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The Milli Gazette, May 16-31, 2002
Bajrang Dal activists on Sabarmati
Express beat up Muslims, forcing them to shout Jai Shri Ram
slogans
Bhelsar (Faizabad), 24 February: Bajrang Dal workers armed with
trishuls (tridents), travelling to Ayodhya on board the Sabarmati
Express this morning, let loose a reign of terror upon dozens of
helpless Muslim passengers, burqa-clad women and innocent
children. They also targeted the people waiting at the platform,
forcing them to shout slogans of Jai Shri Ram. A few even
declared themselves to be Hindus in order to escape their wrath.
According to eyewitnesses, close to 2000 trishul carrying Bajrang
Dal workers, on board the Sabarmati Express coming from the
direction of Lucknow, began indulging in these activities from
the Daryabad Station. Any one identified as a Muslim, on the
train, was mercilessly attacked with trishuls and beaten with
iron rods. Even women and innocent children were not spared.
Burqas were pulled off, women were beaten with iron rods and were
dragged, people waiting at the platform were also similarly
targeted.
This continued between the Daryabad and Rudauli Stations.
According to an eyewitness, a youth who protested against this
barbarism was thrown off the train between the Patranga and
Rojagaon Stations. Several women, badly wounded and covered in
blood, jumped off the train as it pulled into Rudauli around 8
a.m. The Bajrang Dal activists also got off the train and started
attacking those whom they identified as Muslims from among those
present at the platform.
Ata Mohammed from Takia Khairanpur waiting to catch a train to
Allahabad was badly beaten, some others were forced to shout Jai
Shri Ram some escaped by declaring that they were Hindus.
50-year-old Mohd. Absar lives near the station. He was grabbed as
he stepped out of his house, his long beard was rudely pulled
before he was repeatedly stabbed with trishuls. Another man from
the Rudauli Police Station area who happened to be at the station
was badly beaten with iron rods. Local residents rang up the
police.
By the time the Bhelsar Police station chief, arrived at the
station the train had left and the injured were being rushed to
the hospitals. No report was registered at the Police station
since the officer-in-charge was unavailable. The injured have no
idea why they were attacked.
Rumours are rife. The people are petrified; respected Hindus and
Muslims of the area have condemned the shameful attack, Muslims
religious leaders have appealed for peace and requested that
there be no retaliation.
- Our Correspondent
The Milli Gazette, May 16-31, 2002
'Gujarat officials took part
in anti-Muslim violence': US rights report
New Delhi: United States top rights organisation, Human Rights
Watch (HRW), has concluded in an exhaustive report that
government officials of the Indian state of Gujarat are directly
involved in the killings of hundreds of Muslims since February 27
and are now engineering a massive cover-up of the state's role in
the violence. HRW has asked international community to put
pressure on the Indian government to end violence against
minorities.
Entitled "'We have no orders to save you': state
participation and complicity in communal violence in
Gujarat", the 75-page report blames the extremist Hindu
umbrella organisation, the RSS and its affiliates for engineering
the anti-Muslim pogroms in Gujarat.
Saying that police personnel in Gujarat were directly involved in
the killings of hundreds of Muslims, the New York-based HRW
organisation has urged the international community to put
pressure on the Indian government to end "orchestrated
violence against Indian minorities."
The police have been directly implicated in nearly all the
attacks against Muslims that are documented in the report.
"At best they were passive observers, and they acted in
concert with murderous mobs and participated directly in the
burning and looting of Muslim shops and homes and the killing and
mutilation of Muslims," it said.
According to the report, several witnesses reported being told by
the police, "we have no orders to save you." Phone
calls made to the police, fire brigades, and even ambulance
services generally proved futile. "Many of the attacks on
Muslim homes and places of business also took place in proximity
of police posts," the report said.
"Muslim girls and women were brutally raped. Mass graves
have been dug throughout the state. Gravediggers told Human
Rights Watch that bodies keep arriving, burnt and mutilated
beyond recognition," the report underlines.
HRW report names the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (World Hindu Council),
the Bajrang Dal, the RSS and the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party,
collectively known as the "Sangh Parivar" [RSS Family],
as the "groups most directly involved in the violence
against Muslims." The report also said that the Gujarat
state administration had been engaged in a massive cover-up of
the state's role in the massacres and that of the Sangh Parivar.
Though officially more than 850 people have been killed,
unofficial estimates have put the death toll as high as 2,000,
the report states. Calling it a "retaliatory killing
spree" after a Muslim mob in Godhra attacked and set fire to
two carriages of a train carrying Hindu activists, killing 58,
the report says, this incident led to the looting and burning of
Muslim homes, businesses, and places of worship.
Between February 28 and March 2, thousands of attackers descended
on Muslim neighbourhoods, clad in saffron scarves and khaki
shorts, the signature uniform of Hindu ultranationalist groups,
and armed with swords, sophisticated explosives and gas
cylinders. They were guided by voter-lists and printouts of
addresses of Muslim-owned properties obtained from the local
municipality. In the weeks following the attacks, Hindu homes and
businesses were also destroyed in retaliatory attacks by Muslims,
according to the report.
In holding the RSS Family culpable, the HRW said that numerous
police reports filed by eyewitnesses after the attacks had
specifically named local VHP, BJP, and Bajrang Dal leaders as
instigators or participants in the violence. But the police,
reportedly under instructions from the state, face continuous
pressure not to arrest them or to reduce the severity of the
charges filed against them.
