Beed experiences winds of change
Prabhavati Solunke, 65, vows to continue fighting for justice after her sarpanch was murdered, sparking village protests against mafia control in Beed.
BEED
Prabhavati Solunke, 65, has been indisposed over the last few months; weak with perpetual body ache, she barely emerges from her house built from mud, bamboo and dry leaves, in Massajog village, Beed. Solunke was among 200 women who entered a lake near her village on January 1, to participate in the Jalsamadhi Andolan, demanding justice for the village sarpanch Santosh Deshmukh, who was brutally murdered on December 9, 2024. She had to be hospitalised after the protest, as her blood pressure shot up from standing in the water. But poor health will not keep her down and she is resolved to join the “agitation again in the future if need be”.
“I do not care for my life. We have lost our messiah who would stand by us in times of joy and sorrow. He was killed like Sambhaji Maharaj was killed by Mughals,” said Solunke.
Deshmukh, 40, was allegedly killed when he opposed an extortion bid at a windmill plant in his village. Following his murder, nine of the 10 accused with links to Karad, were arrested (one is still at large), while Karad himself was booked under MCOCA for his involvement in an extortion case linked with the murder.
Now, change is in the air, and it is sweeping across several villages of Beed district’s Parli, Kej, Ambejogai and Patoda talukas. In the over 70 days since the incident, just as the Opposition, along with Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) MLA Suresh Dhas, is calling for Munde’s dismissal from the state cabinet, the villagers have started speaking up against a sustained reign of terror unleashed by mafia groups reportedly controlled largely by former deputy mayor of the municipal council, Walmik Karad, a close aide of Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) leader Dhananjay Munde, for decades.
Meanwhile, in the backdrop of the ongoing tussle between Marathas and OBCs over reservation, detractors have tried to paint the pushback as a face-off between two communities as Karad and Munde belong to the Vanjari (OBC) community and the slain sarpanch was a Maratha.
Dhas however refuted the claim saying the battle is “beyond community lines”, while the slain sarpanch’s brother Dhananjay Deshmukh said “even OBCs in our village are standing with us for justice”.
The collective backlash has also led to corrective measures being implemented in Beed, which, according to Dhas, is the region’s Wasseypur. Dhas, who belongs to Ashti village, refers to Karad, as “aaka” (kingpin), and Munde “aaka’s aaka in this gangland”.
It takes a murder
Shivaji Deshmukh, a social activist from Parli, said the heinous way in which the sarpanch was murdered, has “given us confidence to stand against the rule of tyranny that has prevailed in the district for decades”.
Though people of Parli -- the epicentre of anarchy -- continue to be fearful, those in the adjoining talukas such as Ambejogai and Kej are standing up against it, he said. “People feel this is the time to rise their voice. This outcry is the culmination of the lawlessness they have weathered for decades,” he said. “They also believe that until Dhananjay Munde is dismissed, there will be no level field for people seeking justice.”
Haridas Shelar, a villager from Daskhed, Patoda, is emphatic that they will see the “movement to a logical end”. “Social media, which is being used effectively, is boosting our morale,” he said.
Deshmukh, a two-term sarpanch of Massajog village (2012-1017, 2022-), was brutally murdered by a mafia for whom extortion has been a lifeline. Any upcoming industry or project can flourish here only after pay-outs, and those who are deemed hurdles to their objective are removed from their paths.
Deshmukh’s murder changed that. He was popular, known to fight for causes and always out to help people in need and had a clean image. That such a man should meet such a brutal end has stoked anger among villagers, who were up until now hapless spectators of a life as they knew.
Course correction
“People are breaking free of suppression by the criminal power-centre that enjoyed political patronage for decades. Grabbing lands, threatening industries, extortion from the companies and eliminating people who come in their way is not new to Parli. No cases would be registered; forget about action,” said a police officer who worked in Parli in the past, adding “appointments of police and administrative officers were done by this parallel power-centre.”
The public outcry combined with political pressure have prompted local police to flick the dust off old files and order investigations into criminal cases. At least seven to eight cases are being probed or a demand has been made to reopen them.
One of them is the murder of a local land dealer Mahadev Munde, whose body was found with a deep slit in the throat in front of the tehsil’s office in October 2023. Mahadev was killed when he was in the middle of closing a purchase deal for 12 plots next to Karad’s house in Parli, from a Latur-based land owner, after the first deal with Karad had reportedly failed.
Dnyaneshwari Munde, 31, his widow, learnt about the incident when her brother received a call from the police to identify the body. “At the time, police had unofficially told me that they were close to arresting the accused but stopped after getting ‘a call from the boss’. I frequented the police station and moved court, but there has been no progress since then,” she said.
The new-found energy among people for justice has given her hope.
“Now, my husband’s casefile has been re-opened. The district’s superintendent of police (SP) has even assured Supriyataai, (MP Supriya Sule, who visited Dnyaneshwari last week) 100% results in the case. Had Dhas saheb not spoken up, this case would have stayed buried in files,” she said.
The 12 plots are now reportedly in possession of the Karads.
A local journalist who did not wish to be named, said another case – of Maralwadi sarpanch Bapu Andhale, who was killed in a gangwar in Parli on June 29, 2024, is also being discussed in legal circles. “In a video released in July 2024, the main accused Mahadev Gitte, said ‘Karad had had given a contract to three other people to kill me’. Police had initially named Karad as one of the seven accused but dropped the name later.”
