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The times of India, March 21, 2002
5 dead, Army jawan shot at in
Ahmedabad
AHMEDABAD: Five persons were killed in renewed violence in
Ahmedabad on Thursday in the biggest eruption of violence seen in
the walled city area since the riots began three weeks back.
Two persons were killed in police firing in Kalupur, two others
in private firing while one stabbed to death in sporadic
incidents of violence in the Dariapur, Karanj and Shahpur areas.
At least 19 persons were injured and a different pattern of
violence surfaced at Kalupur, which was placed under curfew once
again, where an Army jawan was shot at in the leg from a private
weapon during the rioting.
The injured have been admitted to VS Hospital and Shardaben
Hospital. The brunt of the violence was at Relief Road and spread
to new areas stretching up to Kalupur railway station.
Almost 50 shops in Revdi Bazaar, the main wholesale cloth market
of the city, were burnt down by the mobs. Curfew was imposed in
the Kalupur after incidents of stabbings and stone throwing on
Relief Road.
Police fired at the clashing groups of people as fresh bouts of
panic gripped the eastern parts of the city once again. Rioters
damaged a shoe store in the Gheekanta area and burnt a cabin in
the Bakal ni wadi area.
Two boys were attacked in the Patwa Sheri and Gheekanta area with
pipes when riots broke out and they have been admitted to the
hospital, sources said.
Stone-throwing incidents were also reported from the Panchkuva
and Gheekanta area of Kalupur at the same time when the police
lobbed teargas shells to disperse the rioting mob. Shops downed
shutters in many of the walled city areas and around as people
ran helter-skelter.
Rumour-mongers and rioters kept the police on their toes as the
countdown to Moharram began. The police, however, confirmed that
there would be no tazia processions on Monday in view of the
communally charged atmosphere.
Distress sirens resounded throughout the Ahmedabad Fire Brigade
(AFB) headquarters in Danapith as SOS calls poured in from the
Panchkua and Gheekanta areas. At least 25 fire tenders were
rushed to the Panchkua and Revdi Bazaar area.
Trouble also broke out in the Vejalpur area in the morning
following rumours about a boy being kidnapped. According to
sources, the rumours began when a young boy strayed into the
sensitive areas with his handcart to trade scrap and was advised
to return. Till late afternoon, tension continued in the Vejalpur
and Juhapura areas.
At Himmatnagar town, one shop was set ablaze in the Motipura area
when curfew was relaxed between noon and 6 pm for women and
children.
Vatva continued to remain under the grip of tension after the
arson at Nava Chunaravaas on Wednesday when two persons were
killed in police firing.
The Hindustan Times, March 18, 2002
Mosques attacked in Bhiwani
HT Correspondent
(Loharu (Bhiwani), March 17)
Three Mosques were damaged and adjoining shops and houses set on
fire on Sunday in reaction to reports of a cow having been
slaughtered in Old Bazaar mosque in Loharu.
A group of people, angered by the news, set
fire to a mosque and 20 shops and houses in its neighbourhood in
the Old Bazaar area. Two other mosques in the area were attacked
by the slogan-shouting mob. The mob also tried to obstruct the
fire tenders trying to reach the buildings on fire.
The police, however, managed to save the house of the erstwhile
Nawab of Loharu from being set on fire. When a lathi-charge
proved futile, police fired in the air to bring the situation
under control. Two people were injured in the lathi-charge.
Additional police personnel have been deployed in Bhiwani. The
situation is reported to be tense but under control. Security in
and around the mosques has been tightened.
Four people, accused of slaughtering a cow, have been taken into
police custody.
Many Muslim families have reportedly left town following the
incident. There were reports that some Hindu families came to the
rescue of their Muslim neighbours during the attack.
Council Of Khalistan, Date: Wed Mar 13,
2002 7:29 pm
HON. EDOLPHUS TOWNS OF NEW
YORK IN THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Tuesday, March 12, 2002
Mr. TOWNS. Mr. Speaker, we were all disturbed to read about the
attack on a train full of Hindus in the village of Godhra in
India . It is always disturbing to see this kind of sectarian
violence.