In a stinging indictment of the state machinery, HRW also said
that, in many instances, police officials led the charge of
murderous mobs, "aiming and firing at Muslims who got in the
way." In some cases, they were merely passive observers
while in others, under the guise of offering assistance, police
officers led the victims directly into the hands of their
killers, the report said.
"What happened in Gujarat was not a spontaneous uprising, it
was a carefully orchestrated attack against Muslims," Smita
Narula, senior South Asia researcher for Human Rights Watch who
authored the report after visiting the state told The Times of
India. "The attacks were planned in advance and organised
with extensive participation of the police and state government
officials," she added.
The report provides testimony on retaliatory attacks against
Hindus, with Hindu homes and businesses being destroyed by
Muslims. But it mostly documents excesses by lumpen mobs of Hindu
militants and notes that while burnt Muslim shops and restaurants
dot the main roads and highways in Ahmedabad, neighbourhood Hindu
establishments were notably unscathed.
Describing the state of affairs in Gujarat as "a crisis of
impunity," the report says that unless those responsible for
the violence are prosecuted, violence may spread to other parts
of India.
The report said that assistance from international humanitarian
and UN agencies was urgently needed for the victims in relief
camps. It urged the Indian government to actively seek the
assistance of international agencies and to invite UN human
rights experts to investigate state and police participation in
the violence.
'We have no orders to save you': state participation and
complicity in communal violence in Gujarat" is available
online at: http://hrw.org/reports/2002/india/
The Milli Gazette, May 16-31, 2002
Vajpayee is as much sanghi as
Sudarshan and Advani
By S Ubaidur Rahman
Around two years ago Govindacharya, an RSS ideologue had let slip
a truth that no one was ready to believe. He had termed Atal
Behari Vajpayee “the liberal mukhota (mask) of the
BJP”, to hide the hard core Hindutva agenda. And went on to
say that it is donned every time the BJP wished to distance
itself from the fascist excesses of its sister organizations like
the VHP and Bajrang Dal. People were stunned with disbelief. No
one was ready to imbibe the allegation that this suave, liberal,
and emotional man was a mere mukhota and was a hard core fanatic
like all others in the RSS and its subsidiaries. Later in order
to avoid embarrassment, Govindacharya was banished from active
politics and sent into political exile by his party bosses.
People have always taken Vajpayee as soft-spoken liberal in the
midst of hordes of fanatics in the BJP and have always tried to
defend his integrity and belief in secular ethos of the nation.
He has repeatedly been called the right man in the wrong party.
There are people who claim that they have seen Vajpayee always
rising above the BJP's hardcore Hindutva line. People repeatedly
and endlessly cite examples to convince themselves and others
that this man is cut above the rest.
When he installed Bangaru Laxman, a non-RSS Dalit as the party
head and who went on to appeal to Muslims that they trust his
party, Vajpayee looked like a man who wanted to dismantle the
communal inclination of the BJP. The same was the feeling when he
drove to Lahore to meet Nawaz Sharif, former Pakistan Prime
Minister and showed his eagerness towards establishing permanent
peace. But his latest outburst in the thick of the Gujarat
carnage has shattered the so called liberal image of Vajpayee.
Vajpayee's diatribe against Muslims and Islam in the thick of the
Gujarat pogrom not only unveiled a new face of barbarism and
antipathy towards fellow citizens of the country but also his
true psychological leanings. Liberals who most often described
him as a humane face of the BJP were shattered. They had never
thought that he might be sectarian and prejudiced against Islam
and wary of Muslims' existence in the country. This language was
never expected of a man who used to receive widespread respect
even from opposition parties. It was incredulous for most of the
people and everyone tried to get hold of the text of his speech
in Goa. And everyone was terrified by the message given by the
prime minister of the country.
The prime minister tried to reason the continuing massacre of
Muslims in Gujarat where thousands of people have been
slaughtered like anything. It was the undoing of his stature as
prime minister of the country. He presented the same argument
forwarded by the Gujarat chief minister ‘Gujarat mein kya
hua? Agar Sabarmati na hota to jo hua woh nahi hota (What
happened in Gujarat? If the attack on Sabarmati had not happened,
then what happened later [communal violence] would not have
happened). He persisted with the similar argument and directly
accused Muslims for what is happening in Gujarat. He asked in the
same breath, Lekin aag lagai kisne (But who started the fire?).
It is the same theory that the Gujarat chief minister Narendr
Modi who is directly involved in Muslims’ massacre in the
state has been advocating. Modi has all along been maintaining
that the Muslims’ genocide in Gujarat is directly a revenge
of what happened in Godhra.
He was out of way communal when he accused Muslims of spoiling
every society wherever they live. ‘Jahan Jahan Musalman hain
ghul milkar nahi rahte hain (wherever Muslims are they don’t
want to live in peace), he said and in the same breath added,
‘Auron se ghulna milna nahi chahte. Shantipurn tarike se
parchar karne ke bajaye atankwad se dara dhamka kar apne mat ka
parchar karna chahte hain (They don’t want to mix with
others. Instead they want to preach and propagate their religion
by creating fear and terror in the minds of others). He spoke
like a fascist when he went on to say 'we have allowed them
(Christians and Muslims) to do their prayers and follow their
religion'.
Of course Prime Minister claims he was misrepresented. But he has
said that so often that very few people now believe these
clarifications. No prime minister in the country has eaten his
words so often. Vajpayee seems to have become habitual of
clarifying every statement made by him within or after 48 hours.
