Kirori Singh Bainsla


Kirori Singh Bainsla is a retired Lieutenant Colonel of the Indian Army and in 2007 led a caste protest movement in the state of Rajasthan.[1] This demanded reservation in government jobs for the Gurjar community in Rajasthan. He leads the Gurjar Arakshan Sangharsh Samiti which has led the wave of protests across the state.[2]

Protest marches organised by the movement have at times led to violent clashes with civil authorities and have been accompanied by extensive property damage. In 2007, Bainsla led a protest in which 27 people were killed in clashes with police,[3] and as of May 2008, a total of 43 people had died in such clashes, most of them protesters.[4] Bainsla has blamed police for the violence.[5] In May 2015, a similar protest was organised by thousands of Gurjars under the leadership of Bainsla.[6]

Bainsla has been prosecuted for his involvement in the protests. Following one major protest that blockaded Delhi for a day,[7] the Rajasthan High Court issued a notice of contempt against him for allegedly violating a previous order to keep the protests within lawful bounds.[8] After 25 days of protest and five days of negotiations, Bainsla's meetings with representatives of the Chief Minister of Rajasthan, Vasundhara Raje, resulted in the Gurjar community being awarded the status of special reserved category.[9] The Gurjars continue to campaign for the special reservation (5%), Vasundhara Raje claimed for.

Personal life

Kirori Singh Bainsla circa 1972

After beginning work as a teacher, Kirori Singh Bainsla enlisted in the army as a sepoy, following in the footsteps of his father who served in the British Indian Army. He was married at the age of 14. His wife helped him during the initial years to get ST status for Gurjars. She died in 1996.[3] He fought in the Sino-Indian war of 1962 and Indo-Pakistani War of 1965 and was taken a prisoner of war in the latter. His seniors in the army named him the Rock of Gibraltar. He was later elevated to officer rank and commissioned into the Guards regiment. He rose to be a lieutenant colonel. It has been speculated that his military background might have enabled him to organise the Gurjar protest with such precision and on the large scale which characterised it.[1]

Bainsla has a daughter and three sons. He lives in Hindaun, a tehsil in Karauli district of Rajasthan.[1]. He belongs to village Mundia मुंडिया Rajasthan Pin : 304502 ( lat / long 26.824077, 76.912098 ) around 30 km from Hindaun city. His wife Mrs Resham Bainsla belonged to village Deolen, around 12 km from Mundia. He wears the traditional dress of a red turban and white clothing.[5]

He once said that "Only a bullet or a letter (granting the demands) can remove me from here."[1] He says that one of the reasons he is engaged in this cause is because his children are settled and so now he can think of his "greater family".[3]

He has mooted the concept of "Social Emergency" for a period of 15 years - wherein the society should focus on two things - Good Health & Good Education, reduce all wasteful and extravagant expenditures on marriages / katha bhagwats etc and reinvest the monies saved for education and health. In all his social gatherings in the rural areas of Rajasthan he asks one question primarily - how many people take a book / magazine / newspaper back home in the evening for their families to read. Over the years his focus on education has had massive results.

Demand for scheduled tribe status

Most of our people are illiterate and living in abject poverty. We want better opportunities. For 12 years, I moved from pillar to post crying hoarse with the demands, but the government never listened. So we had to resort to direct action. As a backward class, we have to compete with 123 caste groups for 27 percent of government jobs. Our turn never comes. But as a tribe, we would fight only 15 other groups for about 7 percent of jobs. So it is more beneficial to be called a tribe, even if it is lower in status.

Kirori Singh in an interview with the Washington Post explained why he demanded scheduled tribe status."[4]

In Rajasthan, Gurjar are officially part of many communities that come under Other backward castes(OBC) category. However, Gurjars have failed to make much progress as they compete with many other well educated communities in the OBC category. Bainsla wants to rectify this apparent disadvantage by registering Gurjars as ST (Scheduled Tribe) - a technically lower status, but one that entitles a community to more government assistance. During the initial days he was marked as "mad man" by his own community for raising such a demand.

In 2007, he withdrew the demand for ST status for Gurjars after talks with the Rajasthan Government. However, some sections of the community felt betrayed and accused him of being an agent of the government. In 2008, he renewed the call for ST status, and a new wave of Gurjar protests have since captured the attention of the whole country and put Rajasthan on standstill.[10] Some media outlets have accused other Gurjar leaders of hypocrisy for their alleged lavish lifestyles, but Bainsla has largely avoided these accusations.[11].

DevNarayan Yojana

Bainsla has been the man & thought behind "DevNarayan Yojana" - a government fund / program for the upliftment of Banjara/Baldia/Labana, Gadia-Lohar/Gadalia, Gujjar/Gurjar, Raika/Rebari and Gadaria (Gaadri). The Devnarayan Yojana focusses on imparting education , builds and operates residential schools and colleges , imparts felicitation to meritorious girl students , gives fully funded education to girl students from the classes of 6th onwards- all expenses of education / lodging and boarding are taken up by the Devnarayan Board for these students. He has been instrumental in ensuring opening of Primary Health Centres across the state to ensure medical facilities to the economically backward people in the rural hinterlands of Rajasthan.

The DevNarayan Yojana has an approved financial budget outlay of Rs 1000 Crores by the government, which is now being extended to Rs 1500 Crores to take into account additional Education & Health facilities for the MBC in Rajasthan.

