Mme Chair and members of the Commission:

I appreciate the opportunity to testify before you this morning. I
spent more than six years of my career working from an office in this
very building, and another six years working in an adjacent building,
so this represents something of a homecoming for me.

Unfortunately, my appearance before you today is the direct result of
a great human tragedy that has unfolded in India over the past
several months, a fact that severely diminishes what pleasure I might
otherwise feel by being here today.

I also wish to specify that I testify here today not as a
representative of the Woodrow Wilson Center, but in my private
capacity as a longtime observer of India and of U.S.-India relations.

I have been asked to place the communal violence in Gujarat into a
broader context, with a special focus on what this tragedy might
mean, or not mean, for U.S. relations with India.

But before attempting that task, I wish to add my voice to those who
have already expressed shock and horror and profound sadness at the
events that have caused us to gather here today.

We have heard tales of immense human suffering and unimaginable
depravity. We have been told of acts of deliberate and preconceived
savagery. Our hearts reach out to the victims of this shameful
carnage.

Of equal concern are credible reports from multiple sources that
local officials in Gujarat failed to act to protect victims of
communal violence -- indeed, that the authorities deliberately
encouraged such violence by looking the other way.
We have also received information suggesting that national
politicians were unconscionably slow in responding to the early
reports of violence, and that some persons in positions of authority,
rather than moving to dampen communal tensions, have callously and
irresponsibly stirred the pot of religious intolerance for selfish
political or personal purposes.

All these are reports that elicit profound sorrow. Those behind these
shameful acts - as well as those who by their inaction facilitated
this tragedy - merit the world's condemnation.

One would hope that government authorities in India would now move
decisively to prevent further bloodshed and destruction, and to
address the physical and spiritual needs of the thousands who have
been displaced by the violence in Gujarat. This would seem the bare
minimum we should expect of India in the days ahead.

A restrained official U.S. response

The public response from the Bush administration to the events in
Gujarat has been remarkably low-key - in comparison both to the
magnitude of the tragedy, and to the public response from Europe and
Japan.

I have no doubt that American officials take second place to no one
in their horror at what has transpired in Gujarat, and in their
uneasiness at reports that complicity, negligence, or apathy on the
part of some Indian officials have compounded the tragedy.

Nonetheless, it is notable that as a government, we have been
remarkably restrained in our public expressions of concern.

The reason for this relatively low-key American response rests in
part, I expect, in a recognition that in dealing with India and
Indians, private representations rather than public harangues
frequently prove more effective in producing a desired result.

The explanations for this are many and complicated. Suffice it to say
that for the better part of the past half century - indeed, extending
back even before India's birth as an independent state in 1947 - the
relationship between the United States and India has been a troubled
and prickly one.

Each of these countries has been wont to lecture the other, to assume
an air of moral superiority that, rather than convince the other, has
only produced resentment and a stubborn disinclination to admit the
validity of the concerns being articulated.

Today, I am pleased to report, there exists a somewhat more mature
relationship between our two countries.

But these old patterns of suspicion and resentment remain not far
below the surface, and I expect the Bush administration was correct
in its assessment that a muted voice rather than megaphone diplomacy
was best calculated to convince Indians that U.S. concerns were
genuine. I do not criticize the Bush administration on this count.

The need for public expressions of concern

At the same time, there is also a place for more public expressions
of concern, even horror, so I applaud the Commission for convening
today's hearing.

The United States must take care not to convey the impression that a
moderate response to the horror that has unfolded in Gujarat
indicates a failure of compassion, a willful decision to turn a blind
eye to the tragedy.

To the contrary, private behind-the-scenes representations from U.S.
officials are apt to carry more weight if they are backed up by
highly public expressions of anger and disgust from other Americans.

Whether one thinks in terms of America as a moral force in the world,
or of more modest U.S. political and diplomatic objectives, we must
take care that no one doubts our revulsion over what has happened in
Gujarat, or the intensity of our convictions.

In this regard, I would think it essential that those in the United
States -- including those in the U.S. Congress -- who are seen as
India's friends not hesitate to speak out on these matters.

Especially India's friends should leave no doubt as to our abhorrence
of what has happened.

Not so much in anger as in sorrow - but also with the frankness and
candor befitting friends.

I must say that I have been somewhat dismayed in this regard that
more of India's friends in the U.S. Congress have not addressed these
issues publicly.

I wonder why, for instance, there have not been congressional
resolutions on Gujarat, or why more members of Congress have not
spoken out - and here, I am not talking about Members who are well
known as India-bashers, but those known for their sympathies for
India and their belief in the importance of strengthening the U.S. -
India relationship.