The Gujarat Samachar reported that the train was carrying
high-level activists of the militant, pro-Nazi Vishwa Hindu
Parishad, a branch of the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS),
which is also the parent organization of the ruling BJP. They
were taunting the villagers with slogans about building a Hindu
temple on the site of the most revered mosque in India , which
was destroyed by the BJP some years ago.
In another village, Daahod, they got tea and snacks and did not
pay for them. They knocked over a vendor's stall, according to
the article, and deliberately picked a fight with a man who was
helping the vendor, beating him, pulling his beard and committing
other acts to humiliate him. His 16-year-old daughter tried to
stop them from harming her father. They grabbed her and took her
on the train, according to the article. After a crowd gathered to
try to rescue her from the VHP, they slammed the windows shut
with the girl inside the train. Out of their frustration and
anger over this action, some villagers began to burn the train.
No one condones the killing of these Hindus, even if they were
militants, but I hope none of my colleagues justifies the killing
of Muslims that has erupted in response while the police have
stood by and let it happen. The militant Hindu nationalists want
to make a Hindu society in India , and they can justify actions
like these in the name of that cause, but there is no
justification.
If this is how democracy and secularism are practiced in India ,
then it should not receive any American aid or trade. We should
also acknowledge that the only way to end this kind of violence
is to support independence for all the peoples and nations of
South Asia. It is time for India to begin acting like a democracy
and allow the peoples living under their rule to enjoy
self-determination. It is time for a plebiscite on independence.
Gujarat Samachar, Mar. 3, 2002
TRUTH ABOUT THE TRAIN INCIDENT
By Anil Soni and Neelam Soni
The tragic incident of Sabarmati Express that
occurred today at 7:30 am at about 1 km away from Godhra railway
station has thrown a question mark to those people who claim to
be secular or liberal. Many aspects & facts have been ignored
& which I would like to bring to your notice.
Compartment (Bogey) no S-6 & two other compartment of the
Sabarmati Express was carrying the kar sevaks of the V.H.P.
(Vishwa Hindu Parishad). And it was due to these kar sevaks from
bogey no S-6 that the incident occurred.
The actual story didn't start from Godhra as being told
everywhere but it started from a place from Daahod, a place that
comes 70-75 km before Godhra railway station. At about 5:30-6:00
a.m. the train reached Daahod railway station. These kar sevaks,
after having tea & snacks at the railway stall, broke down
the stall after having some argument with the stall owner and
they processed back to the departing train. The stall owner then
field on N C against kar sevaks at the local police station about
the above incident.
Then about 7.00-7.15 am the train reached Godhra railway station.
All the kar sevaks came out from their reserved compartments and
started to have tea and snacks, at the small tea stall on the
platform, which was being run by an old bearded man from the
minority community. There was a servant helping this old man in
the stall.
The kar sevaks on purpose argued with this old man and then bate
him up & pulled his beard. This was all planned to humiliate
the old man since he was from the minority community. These kar
sevaks kept repeating the slogan, ``Mandir Ka Nirmaann Karo,
Babuer Ki Aulad to Baahar Kar''. (Start building the Mandir and
throw the sones of Babur i.e. the Muslims out of the country.)
Hearing the chaos, the daughter (16) of the old man who was also
present at the station came forward & tried to save her
father from kar sevaks. She kept pleading & begging to them
to stop beating her father and leave him alone. But instead of
listening to her woes, the kar sevaks lifted the young girl and
took her inside their compartment (S-6) and closed the
compartment door shut. Their intention behind this act is best
known to them.
The train started to move out of the platform of Godhra railway
station. The old man kept banging on the compartment doors and
pleaded to leave his daughter. Just before the train could move
out completely from the platform, two stall vendors jumped into
the last bogey that comes from the guards cabin. And with the
intention of saving the girl they pulled the chain and stopped
the train. By the time the train halted completely, it was 1 km
away from the railway station.
