Bhoomi Sena (Maharashtra)

The Bhoomi Sena or Bhumi Sena was a tribal army organization founded by Koli leader Kaluram Dhodade in 1970 in Maharashtra to regain the lands of Adivasis from Indian National Congress party leaders, Sahukars and other rich personalities and fight for the rights of tribals and poors.

Bhoomi Sena demanded the Government of Maharashtra a daily minimum wage of Rs. 12 for agricultural workers in unirrigated areas and Rs. 16 in irrigated areas.

Bhoomi Sena was spread over the 100 villages of Palghar district of Maharashtra. In Jawhar Taluka, Bhoomi Sena came into conflict with Shiv Sena (a regional rightist party), which was backed by the local sahukars. Shiv Sena tried to intimidate Bhoomi Sena workers and supporters and one evening attempted to attack Kaluram Dhodade while he was resting in a adivasi hut but Kaluram was protected by adivasis.

 Formation 
The Bhoomi Sena was formed in 1970 by Koli strongman Kaluram Dhodade who was a full time working leader of Praja Socialist Party. When the lands of tribals were grabbed by Indian National Congress party's leaders, the Praja Socialist Party showed the interest in tribals and under the leadership of Kaluram Dhodade, Praja Socialist Party started an Satyagraha to regain the lands of tribals. After that, Kakuram Dhodade was imprisoned for fifteen days in Palghar jail. During his imprisonment, Kaluram Dhodade realised that PSP is showing interest in tribal's Bhoomi Mukti Andolan because of their politics and to gain the popularity in tribals areas to get votebank and PSP was aggressive whe he was in jail so Kaluram Dhodade decided to form an own tribal dominated army or organisation named Bhoomi Sena and collected an army of 800 tribals in Palghar region.

 Activities and history 
The first action taken by Bhoomi Sena was a dramatic example of direct action aimed at moving local government to implement laws that were in the best interest of the poor adivasis and not of the landlords. The laws in question were a series of Tenancy Acts that were designed, and refined over the years, to establish "protected tenants" tenants with fixity of tenure. they later gave rights of ownership to tenants cultivating the land, Bhoomi Sena's first activity was to organize an investigation of land ownership in ten villages.

The investigation revealed that there were innumerable cases where the Sahukars were actually occupying the land which the revenue records showed as belonging to the adivasis or the sawkars had managed to transfer the title of adivasis land to themselves.

The initial tactic used by Bhoomi Sena was to forcibly harvest the crops on adivasi land that had been-illegally-cultivated by the sahukars. In the first action, some 600 adivasis bearing sickles harvested the crops on one Sahukars land. Initially, there was no resistance from the surprised landowners. But as the harvesting continued, they called in the police. The police threatened the adivasis with arrest, but they stood their ground, explaining to the police that they were acting legally by taking the crops from lands that rightfully belonged to them; they told the police it was they who were acting illegally by defending the Sahukars.

While these confrontations were occurring locally, they were publicized at the state level by the MLA for Palghar, Navinit Shah, Shah was a member of the Praja Socialist Party and had been an important influence on Kaluram's political development; he was wholly in sympathy with Bhoomi Sena's actions. Shah argued in the Maharashtra Assembly that the government should give protection to the adivasis, who were only demanding that the law be enforced. As a result of these dual pressures, the District Sub-Divisional Officer agreed to come to Palghar, and to decide cases of disputed land ownership on the spot. To the surprise of Bhoomi Sena, and of Shah, the Sub-Divisional Officer not only brought his court to the villages, be ruled in favor of the adivasi complainant in 799 of the 800 cases he heard: the adivasis won back several thousand acres of land." Navinit Shah firmly believes that it was the power of the organized adivasis that had produced the most impact; in previous years, when he as MLA had tried to get the land laws implemented, he had not been successful. As MLA he could be useful to the movement by adding pressure and bringing its case to the attention of state officials but bureaucrats, he found. would not listen to an MLA unless he had an organized movement behind him.

Following this victory, the Bhoomi Sena came to the attention of a number of outside, urban-based political activists. Control over the development of the movement was soon yielded by the local adivasis to a voluntary organization for adivasi uplift, the Bhumi Putra Pratisthan, which was intent on improving the production methods used by the adivasis. New agricultural methods, it was hoped, would lead to general social and economic uplift. In 1972, the Shetkari Mandal (Farmers Association) was established in Palghar to administer loans provided by the Bank of Maharashtra, which agreed to cooperate with the program on the urging of the Bhumi Putra Pratisthan." Over the next three years, the Shetkari Mandal undertook a number of economic schemes they hoped would bring increased 

prosperity to the adivasis: in addition to administering the bank loans, it entered the grass trade, serving as middleman between the adivasis and the grass traders in a failed effort to secure higher prices, and dug costly wells, a number of which proved to be dry. The major failing of the Shetkari Mandal, however, was its mismanagement of the bank loan program. Although an audit by the bank showed that there had been no misappropriation of funds, the funds had been diverted for unauthorized and uneconomic projects." Kaluram, the adivast leader, had lent his support to this venture, and in 1975 he publicly admitted his part in its failure. In 1976, the Bhumi Putra Pratisthan workers left the area, and Kaluram and others worked once again to establish Bhoomi Sena under local control.

Now in its third incarnation, Bhoomi Sena has worked to become a grass roots political organization with sufficient power to have an impact on local officials and landlords and to insure the application of the law. In addition to taking on specific issues-notably the struggle against illegal land alienation and bonded labor, and for the implementation of the minimum wage law-Bhoomi Sena has worked for "conscientization, or what westerners might call consciousness raising, among the adivasis. The effort is to educate and politicize, both to eliminate wasteful social evils, such as alcoholism and gambling, and in order to create a pressure group capable, like the vested interests, of being heeded. The effort is entirely within the legal structures of society, and is gradualist; but it is potentially threatening to the dominant class in the countryside whose support has been important to state and union governments. To the extent that such pressure can motivate local officials to vigorously enforce the law, and can push on the state level for more progressive legislation which then in turn serves as a rallying point for more organization, such movements can have a gradual but potentially profound effect. Government cannot legitimately move against groups acting entirely within the law and, indeed, embarrassing the government into enforcing the law. The attention paid to the rural efforts by urban intellectuals and journalists is thus absolutely crucial to widening the impact that can be made at the local level, for government must be pushed to act vigorously by a wide audience. in last years, Bhoomi Sena tried to form as a political party to get more power in state.

 References 

Category:Organizations based in India
Category:1970 establishments in Asia
Category:Koli people
Category:Maharashtra