For Indian currents 8 march 2002

Gujarat -- The Corpse of a Nation's Soul

Secular Civil Society, and an Independent Media, specially TV news
channels, must ensure that vested interests do not succeed re-writing
current history of the systematic state-protected violence in
Gujarat. They have begun the exercise, as can be seen by the sound
bites on some competing channels, and in the writings of a stream of
the print media whose Editors sit in the Rajya Sabha wearing saffron,
if not khaki. What is required at this time is the authentic Voice of
the Victim, which no future coercion can change. The Centre, now
ruling in Lucknow too through the Governor, has announced it is
relaxing curbs that had kept away kar sevaks from Ayodhya. A massive
and aggressive gathering of `simple pilgrims’ (as union minister of
state for Home Affairs I D Swami describes them, as simple pilgrims)
is inevitable for the worship of the stone pillars already ready for
installation. It is time to learn the lessons from the Liberhans
commission’s painful course of hearings on the demolition of the
Babri Masjid, and from the probes of 1993 anti Muslim riots and the
murderous 1984 anti-Sikh arson. The NDA partners have made it clear
their first priority is to remain in power. New allies want a bite of
the cake – and both J Jayalalithaa and Mayawati have said they have
no hesitation in cohabiting with the Sangh parivar, warts,
blood-dripping trishuls and smoke-stained hands notwithstanding.
After all, an aroma is just a stink one has learnt to like.

By John Dayal

Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was born in Porbandar, Gujarat, and was
shot dead in New Delhi. The institutionalised, Constitutional State
as born in New Delhi, and has died in Gujarat. Burnt alive, so to
speak.

At some time in the future at some Judicial commission, the state
government will file an affidavit giving the official number of those
dead in the violence. No one will believe in this figure. There are
all too many reports of bodies burnt to ashes, buried in mass graves
even without a proper recognition by parents, wives and relatives.
There are too many reports of police not registering FIRs, the first
information reports that become the basis of subsequent enquiries.
The Commission of police of course is on record saying, in slightly
different phraseology, that his boys too were human, and had reacted
to the burning of the kar sevaks in the Sabarmati express at Godhra
in an emotional response from their heart. The best ones just watched
Muslims being burnt alive. Others participated in the lighting of the
living pyres.

There are no reports yet of any major Sangh parivar leader arrested
from among the hordes of Vishwa Hindu Parishad and Bajrang Dal cadres
who ruled the towns and villages from 1st to 7th March 2002. Nor
indeed are reports available of policemen suspended for dereliction
of duty. The comparative data on arrests from the two communities
will also have to wait for much more time. If the Gujarat police’s
luck holds out, the shila pooja and succeeding events after 15th
March may well overtake the Gujarat event, diverting media attention
and shifting the political protest from Gujarat to Uttar Pradesh.

Gujarat chief minister Narendra Modi has exonerated just about
everyone he could – the police, the administration, the VHP and the
Bajrang Dal. Union Home minister Lal Krishna Advani has exonerated
Narendra Modi. The Prime minister, in first requesting the RSS to
intervene and then making the Shankaracharya of Kanchi his main
emissaries to bring peace to Gujarat, has exonerated the very
ideology that set Gujarat on fire. And if Union defence minister
George Fernandes, rattles that his car and motorcade were attacked by
the ravaging mobs, at one stage seemed to have blamed the state
government for delaying the military from staging its rout marches –
by its delay in not providing them the smaller trucks the army
required – the close friend of George Fernandes and his former party
president Jaya Jaitely, mad the strongest defence ever of the Sangh
Parivar’s government and the cadres of the parivar.

Relief is another matter altogether. Chief minister Modi set new
standards of equity for the dead – Rs 2 lakh for the dead of Godhra
and Rs 1 lakh for the victims of the state sponsored arson. His
argument is that the kar sevaks were victims of terrorism. Modi of
course had the precedence of the earlier BJP government under whose
patronage; relief was distributed on caste and religious lines
amongst the victims of the earthquake 13 months ago.

The world saw terror unleashed on the living and the dead of
Ahmedabad in the photograph of the wild eyes infant, his head
bandaged, who died a few hours after the flash of the camera, and it
was visible in the picture of the youth whose home had been set on
fire. That has been the contribution of a vibrant section of the
Media – NDTV’s Rajdeep Sardesai and his brave colleagues, not
forgetting the anonymous cameramen, Manas of The Hindu and Rathin Das
of the Hindustan Times and their many collagues formed a select band
of newspersons who are an inspiration to their generation of media
persons. They deserve the gratitude of the nation for having overcome
the fear of retribution beyond the call of duty. It is tougher than
reporting from a bunker, dangerous as reporting from Kargil is. There
at least the state was on the media’s side, and the media on the
state’s.

It is thanks to these young men and women, and at least one or two
not so young, that the Voice of the Victims was first heard. Teesta
Setalvad, Shushobha and Cedric Prakash went later and have kept us
abreast of the emerging conspiracy of silence. More will go as the
dust settles and the smoke dissipates.

It is thanks to them that one hard of senior administrators who first
shaved off their stubbles and then ventured forth. It is through them
one read about the four senior police officers, all Muslims, who had
to call in extra security to their home, and of the Muslim constables
attacked in their barracks by their own colleagues. And it is because
of the media that I now know of at least two Gujarat High court
judges who too had to flee their houses and seek refuge in the warm
bosom of their community and friends.

What has the state come to if the government cannot protect judges,
and senior police officers feel insecure?

The implications of even two High Court judges having to leave their
homes, if even for a short time, are grievances and far reaching.
This nation cannot live with the images of a judiciary that can be so
threatened. At this critical moment, the Judiciary is the arbiter of
issues that may spell life or death not just for those unfortunate to
be caught in a future conflagration that may be triggered by persons
and groups defying their judgments one way or the other. It is no too
difficult to imagine the stress under which the judiciary would be
functioning, in Gujarat, in Allahabad, and in New Delhi. There is no
risk of contempt of court, and a night in Tihar jail, in saying this.

There is little sympathy for the National Minorities Commission, now
really feeling how marginalised it has become. The National
Commission for Human Rights earned for itself the respect of the
people. The Minorities Commission chose to be an agent of the
Bharatiya Janata party, masquerading as a wing of the government. The
state government has told it there is no security for its members if
they come to the state to probe the violence. And surely now the
commission cannot coerce anyone, the Church included, to get them to
dialogue with the murderous ideology, and ideologues, of the Sangh
Parivar. It has itself to blame for opting out of the peace with
justice system.

This role today is with brave individuals in Gujarat and elsewhere
who are mobilising people of conscience, bringing consolation, peace
and relief to the victims, identifying the guilty at the risk of
their own lives. To safeguard the sanctity of the secular
protestations of the Indian nation. And the pluralism of its ancient
heritage.