‘untouchable’) communities in the Indian state of Rajasthan mobilize the 1989 Schedules Castes/ Scheduled Tribes Prevention of Atrocities Act to navigate continuing concerns of social, political and economic disadvantage and outright violent discrimination.