These two men then came to the bogey in which the girl was and
started to band at the door and requested the kar sevaks to leave
the girl alone. Hearing all these chaos, people vicinity near to
the tracks started to gather towards the train. The boys and the
mob (that also included women) that had now gathered near the
compartment requested the kar sevaks to return the girl back. But
instead of returning the girl, they started closing their
windows. The infuriated the mob and they retaliated by pelting
stones at the compartment.
The compartment-adjoining compartment S-6 on both sides contained
kar sevaks of the V.H.P. These kar sevaks were carrying banners
that had long bamboo stick attached to them. These kar sevaks got
down and started attacking with bamboo sticks on the mob gathered
to save the girl.
These was like adding insult to injury for the crowed gathered
and their anger was now uncontrollable. The crowd started to
bring diesel and petrol from trucks and rickshaws standing at the
garages Signal Fadia (a place in Godhra) and burnt down the
compartment. They didn't bring the fuel from any petrol pump as
being reported everywhere nor was this act of burning pre-planned
as being mentioned by many peopole but it happened all of a
sudden out of sheer frustration and anger.
After hearing about this incident, members of V.H.P. (Vishwa
Hindu Parishad) liviing in that area started burning down the
garages in Signal Fadia, they also burnt down Baddshah Masjid,
(Mosque), at Shehra Bhagaaad (small area in Godhra). Reliable
resources have reported all these information and facts to their
information and me cannot be doubted. I would also mention my
sources namely Mr. Anil Soni and Neelam Soni (reporter of Gujarat
Samachar, also members of P.T.I. & A.N.I.) have worked hard
to dig the true facts and they duly deserve words of appraisal
for their hard work. Mr. Soni's mobile number: 0-9825038152.
Resident number 02672 (code) 43153, office number: 43152, fax
number: 45999.
Due to no proper substantial and circumstantial evidence and the
late arrival of the Police at the scene of crime frustrated the
Police. Which resulted in harassment and arrests in innocent
local people living in Godhra. Furthermore the police started
blaming the Mayor of Godhra, Mr. Ahmed Hussain Kalota for
incident. Mr. Kalota who is the member of the Indian National
Congress is also a lawyer. This blaming on Congressmen was also
dune to humiliate, defame and demoralize the Congress. The
V.H.P's plan is to weaken the country by planning internal
conflicts between communities and bring a backwardness of 100
years in the country. Sorry to say but they are carrying out
their plans successfully without the tear of being stopped by
anyone. No one but only the innocents will have to bear the
consequences of their plans.
It is our humble request and prayers to all the members of
Parliament along with the Prime Minister, and the entire media
circle to try and stop the sparks of a fire to gulp down the
whole county in flames to take some auction against the kar
sevaks of the V.H.P (Vishwa Hindu Parished) before they get out
of hand and stop harassing the innocents and catch the real
miscreants and culprits.
We lay our request in front of you with folded hands and hearts
filled with theirs for the death of innocents and anger for the
wrongdoers. We hope our request and efforts will not deafeared or
blind-eyed.
The Milli Gazette
Brief Report on Gujarat
riots
March 2, 2002:
In Panchmahal district of Gujarat state at Godhra Railway
station, on 27 February at about 8:00 am, burning to death of 60
passengers of Sabarmati Express occurred. This inhuman act is
condemnable, and it should not have happened. This grave incident
has certain psychological reasons. If these reasons are explored,
they shall help solve the national crisis. At the same time the
aftermath of Godhra train incident should also be condemned.
While writing this report on the third day of the riots, 210
deaths have occurred officially. Unofficially more than 500
people are dead, and most of them are Muslims. Follow are some
details of the riots and their consequences:
Ahmedabad City/Suburb: In Naroda locality behind S.T. Workshop,
around 60 Muslims have been burnt alive, their property looted
and set on fire. At Chamanpura, Gulmarg Society almost 60 Muslims
have been burnt alive. Victims include Mr. Ahsan Jafri, former
member of Parliament with his family members. His property too
has been burnt.