Prime minister's diatribe against Muslims was nothing new. With
periodical silence he has been exploding like this since the
beginning of his political career. He has also tried to clarify
his statements several times. Earlier during Bill Clinton’s
presidential period when Vajpayee visited the US he made an
outrageous remark when he said that, ‘he is savyamsevak
first and then Prime Minister and that whether he remains Prime
Minister or not he will remain a savyamsevak.’ Members of
the fascist Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the parent party of the
BJP are called savyamsevaks. Later Bajpayee said that he intended
by using savyamsevak to project him as the servant of the nation.
What he said in Varanasi is still afresh in our memories. He had
said while addressing a political rally there that we do not need
Muslims' votes.
But Vajpayee has always taken pride in his more than fifty years
long association with the RSS. An article written by Vajpayee
himself that appeared in the RSS mouthpiece Organiser in its May
1995 issue and hastily retracted throws ample light as to what he
believes. The piece threw light on his long standing association
with the RSS and his self pride in being associated with the RSS.
Eulogizing the RSS he wrote, 'The RSS does not change only
individuals. It changes also the collective mind. This is the
beauty of the RSS ethos. In our spiritual tradition an individual
can attain a great height. Even self realization is possible if
one undertakes the right sadhana and also attains nirvana. But
what about society? Nobody thinks about his obligation to the
society in general. Now for the first time the RSS thought about
it and concluded that by changing individual we shall change the
society.'
He then emphasizes the RSS ideology, ' the RSS has a two-fold
task before it. One is to organize the Hindus. To build a strong
Hindu society, well knit and rising above caste and other
artificial differences. Some differences will persist but then
variety is the spice of life. Like we have the differences of the
language. We don't want to destroy this diversity.'
Then he showed as to what he and his Sangh will do with the
minorities. 'The other task is to assimilate the non-Hindus, like
Muslims and Christians in the mainstream. They can follow the
faith of their own conviction. No one can object to it. We
worship trees, animals, stones and what not. We have hundreds of
ways to worship God. They can go where they want.'
He went all out after Muslims and Islam saying, 'but this country
must be looked upon as the motherland of them. They must have a
feeling of patriotism for this country. But the Islamic division
of the world into Darul Harb and Darul Islam comes in the way.
Islam has yet to learn the art of existing and flourishing in a
country where Muslims are in a minority. They cannot convert
whole of India to Islam. After all they have to live here. So
they have to recognize this fact. And today it has become a
matter of grave concern and deep thinking in the Muslim
countries. Because the Qur'an offers no guidance in this regard.
It only talks of killing kafirs or converting them to Islam. But
they cannot do it always and everywhere.'
Vajpayee then brings out his solution to assimilate them in
Hinduism. 'The Muslims of this country can be treated in three
ways. One is tiraskar which means if they will not themselves
change leave them alone, reject them as our compatriots. Second
is puraskar, which is appeasement i.e., bring them to behave
which is being done by the Congress and others of their ilk. The
third way is parishkar meaning to change them, that is, restore
them to the mainstream by providing them samskar' he added.
Vajpayee the so-called soft spoken face among the hard-line ultra
rightist thugs then goes on to explain. 'We want to change them
by offering the right samskaras. Their religion will not be
changed. They can follow their own religion. Mecca can continue
to be holy for them. You can go to a mosque and offer namaz, you
can keep the roza. We have no problem. But if you have to choose
between Mecca of Islam and India you must choose India. All the
Muslims must have this feeling: we will live and die for this
country' Vajpayee explained.
It is not one of the exceptions. He has always shown his leanings
towards the Sangh's rightist, anti-minorities and anti-Muslim
rhetoric. While participating in a discussion in the Parliament
on 14 May 1970 Vajpayee then a Jana Sangh MP squarely blamed
Muslims for every riot and communal tension.
In fact what he said on that occasion is strikingly similar to
what he said in Goa. Vajpayee said, 'The question is why are
riots started? I call upon this house to think about this. I have
not reached any conclusion. Some Muslims start the riot-knowing
they may lose life and property. One reason could be that our
Muslim brethren have concluded that now there is no place for
them to live in India, no guardian for them, so it is better to
die fighting than to live. Another reason may be that some
Muslims are connected with Pakistan...The third and most
important reason seems to be that some Muslim leaders do not want
Muslims to merge with the national mainstream.'
He accused the Muslims to be communal saying, 'Whatever the
reason our Muslim brethren are getting more and more communal and
as a reaction Hindus are getting more and more aggressive. Nobody
made the Hindus aggressive. If you want to give the credit for
this to us we are willing to take it. But Hindus will no more
take a beating in this country. Hindus will not start, Hindus
will not initiate. If you promote Muslim communalism, the other
feeling will run high.' He added, 'I agree the feeling of revenge
is not good. We cannot allow any individual to take the law in
his hands. But will this rule apply only to Hindus? Will it not
apply to Muslims?'
Atal Bihari Vajpayee's anti-Muslim rhetoric of past and present
are all based on what Golwalkar advocated. Golwalkar articulated
his attitude in the following words, 'the non-Hindu people in
Hindustan must either adopt the Hindus culture and language, must
learn to respect and revere Hindu religion. Must...give up their
attitude of intolerance and ingratitude towards this land...or
may stay in the country wholly subordinated to the Hindu nation
claiming nothing, deserving no privilege, far less any
preferential treatment, not even citizens' rights'. Vajpayee is a
true shishya (disciple)of Golwalkar.
Vajpayee has been rebuking Muslims for their alleged lack of
patriotism. He himself has rarely gone above the petty politics
of Hindutva. He has been claiming that he participated in the
freedom struggle, but there are instances that show that instead
of participating in the freedom struggle he ditched the people
who were fighting for the freedom.
