Shibu Soren (1944-2025): Tribal Redeemer

The man with a beard, long hair and mellow voice was a demigod for the Santhal tribals of Jharkhand.

Around four decades before the state was formed in 2000, Shibu Soren, a Santhal who was 15 when his father Shobaran Soren was killed by moneylend­ers, started filling a vacuum in the tribal leadership, after celebrated hockey player Jaipal Singh Munda, a pre-Independence espouser for a separate state of Jharkhand. Soren re-ignited the spirit of struggle for social reform, fighting exploitation by money­lenders, regressive prac­tices, police brutality while defending tribals’ rights to “jal, jungle, zameen”. His life took several turns from activism to politics, state to the Centre, switching alliances with BJP and Con­gress. But Soren—three-time chief minister, former Union minister, cofounder of the Jharkhand Mukti Morcha (JMM) and face of the agitation for formation of Jharkhand—remained “dishom guru” (leader of the community) for his supporters.

It was in the backwoods of southern Bihar, which was striving to be freed from the rest of the state, that Soren captured hearts. Once while travelling through the forests in Kathikund during the 1996 Lok Sabha elections, he saw villagers carry two peo­ple suffering from cerebral malaria on cots to a Public Health Centre, 11km away. He stopped and sent them in the vehicle accompany­ing him, asking his secu­rity personnel to ensure they got treatment. He told a journalist accompanying him that the plight of trib­als was the root cause for the demand for statehood.

Of the three—Soren, Marxist trade union leader AK Roy and Kurmi-Mahato leader Binod Bihari Mahato—who formed the JMM in 1972, Soren was the last to go at 81. He had taken the reins of the party in the 1980s, also the time of his entry into national politics, chanting state­hood for Jharkhand, carved out of tribal-dominated districts of southern Bihar.

Of the 11 Lok Sabha elec­tions he fought, he won eight, and was member of Rajya Sabha thrice. Soren became a minister in the Manmohan Singh govern­ment thrice and chief min­ister thrice. He, however, could not complete any of the terms, as political and graft cases hounded him. He went missing while in office when a warrant was issued against him over the 1975 Chirrudih massacre case, in which he was named one of the 69 accused. It involved the killing of 10 people, including nine Muslims, in clashes between tribals and Muslims, following a movement launched by Soren to drive out “dikus” (outsiders or non-tribals). Later, on Singh’s advice, he resigned. After a month in judicial custody, he was released on bail and re-inducted as coal min­ister following a deal for a Congress-JMM alliance before the 2005 Assembly polls. In March that year, the Jharkhand governor invited him to form government but he could not manage the confidence vote and resigned within 10 days. He returned as Union minister but in 2006 resigned in the wake of his conviction for the 1994 murder of his former secretary Shashi Nath Jha, who it was said had got to know about a monetary deal between Congress and four JMM MPs, includ­ing Soren, to save the minority PV Narasimha Rao government, facing a no-confidence motion. Soren’s role in coal block allocations when he was coal minister in 2006 had also been questioned.

He, however, retained the unwavering allegiance of the tribals, particularly the Santhals, a legacy inherited by his son Hemant Soren, now the Jharkhand chief minister. Shibu Soren’s image has hovered over every election since the formation of the state with a 26 per cent tribal population.

 

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