Dahod District: At Panderwada and Khanpur villages, 100 Muslims
have been burnt to death. Their properties looted and houses and
shops set afire.
Vijapur Taluka: At village Sardarpur and Ladol, 32 Muslims have
been burnt alive.
It is a great irony that not a single deplorable statement
mentioning the above massacres of more than 200 Muslims, has come
out. Apart from these 200 persons, 250 more Muslims have been
killed or burnt alive in almost all major towns/cities/talukas
and villages of the state of Gujarat.
In the views of leading political personalities, which include
the Chief Minister Mr. Narendra Modi, the above massacres of
Muslims are a result of a reaction of the Godhra train incident.
Not a single news item is seen mentioning the misdeeds,
misbehaviour and uncivilized attitude of karsevaks. No one
mentioned the reasons behind this great problem of confrontation
which has tormented the fabric of united India.
It is very painful and worrisome that for an unwarranted incident
which has taken place at Godhra, the complete Gujarat state is
facing riots, burning alive, murdering, looting property and set
it on fired. As per media reports, in almost all these incidents
several thousands (10 to 20 thousand) hooligans are attacking
their victims with weapons in an organized way. In more than 15
districts and 80 villages, violence has resulted in looting and
burning several thousand houses, shops, showrooms, restaurants, a
3-star hotel and godowns. The major affected areas are:
Panchmahal, Baroda, Ahmedabad, Bharuch, Surat, Kheda, Anand,
Nadiad, Sabarkantha, Banaskantha, Rajkot, Bhavnagar, Mehsana,
Patan, and several other places. Around 80 to 100 villages in the
above places are affected.
The current riots, which have engulfed almost all the state of
Gujarat, reminds of the riots of 1969. It seems that the loss of
human life and properties is multiplied this time due to defunct
state machinery. There are several incidents of
demolishing/setting afire of holy places, Masjids, and putting
idols in certain Masjids. At Balol, Anand district a Masjid have
been completely demolished, its Imam and his wife were burnt
alive. It is shameful for the state government that its capital
is not spared. The offices of the Waqf Board, Minority Board and
Hajj Office, which are housed in a high security zone within the
Government Secretariat are damaged and burnt. Here also several
houses/shops have been looted and burnt.
There is little hope that the series of riots, private firing,
burning alive, looting and burning properties will come to an end
soon. All these incidents are taking place under the cover of
police in the name of protection. Due to this the minority
community has lost complete faith in the state machinery, viz.
Police and State Reserve Police (SRP). There are several
incidents where fleeing Muslims entrusted the properties with the
Police/SRP for protection but on return they found their
properties looted and burnt.
From 28 February morning, when local police and SRP were found
not only inadequate but protecting the hooligans, all sane people
requested for immediate deployment of the army. However, army was
actually deployed in the late evening of 1 March, after very high
pressure from all quarters. The present army strength is also
inadequate in view of the magnitude and dimension of the on-going
riots. For God's sake, we request the strength of army/BSF to be
increased immediately or otherwise riots may engulf the
neighbouring state of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra and
may be even the rest of country. For God's sake please take
necessary steps at once.
Muhammad Shafi Madni
Chairman, Islami Relief Committee - Gujarat
Islami Relief Committee - Gujarat
4th Floor, Karishma Complex, Sarni Society, Behind APMC Market,
132 Ft Ring Road, Ahmedabad 380 055, Gujarat, India
Phone: (+91-79) 681 9086; Fax: (+91-79) 682 0828,
Fax (temporary): (+91-79) 682 1724
ArabNews.com, 29 March 2002
Dance of death in
India
By Siraj Wahab, Arab News Staff
It was early this year. Our information technology expert was in
India to cover a prestigious information technology exhibition in
Hyderabad. It was her first visit to India. Even so, she was a
journalist on assignment, not a tourist on a stroll. I make this
distinction with deliberate intent. For a tourist, by the nature
of things, everything looks rosy and romantic. A journalist, by
the nature of his job, finds everything newsy and report worthy.
Our journalist had a horrible time listening to a litany of
complaints that local Hindus voiced against India’s Muslims.
