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The poll bugle has been sounded in Bihar. Far from the din of the tall claims and the impossible-to-fulfil promises, Seetu Tiwari visited the survivors of the Laxmanpur-Bathe massacre scripted by the Ranveer Sena on 1 December 1997. The horrific scene is still fresh in their minds and they still await justice

Forward Press is not a novice when it comes to getting threats. Our Hindi editor Naval Kishore Kumar, who is at the receiving end this time, is not only a journalist but also a sensitive poet. Brahmeshwar Mukhiya, on the other hand, is a synonym for terror and has shamed humanity. ‘Forward Press’ Managing Editor Pramod Ranjan responds to the threats

Various political parties, including CPI (ML), RJD, RLSP and the Congress, have condemned the issuing of death threats to Forward Press Hindi editor Naval Kishore Kumar by Ranvir Sena supporters

Supporters of Brahmeshwar Mukhiya continue to issue death threats to Naval Kishore Kumar over the phone and write expletive-filled comments on his Facebook page

It’s not hard to grasp why there are attempts to mythicise the killing of Brahmeshwar Mukhiya. The feudal landlords in Bihar still consider him god. Neither can the then government built on the strength of the feudal landlords be declared sinful for killing their god, nor can non-Savarnas be credited with killing him. Complications are a given in solving this murder

The need of the hour is to reread and rewrite history, to build a new culture of the toilers. We will have to carve out new names for our heroes

When the third death anniversary of Brahmeshwar Mukhiya, who had masterminded the killing of more than 300 Dalits and OBCs, was observed as “martyrdom day”, the media, blind to the irony, went into publicity overdrive

What was the crime of these commoners – of those who do not even get two square meals a day? Were Kalawati Devi and seven-year-old class seven student Ramdhyan Rikiyasan, who were murdered, naxals? Will an FIR be registered against the policemen who handcuffed minor boys Bittu, Pappu and Ritesh – all students of class seven

Bullets that go through a body and exit lose their velocity and are usually found around the scene of the shooting. Were these ‘magic bullets’ which flew out of the gun, went through and killed Mukhiya, and then just disappeared?

The man who had formed the Ranvir Sena for oppressing the Dalit labourers, who had attacked their habitations and shot them, who had hurled infants into the air and riddled their bodies with bullets, who had slit open the wombs of pregnant women and hacked the foetuses with swords – only predators can mourn the death of such a fiend. Why should the Dalits feel sad?