A Decade of Gujarat Carnage 2002
By Ram Puniyani
India has witnessed
many an acts of communal violence. Starting from the Jabalpur riot of 1961 to
the last major one of Kandhmal (August 2008). Many an innocent lives have been
lost in the name of religion. Amongst these the Gujarat carnage is a sort of marker.
It came in the backdrop of massive Anti Sikh pogrom of 1984, the anti Muslim
violence of post Babri demolition and the horrific burning of Pastor Graham
Steward Stains in Kandhmal. It was a quantitative and qualitative departure
from the other major carnages which have rocked the country.
To begin with the
burning of Sabarmati S 6 coach was cleverly projected to be an act done by
neighboring Muslims and in turn the violence was directed against the Muslim
population of Gujarat, on the ground that the Hindu sentiments are hurt. The
section of Hindu community was deliberately incited by the decision of state to
take the burnt bodies of victims in a procession, against the advice of the
collector of the city. The Bandh call given by VHP created the ground for
violence. Here the social engineering was at its display, and Dalits and
Adivasis were mobilized to unleash the violence against the hapless innocent
Muslims, accompanied by the propaganda which demonized the Muslim community as
a whole. While in earlier acts of violence, the state police have been an
accomplice and the silent onlooker to the violence, here a sort of active
collusion of state machinery and the communal forces was on display.
The BJP ruled state
Government had unrestricted run in the state as the Central Government was
being ruled by BJP led NDA and the other allies of BJP were too enamored by the
spoils of power to spoil the broth by speaking out. Modi had already instructed
the officials to sit back when the Hindu backlash will take place. The leading
light of socialist movement, George Fernandez, went to the extent of taking the
violence against minority women in the stride by saying that rape is nothing
new and it happens in such situations. What more was needed for the rioters to
run amuck and to central BJP leadership to let the things go on. The pattern of
violence against women was particularly horrific, targeting at their
reproductive organs and shaming them to no end.
While the architect of
Gujarat pogrom Narendra Modi kept saying that violence has been controlled in
three days, and central BJP leadership patted him for this, the matter of fact
was that violence went on and on painfully for a long time, uncontrolled and
unrestricted. The attitude of the BJP controlled state was pathetic and showed
the religious bias in relief and rehabilitation work. The compensations given
to minorities were abysmally low, state quickly retreated from the refugee
camps on the ground that the refugee camps are ‘child production centers’,
hitting the minorities where it hurts most. The biases against them were on
full display. The atmosphere was created by communal forces in such a manner
that the riot victims could not go back to their houses as the people in their
areas demanded a written undertaking from them, that they will withdraw the
cases filed in the context of violence and that they will not file any cases.
Most of the police as machinery either refused to file the FIRs or if
registered they kept enough loopholes for the criminals to get away. It was in
this atmosphere that the process of getting justice became a close to
impossible task. The communalized state apparatus, the attitude of police and
judiciary led the Supreme court to direct the shifting of cases away from
Gujarat.
The investigation
against Narendra Modi by the state police was an impossible task and so the
Special Investigation team was constituted. Unfortunately, that also did not
help the matters. Accompanying all this violence and attitude of state
government the minorities started feeling extremely insecure. They were
boycotted in trade and other social spaces. The result is the sprawling slum of
Juhapura as the symbol of polarization of communities along the religious
lines. The total dislocation of the monitories created multiple problems at the
level of education and sources of livelihood for the minorities.
The religious
polarization and section of media has created a Halo around Narendra Modi,
while strictures against him are coming by, about his failure to protect places
of religious worship of minorities, the malafide intentions of state in filing
cases against social activist Teesta Setalvad, many another cases are still
pending, crying for justice for the victims of Gujarat. Having consolidated the
section of majority community behind him, assured of their ongoing support,
Modi started the high profile propaganda about development and has been trying
to distract the attention from the havoc which he has wrought in the state. The
big capitalists are finding the state of Gujarat as a happy hunting ground for
massive state subsidies, so the media controlled by them is singing praises and
modulating popular opinion in his favor, creating a larger than life size
image, development man, in order to suppress his role in the violence against
minorities.
In this dismal
scenario, there have been many an examples of victims and social activists
standing for the cause of justice and doing the practically impossible task of
getting justice for violence victims despite all the efforts to turn them
hostile and protect the guilty of the communal crimes. While the massive
propaganda and state policies are trying to turn the minorities into second
class citizens, there are efforts which have gone on simultaneously to retrieve
the democratic values in the face of such adverse intimidating situation
created by the communal forces. Lately, apart from Court judgments, the civil
society response has been picking up and the civil society is trying to
overcome the stifling situation and trying to make its voice louder. While we
are nowhere close to what should ideally be there in a democratic set up, the
responses of civil society and social action groups are noteworthy in the
matters of getting justice for victims and in the matters of recreating the
liberal space which has been undermined by the communal forces. Times alone
will tell if democratic values will be successfully brought in this ‘Hindu
Rashtra in one state’
Source: Northern Voices Online
URL: https://newageislam.com/islam-politics/a-decade-gujarat-carnage-2002/d/6726