Of course, all this complaining and whining was during private
conversations at dinners and cultural displays. Still she was
surprised. Our journalist had not expected this tirade against
India’s largest minority on the sidelines of an
international computer show. She thought they would prefer to
discuss with an outsider how they were marching ahead in the
world of technology and how Indians were earning important places
in the world’s best technology firms.
She came back a thoroughly disappointed person but chose to
ignore the backbiting and file her report on the official
activities of the exhibition during which she had seen no
anti-Muslim bias. She pointed out that the event had been
organized in large part by a company from a GCC country and she
felt that she should support such international efforts whenever
possible.
What our IT specialist experienced in India three months ago was
just the proverbial tip of the iceberg. I was in India recently
and I witnessed the orgy of anti-Muslim violence and the dance of
death in which Hindus of all castes participated in Gujarat.
Without fear of contradiction, I can state that across the length
and breadth of the country, Muslims are living under a shadow of
fear, not knowing which Hindu neighbor will betray them and when.
They have been made to realize that they are a disposable
commodity to be torched at the first opportunity and on the
smallest of pretexts. Worse still, they have nobody to turn to in
this hour of tragedy. They have absolutely no faith in the
police, the respective state governments or the fascist Bharatiya
Janata Party-led federal government. Muslim judges, police
officers, teachers, intellectuals, journalists, businessmen,
poets and politicians seem unable to do anything except wring
their hands in despair.
Until recently these people were stressing the need for Muslims
to educate themselves. For what? Brute strength, not intellectual
might, is the only thing capable of quelling Hindu mobs screaming
for Muslim blood. It is a question of survival now. This is not
what they thought would become of India.
“Slowly but surely Muslims have been made to realize what
life can be like in a ‘Hindu rashtra’ as defined by a
mass murderer called Narendra Modi, a Muslim basher called L.K.
Advani and a Hindu terrorist called Vinay Katiyar,” wrote
Teesta Setalvad, a prominent journalist and activist, in her
newspaper “Communalism Combat.” Secular Hindus have
been relegated to writing opinion pieces in the country’s
leading English dailies. Their effort is ineffectual and more for
the consumption and comfort of international observers. Any voice
of reason is now overwhelmed by the militant Hindus who think
they are doing a national service by burning Muslim men, women
and children alive.
Here is a classic case of how helpless the tiny minority of
secular Hindus has become in India today. A Muslim judge of the
Gujarat High Court, Justice M.H. Quadri, was told in not so many
words by his secular Hindu colleagues to vacate his official
residence. They felt they would be unable to save his life from
rampaging Hindu mobs. He had to move, along with his ailing
80-year-old mother, to an area with a predominantly Muslim
population. This is exactly what is happening all over India.
Muslims in large numbers are moving bag and baggage into areas of
Muslim majorities. The ghettoization, which Muslim academics have
long feared, is now complete and irreversible.
When I covered the 1992-93 Bombay riots for Mid-Day, a prominent
Bombay evening paper, we feared that the biggest casualty of
communal riots would be the ghettoization of communities. That,
we thought, would be the final nail in the country’s coffin.
That is what happened in Bombay and what is now happening all
over India. Militant Hindus will now find
“mini-Pakistan,” as that fascist Bal Thackeray loves to
call all Muslim localities, in every state and every city.
Ghettoization indeed is the last sign of the death of secularism.
That mini-Pakistan reference reminds me of one more thing: Indian
Muslims in the past took exception to being labeled Pakistanis.
Now they have become indifferent to such taunts since they know
only too well that it means nothing and so they prefer to keep
quiet.
But when a whole community keeps quiet, even while seething with
anger, the result is a volcanic eruption. Who will blame hundreds
and thousands of Muslim youth who saw their mothers and sisters
raped and torched by rampaging Hindus in the streets of Gujarat?
Even Narendra Modi will have no complaints because he has learned
Newton’s third law of motion too well: To every action,
there is an equal and opposite reaction. India is now sitting on
a powder keg, lit by people who, ironically, refer to themselves
as Hindu nationalists.
