Salman Khan vs Bishnois: How A 1998 Poaching Case Became A Gangster's Calling Card

"Salman Khan must apologise," says a grainy voice in an audio recording of gangster Anil Pandit as he takes responsibility for the shooting at actor Tiger Shroff. The shootout outside Pushpa Nursery Park in Mumbai's posh Juhu area on Sunday has grabbed national headlines and brought the long-running feud between actor Salman Khan and gangster Lawrence Bishnoi's gang back into focus, over the alleged poaching of blackbucks and chinkaras in Rajasthan's Jodhpur in 1998 during the shooting of the film 'Hum Saath Saath Hain'.

In 1998, Salman Khan was in Jodhpur for three weeks, during the months of September and October. The actor was accused of going on a hunt in the rural outskirts of Jodhpur. On the night of September 26 and 27, it is alleged that he hunted and killed two chinkaras in Bhavad village. The case went to the trial court, but Salman was acquitted by the Rajasthan High Court.

On the night of September 28 and 29, it is again alleged that the actor killed two chinkaras at Ghoda Farm in Luni. This case, too, was overturned by the Rajasthan High Court in 2016.

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More serious was the killing of two blackbuck deer, an endangered species, on the night of October 1 and 2 in Kankani village, for which the actor was handed a five-year sentence in 2018. The appeal against the conviction is pending.

In this particular instance, he was also accompanied by his co-stars in the film, Neelam, Tabu, Sonali Bendre and Saif Ali Khan, who are co-accused in the case. They were acquitted by the trial court, but the government has appealed their acquittal, and the case is pending.

Why The Bishnoi Community Raged

The Bishnois, a community that reveres and protects the environment and the animals that live near their villages in rural Jodhpur, tracked Salman on the night of October 1 and 2. It is believed that people from Bishnoi villages in Kankani heard gunshots and rushed out. They also gave chase to the vehicle allegedly carrying the actor and pursued the case with the Forest Department, becoming witnesses in a legal battle that went on for 20 years.

The outrage in the Bishnoi community was over an actor breaking one of their sacred tenets, "the 29 rules", or, as the saying in Marwari goes, "bees nay, nau niyam". These, when combined, form the word Bishnoi, referring to the followers of the 29 rules. The community lives by these 29 rules, one of which is non-violence and the protection of the animals, birds and environment where they live.

READ | Attack, Online Claim, Warning: Gangster Lawrence Bishnoi's Playbook Explained

Fierce protectors of the blackbuck and chinkara deer, the Bishnoi community was outraged by what it saw as the open poaching of deer in its area by a superstar actor who appeared to have complete disdain for the place where he had come to film. The Bishnois agitated on the streets of Jodhpur, in the courts and in front of the police station. To some extent, it was their pressure that brought not only the media spotlight onto the case but also sustained pressure on the authorities to act.

It led to the Forest Department filing cases against Salman and others for poaching, but the Bishnoi community did not leave it there. Its members also fought a long legal battle against Salman Khan, appointing one of their own lawyers to track the case over 20 years in the dusty trial courts of Jodhpur town.

"If the community had not followed this case so closely, we would not have seen convictions in this case. Salman was convicted for the poaching of two blackbucks. That case has now been moved to the High Court by a transfer petition, but the Bishnoi community actively made sure that it tracked it. I myself represented the community for 20 years," Mahipal Bishnoi, the lawyer who has represented the Bishnoi community in court for 20 years, said.

READ | Security At Salman Khan's Home Increased After Attack On Tiger Shroff

Lawrence Bishnoi's entry into the saga came at a much later date. In 2018, Lawrence Bishnoi was being produced in a Jodhpur court in a separate extortion case. As he stepped out, he told the television cameras waiting outside: "Salman Khan will be killed here in Jodhpur, tab inko humaree asli pechan ka pata chalge (then he will know who we are)."

It was Lawrence Bishnoi's defining moment. 

How Lawrence Bishnoi Capitalised

The jailed gangster had tapped into the angst the Bishnoi community had against Salman Khan and a case in which swift justice was nowhere in sight. Lawrence had positioned himself as a protector of the faith and also managed to grab national headlines by threatening a superstar. When the poaching case began in Jodhpur in 1998, Lawrence would have been a minor living in his home in Punjab. But the fact that he used a widely publicised case with a deep-rooted cultural context to establish his criminal hegemony is, in itself, a subject for a crime novel.

"Salman Khan is their propaganda vehicle. It's their way of making headlines; the real aim is extortion. By creating a sensational shootout, they make an entry into the world of high-power, big-optics extortion. Their modus operandi is usually to hire shooters. In some cases, if the shooter is not very skilled, they will abandon him and let him be caught by the police. But if they have a sharpshooter who is part of their gang or has potential, they also have an exit plan for him in place. The Anti-Gangster Task Force in Rajasthan has arrested many such assassins for hire. Most recently, their target in Rajasthan was a former Congress MLA, but they were not able to get to him because the AGTF caught the shooters in Jodhpur," MN Dinesh, who heads the Anti-Gangster Task Force in Rajasthan and has been mapping the movements of gangs in the state, said. 

READ | All 3 Shooters In Tiger Shroff Firing Caught From Rajasthan's Kota

In Jodhpur, views on the gangster raking up a 1998 poaching case against Salman Khan evoked different reactions.

"The Salman Khan poaching case is an emotive issue for the Bishnoi people. We still have not seen justice in the case. The High Court acquitted the actor in the chinkara hunting case, and in the blackbuck case, the appeal is pending. The SLP in the Supreme Court has also not been argued convincingly by the state government, so, in effect, there is little justice in the case. Now, as far as Lawrence Bishnoi is concerned, for him, Salman is a celebrity. But while we want legal action against Salman, we are not asking for his death. The Bishnoi community protects trees, animals and birds. We are a community of ahimsa, or non-violence, so how can we ask for or endorse calls for violence?" Ram Niwas Bishnoi, a member of the Bishnoi Tiger Force and a general secretary in the organisation, said.

Ram Niwas has led many demonstrations against Salman Khan, especially during his court appearances in Jodhpur.

With the case now in the trial court and moved to the High Court by way of a transfer petition, Salman Khan does not have to appear in court personally for hearings, thereby reducing, to some extent, the high-voltage optics around the case.

READ | Tiger Shroff Was Shot At In Mumbai. Hours Later, Suspects Spotted In Surat

"All these statements are a media creation. We cannot really verify what Lawrence Bishnoi said or claims. We only see it reported in the media, but the community, as a community, cannot support any act that is criminal or unconstitutional," leaders from the community, such as Narayan Ram Bishnoi, president of the Jodhpur district unit of the Bishnoi Mahasabha, said. 

While some community members may be evasive on the topic, Devendra Budhiya of the Akhil Bhartiya Bishnoi Mahasabha is more forthright. He said the feud would not end until Salman Khan went to Mukam Mukti Dham in Bikaner, the resting place of Guru Jambheshwar, who founded the community, and asked for forgiveness for killing the deer.

READ | Tiger Shroff Was Tracked For 10 Days, Shooters Recced House, Gym: Sources

Devendra Budhiya's words echo those of gangster Lawrence Bishnoi. Himself a controversial figure, Budhiya has been involved in a factional dispute within the Bishnoi organisation with its former patron and BJP leader Kuldeep Bishnoi.

While views may differ, the Salman Khan connection to the shooting involving Tiger Shroff has clearly brought the spotlight back onto the 1998 blackbuck poaching case, with the Lawrence Bishnoi gang once again using a criminal act to cloak it in the guise of a cultural context.