Leeladhar Bajpai, a freedom fighter who was jailed for five years
because of a confession made to the British police by Prime
Minister AB Vajpayee in 1942. Mr Leeladhar Bajpai three years ago
accused prime minister that he had betrayed the freedom movement
and therefore had no right to describe himself as a patriot and
freedom fighter. Though the issue has been raised several times
in the past but Leeladhar Bajpai was the first affected person to
open up.
For everybody who believed that the mask only got off recently in
Goa it will be terrible to come to terms with the reality.
Reality is that Vajpayee is as much hard-core Sanghi as
Sudarshan, Advani or Ashok Singhal. He wore a mask which has
finally slipped.
The Milli Gazette, May 16-31, 2002
Sangh is my soul
By Atal Bihari Vajpayee
The BJP’s prime minister, AB Vajpayee, disclaims this
article, published under his name in the RSS mouthpiece,
Organiser, in May 1995 and recently posted on but hastily
withdrawn from cyberspace.
I came in contact with the RSS in 1939 through Arya Kumar Sabha,
a youth branch of Arya Samaj, in Gwalior - then a princely state,
which was not part of any province. I came from a strong sanatani
family. But I used to be at the weekly satsang of Arya Kumar
Sabha.
Once Shri Bhoodev Shastri, who was a senior worker of Arya Kumar
Sabha, and a great thinker and an expert organiser, asked us:
'What do you do in the evenings?’ ‘Nothing', we said,
because the Arya Kumar Sabha used to meet in the morning on every
Sunday. Then he recommended us to go to the shakha. Thus I
started going to the shakha in Gwalior. It was my first
association with the RSS. At that time the shakha in Gwalior had
just begun. It had only 'Maharashtrian’ boys and naturally
all the swayamsevaks used to speak only Marathi. I started going
to the shakha regularly. I liked the games played in the shakha
as well as the weekly bauddhiks (intellectual discourses).
A pracharak, Shri Narayanrao Tarte had come from Nagpur to start
the shakha. He was indeed a superb human being; a very simple
man, a thinker and an expert organiser. What I am today is the
making of Shri Tarte. Next to him I was inspired by Deendayal
Upadhyaya and Bhaurao Deoras. Gwalior was then not within the
field of Bhauraoji. But once he had come to Gwalior with Shri
Balasaheb Apte who was the then Bauddhik Pramukh.
Apteji was very soft-spoken. We were soon drawn towards him. I
had talked with him for only a few minutes. But the same year
(1940), when I went to see the first year Officers’ Training
Camp (OTC), I came in close contact with him. I went there just
to attend the valedictory function of the camp not for training.
Dr Hedgewar had also come there for some time. I first saw him
there. When Doctorji was ill I went to see him. In 1941, when I
was in high school, I did my first year OTC. In 1942, when I, was
in intermediate class, I did my second year OTC, and I did my
third year in 1944 when I was doing my BA.
When I wrote “Hindu Tanman, Hindu Jeevan” I was a
student of class X. After completing my graduation from Gwalior I
did my MA from the DAV College in Kanpur, because there was no
postgraduate college in Gwalior. I then got state
government’s scholarship also. Owing to Partition, I could
not complete my law [studies]. And then in 1947, I decided to
give up my studies to come out as a whole-time worker of the RSS.
Till 1947 I did the RSS work at the shakha level and carried on
my studies.
I also participated in the Quit India Movement 1942 and was
jailed. I was then studying for my intermediate examination. I
was arrested from my native village Bhateshwar, in Agra district.
I was then 16.
My father was not attached to the RSS, but my elder brother was.
He would go to the shakha. Once he went to the winter camp where
he created a problem. He said: ‘I cannot take my food with
the other swayamsevaks. I shall prepare my food myself.’ And
see how deftly the RSS handled the situation. The sarvadhikad
(superintendent) of the camp complied with his request and
provided him all the necessary thing for preparing his food.
After taking his bath and properly adjusting his sacred thread
etc., he started cooking his food. On the first day he prepared
the food for himself. The next day, however, he could not prepare
it and joined the queue of all swayamsevaks for partaking of the
food. Within 44 hours he was changed.
The RSS does not change only individuals. It changes also the
collective mind. This is the beauty of the RSS ethos. In our
spiritual tradition an individual can attain a great height. Even
self-realisation is possible if one undertakes the right sadhana
and also attains nirvana. But what about society? Nobody thinks
about his obligation to the society in general. Now for the first
time the RSS thought about it and concluded that by changing
individuals we shall change the society. Had the sarvadhikari at
the camp scolded him and not allowed him to prepare his food
himself his spiritual development would have been thwarted,
whereas in the RSS within 44 hours he was a changed boy. This is
the ‘secret method’ of the RSS. That is how society is
changed. It is true that it is a long process but then there are
no short cuts, no instant recipes.
Gandhiji had praised the RSS for the absence of untouchability in
the organisation. Only the RSS organises the society. Other
movements only divide the society by emphasising distinct
‘identity’, different ‘interests’, special
‘status’, etc. They only encourage untouchability by
constantly reminding the so-called untouchables of their
‘separateness.’ ‘You are being insulted. You have
no place in society.’
The RSS has a two-fold task before it. One is to organise the
Hindus. To build a strong Hindu society, well-knit and rising
above caste and other artificial differences. Some differences
will persist but then variety is the spice of life. Like we have
the differences of the language. We don’t want to destroy
this diversity. The other task is to assimilate the non-Hindus,
like Muslims and Christians, in the mainstream. They can follow
the faith of their own conviction. No one can object to it. We
worship trees, animals, stones, and what not. We have hundreds of
ways of worshipping God. They can go where they want.