Again, not so much to criticize or condemn, but to make it clear that
the United States and the United States Congress care about all
Indians, not merely the Hindu majority.

America and the Muslim world

At this particular moment in history, it is especially important that
the United States not allow the impression to take hold that
Americans somehow value a Muslim life less than the life of a person
of another religion.
In this sense, there exists a direct linkage between the Gujarat
massacres and the global war against terrorism.

As the members of this Commission know, there are some in the Islamic
world who assert that the present conflict is a war directed not
against terrorism, but against Islam. That the United States does not
care about Muslims. That we seek to utilize the tragedies of
September 11 to carry out long-desired plans to repress the Islamic
world.

These are detestable lies. But many in the Muslim world are prepared
to believe them.

As a consequence, it is incumbent upon us to fight these false
impressions, to avoid any steps that might buttress such gross
distortions of America's views and values and purposes.

Here then is yet another reason why India's friends in the United
States should speak out, to condemn intolerance and hatred, to lend
support to those Indians, of all religious beliefs, who are working
to address the wrongs that have been committed, and to encourage the
moderates and those who believe in a just, secular, multicultural
India.

I would also urge the American ambassador in New Delhi to demonstrate
his nation's true sentiments by means of a high-visibility action
that would underscore America's sympathy for the victims of the
Gujarat pogrom.

This might take the form of a visit to one of the Muslim refugee
camps that have sprung up to house the thousands who have fled their
homes.

Or an inspection tour of one of the Muslim neighborhoods destroyed in
the violence.

Ambassador Blackwill should demonstrate our concern for the Hindu
victims of intolerance as well.

But since the vast majority of the Gujarat victims have been Muslim,
it is especially important that America's senior diplomat in India be
seen as demonstrating a particular concern about the fate and future
of this community.

An internal Indian affair?

There are those in India, of course, who say that the tragic events
in Gujarat are a domestic Indian affair, and that the United States
and the rest of the world have no business intruding into a purely
internal Indian matter.

This is an erroneous and self-serving falsehood.

We have already seen that the war against terrorism can be directly
impacted by what we say - and fail to say - about Gujarat.

In addition, the violence in Gujarat, and the steps the Indian
government might take in coming months in response to these events,
will have a significant impact on American views of India, and hence,
on political and public support in this country for a close and
collaborative U.S. - India partnership.

So rather than being merely a domestic Indian matter, Gujarat impacts
directly and in multiple ways on important American interests and
objectives.

But beyond this, India is a signatory to various international human
rights covenants, including the International Convention on the
Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination, the International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and the International
Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights.

These are international accords into which India has voluntarily
entered - and in so doing, acknowledging that matters falling under
the compass of these accords are properly subjects of concern of the
international community.

We should be under no compulsion to accept the view that recent
events in Gujarat are a strictly domestic Indian affair, and
therefore off limits to international scrutiny, any more than we
accept similar arguments from China, Serbia, or Sudan.

A sectarian versus a secular India

The United States also has a keen interest in seeing India strengthen
and further institutionalize the forces of secularism, toleration,
and moderation within that country.

Here again, it is incorrect to say that we have no interest in the
events of Gujarat.

To the contrary, all who admire Indian culture and Indian
accomplishments, who celebrate the extraordinary progress India has
achieved in its still brief national existence, understand that the
tragedy of Gujarat strikes at the very essence of India's being,
India's promise.

In this respect, I would draw the attention of the members of this
Commission to the recent assassination in Kashmir of Abdul Ghani
Lone, a Kashmiri nationalist who opposed India's iron-fisted rule in
Kashmir, but who in his final years had come to the realization that
violence and extremism offer Kashmiris no way out in their struggle
with New Delhi.

Lone's death last month represented another blow to the ideals of
tolerance and moderation, another triumph for the forces of hatred
and sectarian-based violence.

In this sense, the tragedies of Gujarat and of Kashmir are
inextricably linked. Kashmir was certainly not the cause of Gujarat.
Sadly, the seeds of Godhra and Ahmedabad and Baroda spring from still
more ancient soils.

But the continued violence in Kashmir makes the hatred we have
recently seen in Gujarat more likely, and in a perverted sense, more
"respectable," or at least acceptable.

Perhaps it does not go too far to assert that until the Kashmir sore
is at last healed, the poison that produced Gujarat will make other
Gujarats increasingly likely.

Impact on U.S. - India relations

Some have asked what impact the recent events in Gujarat will have -
should have - on the new and healthier relationship that the United
States is developing with India.

