A Note from a Victim of Social Boycott

Lata Chandu Chavan, a 17 year-old and a student of 12th standard, attempted suicide on October 2, 2018, in Vijayapura district of Karnataka. Lata had live streamed her suicide attempt on Facebook. In the recorded suicide note she asks the Prime Minister, “Narendra Modi sir, I want to ask you one question. You sit so far away and say “Beti Bachao, Beti Padhao”. Am I not a daughter? Do I not have the right to education? I had to discontinue my studies because we were branded as outcasts. All my dreams have been shattered. I don’t have any reason to live so I have decided to commit suicide.” 

Five years ago, Lata’s family was declared outcast by the village Panchayat over a property dispute. The family was forced by the elders of the village to move out of their house and live outside the village. Lata, in the note, said, “We had complained to the Inspector, the PSI (sub-inspector), SP (Superintendent of Police) and DC (District Commissioner) about this, but no one registered an FIR and they refused to take up the case. They told us that M.B. Patil would get the officers transferred if they took up our case.” M.B. Patil is the Babaleshwar MLA and former Water Resource Minister.

Lata also notes that multiple letters to the then Chief Minister Siddaramaiah and also Prime Minister Narendra Modi seeking help for the family had proven to be a futile exercise. I am a second-year PUC student and my father has tried a lot to provide us with education, but due to the legal proceedings, he is not in the right frame of mind. I have also dropped out from school, however, even this doesn’t seem to be pacifying the villagers. I am threatened whenever I am in public. Then I called M.B. Patil. He told us to go to his house. He also told us that he would call the sarpanch and other village elders and sort out the matter.” These words of the minister did not make any difference. 

When she told the minister that the police have threatened the family by taking his name, she noted that Patil asked her to threaten the police in return by taking his name. Frustrated and angry, Lata finally broke down in the video note and asked, “Should I give up my education and turn into a goonda?” 

She is currently under observation in a private hospital of Vijayapura.  In her suicide note, she   thanked the media that had initially come for the family’s rescue; however, she also says that probably due to political pressure, the family lost the media’s support at a later stage. Lata, at the end of the note names the police authorities, the sarpanch of Hanchnala village as well as Panchayat members as responsible for her death. 

With no legal check, particularly on the practice of social ostracisation by caste or village panchayats, it is still a prevailing exercise in rural India.  Maharashtra is the only state with an act criminalising the practice. With the Maharashtra Prohibition of Social Boycott Act, 2015, the state became the first and the only state to have a law against social boycott. 

Lata’s note reminds us to look into the practice of social ostracisation by the panchayats which violate the fundamental rights guaranteed by the Constitution of India. 

Also read: Boycott of 72 Dalit Families is a Stark Reminder of Failing Administration, Say Activists