But this country must be looked upon as the Motherland for them.
They must have a feeling of patriotism for this country. But the
Islamic division of the world into Darul Harb and Darul Islam
comes in the way. Islam has yet to learn the art of existing and
flourishing in a country where Muslims are in a minority. They
cannot convert the whole of India to Islam. After all, they have
to live here. So they have to recognise this fact. And today it
has become a matter of grave concern and deep thinking in the
Muslim countries. Because the Qur’an offers no guidance in
this regard. It only talks of killing kafirs or converting them
to Islam. But they cannot do it always and everywhere.
How can they do it where they are in a minority? If they try to
do it, a major clash will take place and only the members of the
minority will be killed. But Muslims themselves have to change
this state of affairs. We cannot change it for them.
Congress has not correctly understood the Muslim problem. They
continue to carry on their policy of appeasement. But to what
effect? The Muslims of this country can be treated in three ways.
One is tiraskar which means if they will not themselves change
leave them alone, reject them as our compatriots. Second is
puraskar, which is appeasement, i.e., bribing them to behave,
which is being done by the Congress and others of their ilk. The
third way is parishkar meaning to change them, that is, restore
them to the mainstream by providing them samskaras.
We want to change them by offering them the right samskaras.
Their religion will not be changed. They can follow their own
religion. Mecca can continue to be holy for the Muslims but India
should be holier than the holy for them. You can go to a mosque
and offer namaz, you can keep roza. We have no problem. But if
you have to choose between Mecca or Islam and India you must
choose India. All the Muslims should have this feeling: we will
live and die only for this country.
I wrote “Hindu Tan-man, Hindu Jeevan” when I was
studying in the tenth class. I had then said, 'Koi batlaye Kabul
mein jaakar kitni masjiden todin.' I still stand by my words. But
we (Hindus) did pull down the structure in Ayodhya. In fact it
was a reaction to the Muslim vote-bank. We wanted to solve this
problem through negotiation and legislation. But there was no
puraskar for burai (evil act). We change burai also with
parishkar. Now, I think, the Hindu society has been regenerated
which was the prime task of the RSS. Earlier Hindus used to bend
before an invasion but not now. This change in Hindu society is
worthy of welcome. So much change must have come with the
new-found self-assertion.
This is a question of self-preservation. If the Hindu society
does not expand itself it will face the crisis of survival. We
have to expand ourselves. We have to take others along with us.
Now the Yadavs and the so-called Harijans are coming with us.
After all we have to live as Hindus.
Once a Yadav leader came to me and said: 'Don’t condemn all
Yadavs. All Yadavs are not with Mulayam Singh and Laloo Prasad. A
sanskrit (cultured) Yadav does not like them. There can be
sections of Rajput, Kurmi and Gujar Muslims but you cannot find
any Yadav Muslim anywhere. The Yadavs never accepted Islam. This
talk of "Yadav-Muslim" Unity- MY card - is nothing more
than an empty slogan for votes.'
The simple reason for my long association with the RSS is that I
like the Sangh. I like its ideology, and above all I like the RSS
attitude towards people, towards one another which is found only
in the RSS. I remember an incident, when I was in Lucknow. The
socialist movement was at its peak. Suddenly a senior socialist
activist fell ill. He was lying alone in his house, and nobody
went to enquire after his well-being. Then Acharya Narendra Deo
came to know and he went to his house to see him. The Acharya
then said, 'What fraternity is this in the Socialist Party?
Nobody has come to see you. It can never happen in the RSS. If a
swayamsevak does not go to the shakha only for one day the same
day friends will promptly reach his house to enquire about his
well-being.’
When I was ill during the Emergency, my family members did not
turn up to see me. They were afraid of being arrested for any
such action. Only the RSS workers helped me. See, how much living
contact and fraternal feeling is in the RSS. Actually the Sangh
is our family. We are all one.
In the beginning we could not spread our work in all sections of
the society because we did not have enough workers. 'Man-making'
is the prime job of the RSS. As we now have more workers, we are
covering all sections of the society in all fields of life.
Changes are taking place in all spheres. But the work of
man-making will not be discontinued, it will go on. It must go
on. That is what the RSS movement is.
(Organiser, ‘RSS - Vision and Action’ Special. 7 May
1995)
The Milli Gazette, May 16-31, 2002
Death train: the mystery
simmers
The torching of the Sabarmati Express on February 27 was
itself a reaction to massive provocation from kar sevaks
returning from Ayodhya, says Teesta Setalvad, after a personal
journey of discovery to Godhra, April 27
On February 27, late by over four hours, the Ahmedabad-bound
Sabarmati Express pulled into Godhra station. After a 25-minute
halt, against the scheduled five-minute stoppage, the train
pulled out of the platform. Even before it could gather speed,
the pulling of the alarm chain brought the train to a halt near
the Muslim-inhabited Signal Falia locality, less than a kilometre
from the station. Twenty minutes later, compartment S-6 was on
fire, as a result of which 58 passengers, including 26 women and
12 children were either choked or burnt to death.
Nothing, absolutely nothing can justify the killing of innocent
people, whatever the provocation. But for Gujarat Chief Minister
Narendra Modi, and many leading lights of the Sangh Parivar, this
heinous crime became the justification for the "natural
reaction" against Muslims across the state.
