Outlook English - Print Subscribers Copy Outlook English, 06 August 2018 | Page 13
I’M ALIVE Baijnath, long
dead, asserts his existence
(left); Dhiraji Devi (right)
and her identity cards
that mean little next to a
death certificate (above)
the scribe for local land records and reve-
nue office. But ever so often, he also dou-
bled up as the angel of death.
Baijnath (he goes by one name) is a
semi-literate Dalit farmer who owns, or
rather owned, less than an acre of land in
an Azamgarh village. Years ago, unbekno
wnst to him, a lekhpal wrote him a death
certificate. A Brahmin called Baijnath
Pandey had died and the lekhpal made an
entry on the records substituting the
names of Pandey’s heirs, his sons
Bachaspati and Triveni, as inheritors of
the plot owned by the living, breathing
Baijnath. It may seem like a careless error
to make, just a case of mistaken identity.
But turning back the clock requires a
Herculean effort as others have found out.
The living Baijnath had no idea he was
no longer supposed to be alive. And the
lekhpal had not made a field visit to check Azamgarh town. She married again and
if he had entered the correct name. In left him with her aunt. He never attended
2015, Bachaspati and Triveni tried to sell school: a few stray tuitions at a neighbo
that half acre—that’s when Baijnath came ur’s is all he got while he became a child
to know about his legal death. His lawyer labourer. He was weaving Banarasi saris
finally told him to approach the Mritak for a living when a paternal aunt declared
Sangh—literally, Association of the Dead. him dead to the lekhpal in his father’s vil-
This is where he found himself to be part lage—a technical knockout dealt with an
of a whole community almost, a kind of eye on his share in the ancestral property.
At age 21, Lal Bihari applied for a loan to
Brotherhood of Zombies which claims
their total population in India could run start a business. The bank wanted proof of
into tens of thousands. They demand the identity and other documentation and he
went back to his father’s village to get it.
right to life, in the most literal sense.
The Mritak Sangh was founded by Lal That’s when he heard the news of his own
Bihari Mritak, a bit of a legend in these death! Now, Lal Bihari didn’t want any
parts. Lal Bihari lost his father at a young property. He just wanted to get on with life.
age and shifted with his mother to her “People called me ghost and satan to my
natal home in Mubarakpur, 30 km east of face. They laughed at me. Nobody took it
seriously,” says Lal Bihari, who now smiles
at every dead joke you can throw at him.
Lal Bihari pleaded with every official
possible
to rectify the error, but in vain.
Baijnath ‘died’ when a
He also tried many ruses to get an official
lekhpal confused him
document to acknowledge him as alive: it
with a dead man of the became his life’s mission to not be dead.
He kidnapped his cousin, the son of the
same name. He lost his aunt who’d rendered him inexistent. “I
land to the man’s sons. went to his school and got him to Muba
6 August 2018 OUTLOOK 13