Superintendent of police, Beed, Navneet Kanwat, however said that only the murder case of Mahadev Munde is being re-investigated.
The rise of mafia
Over the years, in Parli -- around 545 kms from Mumbai – businesses such as cooperative banks, automobile showrooms and tutorial chains, have closed down, while professionals moved to neighbouring tehsils unable to bear the land mafia’s reign of terror. Only thermal power plants have managed to sustain.
Parents chose to send their children to Pune and Latur for schooling and higher education, while government officials and teachers also preferred to live in neighbouring tehsils like Ambejogai and Kej. However, emboldened by the free rein they enjoyed in Parli, it was only a matter of time they would spread their wings in neighbouring tehsils -- Kej, Renapur and Ambejogai.
“At least three wind power plants are planned in Ashti, Patoda and other tehsils, thanks to their geographical location – they are surrounded by hills with an even flow of wind. It offered criminal gangs an additional way to mint money – through extortion and theft of equipment. O2 Power and Avaada are the new players in Beed. Gangs extort money from the plants in the name of protection money. Machinery and crucial equipment are not allowed to enter unless ransom is paid to the local goons; they come to the sites and demand lakhs,” said a security officer of a power generation company in Patoda, choosing to remain unnamed. He added, extortion and hooliganism has stopped since Deshmukh’s murder.
Cashing on ash
It is only recently that the Maharashtra State Power Generation Company (Mahagenco) realised that ash generated from its thermal power plant at Parli is worth ₹2.25 lakh a day.
The three power generation units that generate a total 750 MW a day, also generate 4000 tonne ash from 10,000 tonne coal used daily. The ash which has accumulated for years has resulted in a stock pile of 25 lakh tonnes. The mafia started lifting the stock daily in the absence of any government control, and supplied to brick kilns, manufacturers of asbestos sheets, and contractors engaged in construction of bridges and roads. Since 2018, 15 lakh tonnes have been lifted illegally, leading to a loss of over ₹85 crore to the state exchequer.
Once realisation dawned, Mahagenco floated tenders in December 2023 for collecting the precious residue, which were given to various bidders. “But the ash mafia would not allow bidders to lift the ash. Dautpur and Wadgaon Dadahari, villages that house ponds of ash generated from the thermal plants, have seen at least 400 tippers (dumpers that are deployed to lift the ash) from the mafia a month after they realised the potential in ash business,” said an official from the energy department, requesting anonymity.
He added, though the government bidders quoted the price of ash at ₹550 a tonne, the mafias who excavate from the pond sell it at over ₹700.
The ash business and its criminal links caught the attention of BJP MLA Dhas who levelled allegations of links between policemen and Vishnu Chate, one of the 10 accused in the sarpanch’s murder. Dhas said local policemen own tippers and have links in illegal businesses with Chate.
Political patronage
After Karad was booked under MCOCA, though Munde admitted that he was a close aide, he has been turning down the demand for his resignation. “There is no question of my resignation until found guilty,” he has said on several occasions.
“There is no doubt that the accused had political patronage. It was only after our 20-hour long rasta roko (on December 9) and me climbing up a water tank that leaders like Dhas, social activist Anjali Damania, and the police took notice. Karad surrendered because of pressure from people,” said Dhananjay Deshmukh.
Navneet Kanwat, the SP of Beed, however refused to accept the taint on the police lightly, affirming that “police had done everything from the beginning – three of the accused were arrested on the day of the murder, two more in next few days; and some officers have been transferred for dereliction of duty”.
Rise of Dhananjay Munde and Walmik Karad
Though his links with crime are not established, Dhananjay Munde’s alleged patronage to Karad, has put him in a spot. After his initial resistance, his boss and NCP chief Ajit Pawar too has changed his stand over his resignation – a week ago, Pawar said “the decision of Munde’s resignation must be taken by Munde himself on moral grounds”.
“This is an indication that Munde may not be able to survive in the cabinet for long,” an NCP minister told HT.
Munde, 49, started his career as president of Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha in the late 1990s when his uncle Gopinath Munde was deputy chief and home minister of Maharashtra. At the time, he looked after the daily affairs of the senior Munde’s assembly constituency.
When Gopinath Munde switched to national politics by contesting Lok Sabha election, he chose his daughter Pankaja as his political heir which upset Dhananjay, who then started looking for options on his own. Since he could not get a BJP ticket to contest Parli constitueuncy, Dhananjay joined NCP. In 2014, when BJP came to power, the NCP leadership picked him to lead the Opposition in the legislative council which boosted his career. He became a minister when the MVA government was formed in 2019; and since then started building his political empire.
“When he became guardian minister of Beed in December 2019, he had control over the district. After her father’s death, when Pankaja Munde also snapped ties with him, he became the ‘undisputed king’ of the district; and Karad, once a house staff in Gopinath Munde’s household, was given unfettered control over Munde’s empire,” said a local BJP leader, requesting anonymity.
Over time, Karad, the once blue-eyed boy of Gopinath Munde, decided to sever ties with his mentor choosing to align with Dhananjay and his father Pandit Anna, when they snapped ties with Munde.
Though Munde continues to claim innocence, the slain sarpanch’s brother said: “The link between Walmik Karad and Munde is well established. There are documents that show Karad and Munde’s wife were business partners. What else you need to establish the links?”
Messages and calls to Munde from this reporter, for his version, remained unattended. His office said that the he has been unwell and could not be contacted now.
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