Commission members will not need to be reminded of the tortured
history of U.S. - India relations over the years, or the difficulty
the two nations have had in working collaboratively with one another,
even on those issues where our purposes and interests ran along
parallel tracks.

Over the past half dozen or so years - and notwithstanding the
temporary if traumatic jolt to the relationship administered by
India's 1998 nuclear weapons tests and the subsequent imposition of
American sanctions - Washington and New Delhi have begun to construct
a qualitatively better relationship - so much so that Prime Minister
Vajpayee has come to describe the two countries as "natural allies" -
a phrase increasingly used by Americans as well.

Following the trauma Americans experienced on September 11, India was
one of the first countries in the world to step forward with a pledge
of unconditional and unambivalent support for the United States in
its quest to bring to justice those responsible for the terror
attacks in New York and Washington.

Prior to the February 27 Godhra attack that touched off the bloodshed
in Gujarat, this new and more sanguine relationship between the
United States and India was widely viewed as in the American national
interest.

It remains so today, despite the killings in Gujarat.

This is not an issue that divides Republicans from Democrats,
conservatives from liberals.

There now exists in this country a widespread consensus that India is
too important a country, and possesses too much potential, for the
United States to treat it with the disdain or indifference that, in
the past, was frequently our custom.

Gujarat has not changed this calculation.

And yet, it is neither possible nor practical for us simply to move
forward and pretend that Gujarat did not happen.

I recently had the opportunity to spend some time with a senior
member of the Indian government, who is also a leading member of the
BJP. I must tell you that although I was hardly naive about the BJP
and its more intransigent wing, I left this meeting shaken by what I
had heard during his remarks on the communal violence in Gujarat.

Until prodded to do so, after spending 10 or 15 minutes on the
subject, this senior Indian official expressed no remorse over the
violence, nor any recognition that a great human tragedy had taken
place.

At no time did he acknowledge that the overwhelming majority of the
Gujarat victims had come from the minority, and presumably more
vulnerable, community.

Nor did he acknowledge that credible reports and respected sources
have raised serious issues regarding possible negligence or even
complicity in these events by BJP officials at the Center and
especially the state level.

He made no attempt to deal with the suggestion that the BJP and its
affiliated organizations bear some responsibility for these events by
encouraging intolerance and religious bigotry.

Instead, he tried to shift responsibility for the tragedy to others -
especially the media but also cross-border "jihadis" and even the
minority community itself - while dismissing any thought that those
in positions of power might also be called accountable.

Lastly, I was appalled when this official described questions
regarding a possible role of the BJP government in these events as
"blasphemous."

In short, he could not have been more effective in raising doubts
about the similarity of American and Indian values - a frequent
argument offered by those lauding the "democratic values" linking the
two countries - had he deliberately set out to do so.

Do not get me wrong here: I applaud the new, more mature relationship
we have established with India in recent years. I believe in the
desirability, nay, the importance, of a close and collaborative
Indo-American partnership. I agree with those who underscore the
complementarity of both interests and values that increasingly bind
the United States and India.

Nonetheless, I do not think we can simply write off as immaterial or
irrelevant the views expressed by my interlocutor.

* First, because he is a senior official in the government.
* Second, because his opinions apparently reflect a
considerable body of sentiment in both official and nonofficial
circles in India.
* And third, because while at the moment Prime Minister
Vajpayee presents a more reassuring face for the current government,
we have to recognize that Vajpayee's tenure in office is subject to
the vagaries of domestic politics, ill health, and advancing years.
The less benign face of the BJP represented by the official with whom
I spoke could well be the predominant strand of the BJP, and of the
Indian government, in the years ahead.


We ought to take note of that possibility, and to regard it as an
issue of concern and a factor that would almost surely greatly
complicate the U.S. - India relationship.

American humility

Finally, I would suggest that as we contemplate the spectacle of
wholesale, horrendous, barbaric butchery in Gujarat, we not lose
sight of our own national shortcomings.

I feel certain that members of this Commission will agree with me
when I note that America has much about which it can take great
pride, but that we are far from resolving all the ills that infect
our own society.

It is entirely appropriate that we expect the people and the
government of India to face up to the tragedy of Gujarat, and to take
all necessary measures both to help the victims of the violence begin
to refashion their lives, and to do everything humanly possible to
prevent a reoccurrence of such a national tragedy.

India should do these things, and take these steps, not because the
United States asks or expects her to do so, but because she owes this
to herself.