Even 50 days later, it is evident that only a full-fledged
inquiry will be able to finally settle the issue of who was the
culprit and what was the motive behind the torching of a few
compartments of the Sabarmati Express. That such an inquiry must
be conducted and the guilty punished is without question.
Meanwhile, taken together, the comments of Ahmedabad's former
commissioner of police, M M Singh ("Godhra has a history of
communal riots. It was known that kar sevaks were coming by that
route. This fact necessitated preventive deployment. That was,
apparently, not done") and those of Major General (retired)
Eustace De'Souza, who on more than one occasion has been involved
in dousing the fire in communally-sensitive Godhra "I see a
fiendish plan and demand immediate attention”.
In a report published on February 25, the Jan Morcha, a Hindi
daily published from Faizabad, detailed instances of provocative
behaviour by kar sevaks, who allegedly beat and threatened Muslim
passengers, insisting that they chant 'Jai Sri Ram'. They even
unveiled Muslim women.
The Jan Morcha report published two days before the incident at
Godhra, reports the conduct of kar sevaks from Gujarat headed for
Ayodhya. But, by several accounts, the conduct of kar sevaks
returning to Ahmedabad by the ill-fated Sabarmati Express on
February 27 was no better.
The Hindu reported on February 28: "Eyewitnesses said that
about 1,200 'Ram sevaks' were travelling in the train. The local
people in the Muslim-dominated Godhra town had been 'irritated'
by the 'abusive language' used by the 'Ram sevaks' while they
were going to Ayodhya by the same train a few days ago. They had
reportedly raised slogans as the train approached Godhra on the
return journey this morning."
A report in The Times of India on February 28 stated:
"Officials said a mob, enraged by the provocative slogan
shouting by the VHP activists, attacked the train just after it
left Godhra railway station at 6.30 am…Officials said it was
possible that some passengers from Godhra travelling by the train
had been harassed along the way by the VHP activists returning
from Ayodhya and they had incited the mob to attack the
passengers after getting off the train… However, other
accounts say that the mob was waiting to pounce on the train
because they knew the VHP and Bajrang Dal activists were
returning from Ayodhya."
And, on March 7, Akbarbaig Sirajudding Shah, a Muslim passenger
who was returning to Ahmedabad with his family, in an interview
with the Gujarati daily, Gujarat Today, recounted the
misbehaviour of the kar sevaks throughout the journey.
As stated earlier, no provocation whatsoever can justify a
heinous crime like burning people to death. But the misconduct of
kar sevaks is nonetheless important to record for two reasons:
one, given such persistent hooliganism, where was the
intelligence machinery of the law enforcement authorities? Why
was no preventive measure taken by the police? Two, if the attack
on kar sevaks was pre-planned, as Chief Minister Modi and Union
Home Minister L K Advani have maintained, was the outrageous
conduct of kar sevaks a part of the pre-planning?
The former Ahmedabad CP, MM Singh's has observed: "Burning
nearly 60 passengers alive at a district headquarters railway
station is unprecedented. Godhra has a history of communal riots.
It was known that kar sevaks were coming by that route. This fact
necessitated preventive deployment. That was, apparently, not
done. With modern means of communication it should be unlikely
that the multifarious safety and security installations at Godhra
itself were not informed on the first sign of trouble. Even one
determined man in khaki firing a few effective shots could have
checked the worst, as witnessed in Parliament.
"Godhra railway station has RPF (Railway Protection Force).
Godhra has a railway police station, too. A district headquarters
with police HQ, armed police, control room, town police station
with eight chowkies, all equipped with telephones and a taluka
police station, it is the HQ of SRP Bn, too, and has a municipal
fire brigade. These are the points one has to ponder instead of a
routine probe, whose report gathers dust." (Letter to the
editor, The Times of India, March 1, 2002)
Godhra is a small town with a roughly equal population of Muslims
and Hindus and a long and bloody history of communal tension and
violence. The Muslims living at the Signal Falia area near the
railway station, who allegedly attacked the Sabarmati Express
with tragic consequences, are "Ghanchis", a largely
uneducated and poor community, reportedly conservative and prone
to react quickly. Records and accounts also say that they have
been quick to assemble and participate in earlier rounds of
communal violence. Godhra has had tensions (that were
incidentally quickly controlled by a quick deployment of the army
in 1948, in 1953-55, and again in 1985). This time, this did not
happen.
Local accounts say that stories of the behaviour of kar sevaks
(believed to be as many as 1,200 or so on board) had preceded the
train's arrival. Dahod, an-hour-and-a-half before Godhra, had
seen the eruption of tension and the news had already travelled.
As the train pulled in and stopped at Godhra railway station,
locals who live just outside the station recounted that they
heard abusive shouts and sounds of stonethrowing from the
station. Vendors near the station recounted that tea stall owners
at the station (who, incidentally, hail from the same Ghanchi
Muslim community) had an altercation with the kar sevaks who
refused to pay. One elderly vendor on the platform was threatened
by the kar sevaks and asked to shout slogans; they pulled his
beard and assaulted him when he refused.
At this point, according to some locals who spoke to this writer
on March 22, a local Muslim woman, Jaitunbibi was waiting for the
train to Vadodara, scheduled to arrive at around 8 am, with her
two young daughters, Sophiya and Shahidi. On observing the
altercations, they tried to flee the station. Suddenly, a kar
sevak obstructed their departure, grabbed Sophiya and tried to
drag her inside the compartment. He did not succeed in doing so.