Some achievements of bainsla's Devnarayan Initiative that are directly impacting the people of the community & region are  :

  1. Pre Metric Scholarships : Till date 7,87,194 students have availed the benefits of Pre metric scholarships
  2. Post Metric Scholarships : Till date 3,56,305 students have availed the benefits of Post metric scholarships
  3. Gurukul Yojana : 14359 students are studying in the gurukul yojana completely free where the education, lodging and boarding is provided free to needy children.
  4. Scooty Yojana : Aimed at increasing the education in the girl child segment , bainsla started the Scooty Yojana in which Girls from the community who topped the merit in the 12th exams would get a Scooty ( mechanised two wheeler ) as an incentive to perform well in the exams . During the first year of the Scooty initiative ( 2011 ) only 280 scooties were given out against an allocation of 500 and the cut off merit percentage was 53% due to lack of girls being educated from the community. In the year 2017-18, 1000 scooties were given against 11,000 applications and the merit cut off was at 80% plus. An additional 7589 girl students were given consolation financial awards who missed the scooties by a small percentage but who had put in great efforts.
  5. 47 Student hostels given in rural and semi urban locations to aid the needy children to get quality education.
  6. 2 Colleges have been built and are operational (1) Girls College at Bayana (2) Boys College at Nandauti.
  7. 26 + 10 , 36 residential schools approved and under different stages of construction . These schools are operational under the RICE pattern where the students are admitted in class 6th and full education is provided till class 12th. Some operational schools are :
    1. Devnarayan Girls Residential School, Suvana ( bhilwara )
    2. Devnarayan Boys Residential School, Baleta ( alwar )
    3. Devnarayan Boys Residential School, Chandapura ( jalore )
    4. Devnarayan Girls Residential School, Hindoli ( bundi )
    5. Devnarayan Girls Residential School, Devlen ( karauli )
    6. Devnarayan Girls Residential School, Yusufpura ( tonk )
    7. Devnarayan Girls Residential School, Macchipura ( sawai madhopur )
    8. Devnarayan Girls Residential School, Amarpur ( dausa )
  8. Dairy Plant at Khetri under construction , that will give additional means of livelihood to the community that is predominantly dependent on cattle and milk production.
  9. Health : 192 Sub-Primary health centres made operational in these backward rural areas. 6 Mobile hospital units operational to bridge the gap between the sub primary and primary health centre . 7 Primary health centres operational.

OBC Reservation Issue in Rajasthan

The Current OBC Reservation follows the creamy layer process wherein the OBC certificate is prerequisite for availing reservation benefits . Only the incumbents who do not fall into the Creamy Layer ( annual income / assets / value above Rs 6 Lacs per annum ) will be issued the OBC certificate basis which they can apply for the benefits of OBC reservation.

The 'creamy layer' categorization is currently meant only for the OBCs and are not applied to the Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. The reasons cited for this parity is that the provisions for reservations for SC/ST are not for their economical benefits but for their social upliftment. Thus, SC/ST reservations are applicable irrespective of the financial status of the beneficiaries, which in other words means that even if the SC/ST is financially sound he /she would still get the benefits of reservation.

In Rajasthan 91 entries (by way of castes, their synonyms, sub-castes etc.) have been notified by the State Government in the State list of Other Backward Classes (OBCs) in Rajasthan. In Rajasthan, the total reservation of 49% included 21% for OBC, 16% for SC (Scheduled Castes) and 12% for ST (Scheduled Tribes). The Demand is for logical bifurcation of the 21% based on population percentage for each OBC caste as the majority of the existing 21% is being availed by the few strong and robust castes in Rajasthan , and the economically backward castes do not get the relevant benefits of OBC reservation. Justice Rohini Commission has been empowered to look into the bifurcation of the OBC by the centre under article 340 of the constitution.

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 "SUBALTERN GENERAL". www.tehelka.com. 16 June 2007. Archived from the original on 28 September 2011. Retrieved 9 June 2008.
  2. ↑ "Raje govt, Gujjar leaders agree to hold talks". timesofindia.indiatimes.com. 8 June 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-09.
  3. 1 2 3 "The making of Col. (Retd) Kirori Singh Bainsla". Indo Asian News Service. www.aol.in. 4 June 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  4. 1 2 Lakhmi, Rama (2008-05-31). "Indian Protesters Let Dead Decay". www.washingtonpost.com. Retrieved 2008-06-09.
  5. 1 2 Joychen, PJ (25 May 2008). "Won't budge an inch: Bainsla". timesofindia.indiatimes.com. Retrieved 2008-06-09.
  6. ↑ "Led by Col. Kirori Singh Bainsla, Gujjars block Rail Route in Rajasthan for Quota in Govt Jobs". news.biharprabha.com. ANI. 22 May 2015. Retrieved 22 May 2015.
  7. ↑ "Gujjar protesters blockade Delhi". www.deccanherald.com. 2008-05-29. Retrieved 2008-06-09.
  8. ↑ "Raj HC issues contempt notice to Gujjar leader Kirori Singh Bainsla". www.theindiapost.com. 27 May 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-09.
  9. ↑ "Final round: Gurjar leader Bainsla to meet Raje today". www.ibnlive.com. www.ibnlive.com. 17 June 2008. Retrieved 2008-06-17.
  10. ↑ "A politically wiser Bainsala". in.news.yahoo.com. 2008-05-30. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
  11. ↑ "Lavish in protest". indianexpress. in.news.yahoo.com. 2008-06-13. Retrieved 2008-06-13.
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