But as we make known our views on these issues, it is also
appropriate that we do so with humility and a keen awareness of our
own imperfections.

Recommendations

I conclude this testimony with a number of specific recommendations for action.

1. This Commission should call upon the government of India to
take decisive steps to stop the killings and other communal violence
that continue to this day. As tragic as the violence up to now has
been, even more tragic is the fact that murder and bloodshed
continue. The United States and this Commission should make clear
their belief that Indian authorities must act immediately to bring
further violence to an end.
2. The United States and concerned Americans should work with
the central and state governments of India, with international
agencies, and with Indian, American, and other non-governmental
organizations to provide relief for the victims of the bloodletting
in Gujarat, and to help them begin the process of rebuilding their
lives. This is a matter of some urgency. Conditions in many of the
refugee camps housing those who have fled the violence are grim.
Worse is to come, as the monsoon season is approaching, and with the
rains, the inevitable epidemics. The Indian government has been
strangely slow in dealing with the issues of resettlement and
compensation for the victims of the violence. We should let New Delhi
know that this is an issue of considerable importance to the United
States, and that we will be monitoring progress in these areas
closely.
3. Senior U.S. officials in India, including the American
ambassador, should undertake high-visibility actions to demonstrate
America's sympathy for the victims of the Gujarat carnage.
Appropriate actions might include a visit to a Muslim refugee camp,
or to one of the Muslim neighborhoods destroyed in the violence.
4. The United States and this Commission should encourage the
government of India to use the full resources of the United Nations
Development Programme and other U.N. relief agencies to provide
humanitarian assistance for those now living in refugee camps. For
India to request and facilitate outside assistance would not
constitute an admission of weakness or culpability. To the contrary,
such action would underscore the government's commitment to assisting
the victims and its abhorrence of sectarian violence.
5. The United States should encourage the government of India to
bring to justice those, of all religious persuasions, who bear a
responsibility for this tragedy. Sadly, India has a long history of
failing to punish those who have fomented sectarian or communal
violence. Until the Indian judicial system redresses this failure,
Indians can expect to see reoccurrences of the Gujarat pogrom.
6. The United States and private groups should work to
strengthen those individuals and organizations within India that are
trying to promote tolerance and communal harmony. The Indian National
Human Rights Commission has made many very constructive
recommendations along these lines. We should indicate our support for
these recommendations, and our expectation that the Indian government
will make a good faith effort to implement them.
7. Those Americans who are publicly identified as friends of
India, including and perhaps especially members of the U.S. Congress,
should take the lead in condemning the violence in Gujarat, and in
urging the government of India to take all necessary steps to punish
those responsible for these crimes, to assist the victims, and to
ensure that a repetition of this tragedy not occur.
8. The two houses of Congress might adopt resolutions expressing
concern and dismay over recent events in Gujarat. Such resolutions
might simultaneously voice support for the bilateral U.S. - India
relationship, note that communal violence undercuts public and
political support within the United States for close Indo-American
relations, and applaud the government of India for any constructive
steps it might have taken to assist the victims of the violence, to
bring to justice those responsible for this tragedy, and to promote
communal harmony.
9. Credible reports suggest that substantial sums of money are
sent from Indians resident in the United States, and from American
citizens of Indian origin, to groups and organizations in Gujarat and
elsewhere in India that are directly linked to the violence in
Gujarat. If these reports prove to be accurate, then it is possible
that such financial transactions violate U.S. anti-terrorism or other
statutes. The Commission should urge an official inquiry into
financial transactions of this nature, to ensure that U.S. laws are
not being violated.
10. The Commission should also recommend an inquiry into
fund-raising activities in the United States by groups implicated in
the Gujarat violence. Responsible sources report that some U.S.
residents make financial contributions to overseas religious groups
in the belief that these funds are to be used for religious or
humanitarian purposes, when in fact the monies so raised are used to
promote religious bigotry. [See Wall Street Journal, May 22, 2002, p.
A26, for one such report.] The United States has acted in the past to
regulate or even to ban fund-raising activities by groups advocating
violence and ethnic or religious intolerance in other countries, as
well as activities where fraud may be an issue. It is possible that
such issues come into play here as well.

I thank the members of the Commission for their invitation to testify
this morning. I stand ready to take any questions they may care to
pose now, and to work with them and members of the Commission staff
on these issues in the days ahead.
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Robert M. Hathaway is director of the Asia Program at the Woodrow
Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C. He
appears before the Commission today not as a representative of the
Wilson Center, but in his private capacity as a longtime observer of
India and of U.S.-India relations.