Sixteen people, including four children, belonging to backward classes were dragged out of their huts, tied and gunned down in Bihar’s Khagaria district past midnight Thursday. While villagers called it “cold-blooded murder by Maoists and their supporters”, police said it was a fallout of an old dispute between the OBC Kurmis-Koeris and the Mahadalit Musahars over riverine land.

Chief Minister Nitish Kumar said prima facie it appeared to be the handiwork of Maoists “but the state government will take a final view and order an inquiry after getting a report from a team that has been rushed to the area.”

The incident occurred past midnight at Amausi Bahiyar diara, which can only be reached by crossing the rivers Kareh and Kosi, from Amba Icharua village, 175 km east of Patna.

Villagers said 16 of the 17 people guarding an urad crop over 500 acres of the diara were shot dead by over 50 armed men, allegedly assisted by the Sadas (Musahars) of Amausi, the nearest village situated across the Kosi. Of the 16 dead, 14 were Kurmis and two Koeris.

For the CM, the violence between these communities creates a particularly piquant challenge. It is uncomfortably close to home — and not just because Nitish Kumar is himself a Kurmi. The Kurmis-Koeris count among the OBCs and the Musahars occupy the lowest rung among the Mahadalits. Both Kurmis and Musahars belong to the unique caste coalition that Nitish has attempted to stitch for himself.

The Mahadalit is a new category formalised by the Nitish administration, ostensibly for the purpose of addressing the special development needs of the most backward among Dalits — 20 of Bihar’s 22 Dalit subcastes have been identified as Mahadalit by a commission set up by the Nitish government in August 2007.

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