(By the time this writer reached Godhra, on March 22, e-mails
were in circulation, claiming that she been dragged inside and
the attempt to rescue her was the trigger that culminated in the
torching of bogey S-6. Later, this family left for Vadodara. When
this reporter spoke to Sophiya's kin in Godhra, where she had
come with her family for Id, they confirmed that Sophiya did not
get dragged into the train.) The train was stationed at the
Godhra railway station for 20-23 minutes before it began to move
away.
By now, tempers were running high and stonepelting had begun from
both sides. As the train began to pull out, the emergency chain
was pulled in one of the three general compartments in the front
of the 16-bogey train, (bogeys S5 and S6 were 11th and 12th
respectively in this chain). The trains halted briefly. In a few
minutes, the train reached Signal Falia, about a kilometre away
from the station. Here, it was stopped again when the emergency
chain was pulled. Who pulled the chain? In which compartment was
the chain pulled?
Reports of misbehaviour, repeated provocation, the rumour of the
abduction of a young Muslim girl, allegedly incited a
2,000-strong mob of Ghanchi Muslims from Signal Falia to attack
the train with stones and firebombs. The kar sevaks also resorted
to stonethrowing. The main target of the Ghanchi mob appears to
have been coach S6, which was badly burnt. It was in this coach
that 58 passengers, including 26 women and 12 children were
killed. In comparison, the adjoining coach, S5, was not badly
damaged, with only a few windows broken.
That day, there were only3 SRP men on duty; of the 111 GRP
(Government Railway Police) officers stationed at Godhra, only
two or three were on duty; although the fire brigade station is
only five minutes away from the railway station, it took a while
for the fire brigade to reach the torched coach. Two GRP jawans
reached the spot within minutes; it is a matter of serious
conjecture why they did not fire shots to disperse the mob. The
arrival of firefighters was delayed allegedly by Bilal, a local
leader, according to one version; a second version says that he
was helping the victims.
Was the attack pre-planned? A senior police official in charge of
investigation of the Godhra incident, while requesting anonymity,
gave the gist of his findings as follows:
Chaiwallas in the train come from the same community (Ghanchis).
On the Dahod-Godhra sector, there was an altercation between the
kar sevaks and the chaiwallahs on the train. They reached Godhra.
Tea vendors at Godhra station collected, as again there was an
exchange of words about payments. The vendors from the station
got on the train and at Signal Falia they were the ones who
pulled the chain. Other Muslims collected from the basti. Many
local Muslims got into the train.
They procured diesel from the garages near the tracks. That
diesel was thrown, using cloth balls dipped in diesel. Stones
were also pelted.
Criminologically speaking, in the assessment of this officer, the
fire was not intended. It "caught more than they expected.
There was no pre-planning."
Interestingly, the following report published by The Times of
India on March 29 quotes Inspector-General of Police P P Agja as
stating that there is no evidence at all that the attack was
pre-planned:
"The case is still being investigated and if there was some
deep conspiracy, then we are yet to find it," said
Inspector-General of Police (Railways) P P Agja. Agja, who for
the better part of the last one month, has been camping at
Godhra, spoke with The Times of India standing in front of the
railway police station on the platform where trouble began.
"According to the sequence of events as found by the police,
all was not well in coach S-6 of the Ahmedabad-bound Sabarmati
Express on that day. A group of unruly Ram sevaks had boarded the
train at Lucknow without reservations (and) had put to discomfort
the 66 genuine passengers of the coach. Some of the ticket-paying
passengers had to sleep on the floor, so overcrowded had the
compartment become that the ticket collector who came aboard the
train at Ratlam (two stations before Godhra) was not allowed to
enter the coach.
"At Godhra station, the hawkers on the platform started
stoning the train after an unsavoury incident, especially
targeting coach S-6, because some occupants of the coach had
given offence. At any point of time, there are some 250 hawkers
on the station. Some of them carry stoves with kerosene in them.
All of them live in the slum called Signal Falia next to the
station," said Agja.
He added: "This means it is not surprising that a crowd
could collect at the station so fast. The people who live cheek
by jowl in the slums next in the station include a fair share of
criminals indulging in railway crimes like looting,
pick-pocketing and stealing of goods of passengers and also
railway property. All of them are Ghanchi Muslims and they are
uneducated, without any jobs and poor."
From 8.30 am, when the Godhra attack on the Sabarmati Express
took place, until 7.30 pm that evening, repeated statements by
the Godhra district collector, Jayanthi Ravi, relayed on
Doordarshan and Akashwani (radio) stated that "the incident
was not pre-planned, it was an accident". It was only after
7-7.30 pm, when Chief Minister Narendra Modi spoke and called it
a "pre-planned, violent act of terrorism", that the
official version changed.
As we have seen above, investigating officials have yet to find
any proof of the Godhra atrocity being pre-planned. Nonetheless,
Modi, L K Advani and others continue to reiterate the distorted
version of the motive behind the incident at Godhra. When and why
the government's version changed needs serious investigation
because it is widely believed that it is the "pre-planned,
violent act of terrorism" theory, pronounced by politicians
and given a huge splash by much of the Gujarati press, which
provided the lethal charge to the "backlash".
Signal Falia, where the Godhra railway station is located, is
home to auto-repair workers, rickshaw-pullers, autorickshaw
drivers, smalltime wagon-breakers and criminal elements
reportedly living in the slum. As such, the gathering of a large
mob at a short notice and the availability of improvised petrol
bombs and other weapons and implements do not by themselves
support the theory of any deep-rooted conspiracy, with or without
the support of foreign agencies.
