[Mr. Khan’s family said the Rajputs pressured them to accept some money and not report the crime to the authorities. But talks over exactly how much money should be paid soon broke down, and Mr. Khan’s family then jettisoned tradition and went to the police.]
By Suhasini Raj and Kai Schultz
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After her husband, a singer,
was killed, Kaiku Begum, center, with their daughters,
sought justice from the
police. The family said they were pressured to accept
money and not report the
crime. Credit Atul Loke for The New York Times
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DANTAL, India — For generations, folk
musicians have camped out on a dusty cattle range in the northern Indian state
of Rajasthan. Mostly Muslims, they earn their keep by performing for Hindus who
live in sturdy huts built of stone.
So it came as no surprise when Aamad Khan, a
poor singer with deep-set eyes, was summoned to a nearby temple one night to
play his harmonium, an air-driven organ. He was told to use his music to
inspire the Hindu goddess Durga to enter the body of a local faith healer who
happened to smell of alcohol that September evening.
The song would be Mr. Khan’s last.
Around 10:30 p.m., Mr. Khan’s limp body was
taken to a hospital, a stripe of blood congealing below one ear. Eventually,
the faith healer, Ramesh Suthar, confessed to killing him, saying he had
murdered Mr. Khan in a drunken rage, smashing his head against a cement floor.
A week or so later, the folk musicians living
here, who number about 200 with their families, did something they had never
dared to try: They picked up and left.
For hundreds of years, the folk musicians,
known as Manganiyars, have been bound to perform for high-caste Hindus,
absorbing discrimination and abuse and getting paid little for it. But the
thoughtless killing of one of their own seems to have been the last straw.
The Manganiyars who live around the village
of Dantal say they are now finished with their feudal-style bondage — another
sign that India’s centuries-old caste system may not be completely
disintegrating but is definitely fraying.
Continue reading the main story
“The country is free, but we are still
slaves,” said Chugge Khan, 39, Mr. Khan’s brother. “This is the tipping point.”
Bound at birth to the Rajputs, a princely
Hindu warrior caste, the Manganiyars, whose total number is in the thousands,
are scattered across small pockets of India and Pakistan. For centuries, this
caste arrangement, knitted together with music, has persisted across the
cracked plains of the Thar Desert.
But as patronage systems have been dismantled
in many parts of India, many Manganiyars have searched for a way out, looking
for better jobs and pushing to change their name, which derives from the local
word for “beggar.” Emboldened by increasing literacy, they have also migrated
to cities, enticed by the prospect of performing for higher wages in hotels,
for tourists and alongside Grammy winners.
Daniel Neuman, an ethnomusicologist who did
field research on the Manganiyars a few decades ago, still remembers surprising
conversations he had with singers, some of whom lived in places accessible only
by camel.
The musicians lived in India without access
to electricity or consistent access to water, so “the contrast was difficult to
imagine,” he said, when they talked about the five-star hotels where they had
stayed — in London, Paris and New York when commissioned to perform.
Manganiyars, who are traditionally Muslim but
are often nonpracticing, are classified as a seminomadic tribe by the Indian
government. They qualify for many of the same constitutional protections and
benefits aimed at low-caste Hindus like Dalits, or untouchables, and those from
what are officially called Other Backward Classes, according to Surinder Singh
Gajraj, an official with the Ministry of Social Justice and Empowerment.
These protections and benefits have not
always been realized in rural India, but they include school scholarships, land
entitlements and housing for families living below the poverty line.
Generations ago, the patrons of the
Manganiyars were the Rajputs. But the distinction has been relaxed to include
other Hindus in Dantal, a village in Western Rajasthan of a few thousand people
clustered near a lone cellular tower, one of the few signs of modernity.
With high-pitched voices that wiggle and
shake, Manganiyars sing at weddings and religious gatherings. Their
mandolin-like kamaichas are made from mango wood and goat hides. They perform
sobering songs about abuse, love, loss and the casualties of past battles,
evoking historical figures like Alexander the Great.
They also help faith healers reach a trance
state.
That was the case the night of Sept. 27, when
Mr. Khan, who was around 50, was asked to perform for the Suthars, a group of
carpenters from a lower caste than the Rajputs. In the village’s social
stratification, the Suthars are considered rough equals to the Manganiyars.
According to the criminal complaint, Mr.
Suthar, the faith healer, and his brothers surrounded the musician, mocking his
singing and tearing his clothing.
Later that evening, when Mr. Khan’s cousin
came looking for him, Mr. Suthar uttered that Mr. Khan had been “sacrificed at
the altar of the goddess.”
Under police interrogation, Mr. Suthar
eventually admitted to killing the singer by slamming his head on the floor of
a water tank near the temple. The Rajputs, who more or less run Dantal, tried
to handle this the old-fashioned way: with silence.
Mr. Khan’s family said the Rajputs pressured
them to accept some money and not report the crime to the authorities. But
talks over exactly how much money should be paid soon broke down, and Mr.
Khan’s family then jettisoned tradition and went to the police.
“We wanted justice,” said Kaiku Begum, Mr.
Khan’s widow, between sobs.
Khet Singh, the acting village head, denied
that the Rajputs had offered any money to halt the investigation, saying it was
the Manganiyars who had demanded an exorbitant sum from village leaders.
“We keep them like our children,” Mr. Singh
said, referring to the Manganiyars. “When we make chapatis, we set one aside
for them. They don’t even have to cook. They come asking for food toward the
evening and we give them whatever we wish.”
Mr. Singh said he believed Mr. Khan’s death
was a convenient excuse to hatch an escape plan, characterizing the Manganiyar
exodus as a kind of betrayal fueled by greed for worldly comforts.
“These people have tasted blood,” he said.
“So many of their community are going abroad and becoming famous. They do not
want to live on our handouts.”
A few days after the criminal complaint was
filed, all the Manganiyars living in Dantal left. They are now in Jaisalmer,
two hours away, where life rotates around a giant sandstone fort. They have
initially set up camp in a blocky government shelter typically used by people
seeking refuge from the scorching desert heat.
On a recent evening, a group of musicians
gathered in a circle outside the shelter, plotting their next moves. Among them
was Chugge Khan, Mr. Khan’s brother, who said the relationship between the
Rajputs and Manganiyars had always been corrosive. The decision to leave was
partly about fear, he said, but also an act of protest.
“If a child does not bow down before a Rajput
with folded hands, even if it is a small child, he will be chided and, at
times, slapped,” he said.
Some singers wonder how long they can hold
out. Mr. Khan preferred taking the long view. The time had finally come to
leave behind hundreds of years of slavery, he said.
“All that we have are our mouths,” he said.
“Now, we are trying to hold onto our dignity. We have decided not to live the
life of insects anymore.”