(This reporter has been told about a confidential meeting between
the top brass of the BJP Cabinet, the VHP, the RSS and the
Bajrang Dal on the evening of February 27, allegedly to plan
details of the carnage that was to follow. If true, this might
offer some clue as to why the official version underwent a
dramatic shift.).
News of the deaths enraged the kar sevaks, who then tried to
attack a nearby mosque at Signal Falia. The police fired 30 tear
gas shells and 14 rounds of live bullets to disperse them. The
damaged coaches S5 and S6 were detached, and the train departed
with the rest of the passengers at 12.40 pm. On the way to
Ahmedabad, some kar sevaks reportedly stabbed two or three people
at the Vadodara railway station, giving a clear warning of things
to come. The inquest and post-mortem of all the recovered bodies
was undertaken by 4.30 pm. Under instructions from the
administration in Ahmedabad, all the bodies, excluding those of
the five passengers from the Godhra region, were dispatched to
the Civil Hospital at Sola, Ahmedabad.
By the evening of February 27, a well-hatched scheme to make
maximum political capital out of Godhra had been launched. As
part of this scheme, around 2.30 am, the bodies of the kar sevaks
were brought to Ahmedabad. Around 500 people were waiting outside
Sola Civil Hospital in Ahmedabad for the charred bodies to arrive
from Godhra. By 3.35 am, a convoy of five trucks led by a pilot
Gypsy entered the hospital compound.
Sloganeering started: "Kar sevak, amar raho!" and
"Hindu ekta Zindabad", as small bundles carrying the
victims' remains were offloaded on to waiting stretchers. The
mood was morose but tears were few. Anger welled in the eyes of
bereaved relatives as each bundle - the remains of the Godhra
massacre victims - was placed on ice slabs. Vows for vengeance
and shouts of "Jai Sri Ram" resounded through the
hospital compound as martyrs' honour was accorded to the Godhra
victims.
"For the nine from Amraiwadi who laid their lives for the
country, there will be 90 more to replace. We had gone there for
yagna only, yet the kafirs (Muslims) butchered the devotees. This
time we will go and construct the Ram temple," said a
waiting VHP man outside the hospital. The corpses of the
unfortunate victims of the Godhra arson were used to launch a
statewide pogrom of decimation that has not entirely stopped to
date. Gujarat and the whole country were on a red alert due to
the aggressive mobilisation by the VHP for rebuilding the Ayodhya
movement. In Mumbai, the police made as many as 8,000 preventive
arrests in the first week of March to keep the situation under
strict control; in contrast, even after Godhra happened, the
Gujarat police arrested only two persons in Ahmedabad. And both
were Muslims.
On February 27, after the Godhra tragedy, although the Rapid
Action Force (RAF) was called in, no adequate powers were given
to the forces. Although curfew was declared in Godhra, the RAF
men were made to sit in the officers' mess, helpless, unable to
do anything.
On the afternoon of February 28, while Godhra was entirely under
curfew, 200-300 cabins (shops) that line the railway station
selling their wares and belonging to Muslims were demolished
using bulldozers belonging to the Godhra municipality, all under
police protection. The economic loss of this destruction is Rs
3-4 crore. The Muslim owners of these shops see nothing but a
"teach-them-a-lesson" notice behind this act. An
investigation into the background of Godhra shows that when
disturbance erupted in 1965, the then collector promptly arrested
both Muslims and Hindus whose names appeared in FIRs; within a
couple of days, the disturbance was curbed. Even after the
October 1980 disturbances, the then collector, S K Verma, had
immediately put the miscreants behind bars.
Although all accounts suggest that there was provocation enough
by the kar sevaks, little can justify the crime that burned 58
persons alive. The guilty need to be brought to book and
punished. The tragedy and crime simply need to be placed in the
charged and venomous atmosphere that our country and out polity
has been held victim to, where sane, rational impulses are being
overwhelmed by rage, revenge and violence.
The immediate uproar that this ghastly attack led to, the
subsequent police action, and political manipulation of the
motives have caused many witnesses to simply dither from giving
evidence. The day I visited Godhra, the area around the station
and Signal Falia was eerily quiet. It was also the day the
National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) was visiting. Twice, the
vehicle we were moving around in was attacked. Curfew was imposed
and even as we were driving through the city, tense as it was,
two persons were shot in police firing.
Among those arrested for the Godhra tragedy - first, under the
Prevention of Terrorism Ordinance; later, charges under this law
were removed - are municipal councillors, Abdul Dhantiya and
Salim Shaikh. Shaikh Abdul Hamid Gaffar, who was also arrested,
is a brother of Salim Shaikh. Godhra Nagarpalika president
Mohammad Hussain Kalota and another councillor, Haji Bilal, who
have also been accused of violence, are absconding.
Some locals point out the local politics of the Godhra
municipality which, in their opinion, has also contributed to the
schisms. In April 2001, the BJP was ruling the municipality but
failed in a no-confidence motion through which a Muslim was
elected president. For the first time in its history, Muslims
dominated the Godhra municipality.
While one section of those interviewed clearly blames Bilal for
attempting to disrupt the fire department workers, another
version says that Bilal and Abdul Rehman were actually getting
ready to go for a hearing (scheduled at Gandhinagar that day) on
the disqualification case. Suddenly, they got a call from workers
of the municipality informing them that the train had caught
fire. At that state, according to the second version, Bilal
rushed there and actually helped control the angry Muslims and
assisted in putting out the fire. The persons who gave this
information said that the deputy superintendent of police of
Panchmahal district, Raju Bhargava, knows these facts about
Bilal's conduct but remains quiet because of pressure from the
government. (Communalism Combat).
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