From my first-hand experience and from encounters with state
officials and Jamaat-e-Islami volunteers in Ahmedabad, the number
of Muslim casualties is not less than 5,000. Dozens of mosques
have been razed and converted into makeshift temples. The mass
murderers roam free, threatening those who dare to collect
whatever remains of their homes. The police continue to brutalize
the already terrorized Muslims. As the B.N. Srikrishna Commission
on the Bombay riots of 1992-93 wrote, “The response of the
police to appeals from desperate victims, particularly Muslims,
was cynical and utterly indifferent. On occasion the attitude was
that one Muslim killed was one Muslim less.”
Of course, Muslims, especially some of their self-styled leaders,
have also played a major part in worsening the country’s
communal situation. But that needs a separate article. The
atmosphere has become so poisonous that an average Hindu with
absolutely no party affiliation has now turned against the Muslim
community. He feels that economically backward Muslims have
become a drain on the country’s meager resources. He
believes that all of them are terrorists and criminals. He fears
that all madrassas are breeding grounds for hate and therefore
they need to be obliterated. He has been led to believe that
Hindus have been too lenient toward Muslims. The time has come,
not only to teach them a lesson but to tell them that this is a
Hindu nation with absolutely no room for any other community,
especially Muslims.
“Have we not given them Pakistan?” is the oft-repeated
question. This Hindu blames Muslims for the attack on Parliament.
He blames Muslims for the Kashmir problem. He blames Muslims for
not allowing the temple to be built in Ayodhya. He blames Muslims
for the killing of “kar sevaks” in Godhra... In fact,
he blames Muslims for all the country’s ills. He is firm in
his belief that once the country’s Muslims are eliminated,
India will emerge as a superpower. The votaries of Hindutva have
sadly succeeded in making India what it is: one large
crematorium.
I can still smell the stench of the burned bodies in the streets
of Gujarat. I can still see in my mind’s eye smoke billowing
from what were once sprawling Muslim mohallas. I can still recall
how a 60-year-old Muslim, drafting a letter in tears to the UN
secretary-general, kept pleading with me for Kofi Annan’s
address. I can still hear the cries of those Muslim women in the
makeshift relief camp in Ahmedabad. “Why do they hate us so
much? What have we done to them? I know those people very well.
Yes, those who chopped my husband to pieces and made a bonfire of
his torso, hands and legs and then threw my 12-year-old son into
it. And then raped me in full public view? Why? And then why did
they leave me alive?”
Then I remembered another horrible account of another tragedy.
“We were betrayed by the very people whom we used to call
our uncles. I saw my neighbors raping my niece and setting my
mother on fire. Our residential quarters were surrounded by
different communities, but we always had faith in our neighbors.
In fact, upon learning that a mob of outsiders had come to hunt
down Muslims, all of us sought shelter in the neighboring area.
About 150 of us sat there for over five hours, hidden, without
making any noise. Then our neighbors told us that it was safe to
go out. But when we came out, we saw that all the escape routes
were sealed. Our neighbors threw kerosene on us and set us on
fire. In the mad rush I hid under a tin sheet from a phone booth
and managed to escape the frenzy.”
This is the state of India today. A country that has shamelessly
prided itself on being a secular nation, all the while crushing
its minority population. A country whose prime minister admits to
the whole world that the riots were a blot on the country’s
image and then does nothing to bring the murderers to justice. A
country whose home minister, with a straight face, defends what
is clearly state terrorism.
Riots are nothing new to India. They have been happening since
1947. Ask my mother what happened to her and her family in the
former Hyderabad state. “In the name of so-called Police
Action on Hyderabad, the invading Indian Army and the Hindus in
their wake perpetrated untold atrocities on the Muslims. Many
women jumped into wells to save their honor from lustful Hindus.
Others were raped and some were forced to live in Hindu homes.
They are still living with Hindus as they could not be reclaimed
by the Muslims.”
Muslims of my generation never thought such things could ever
again happen in modern India. We kept mouthing delusional
platitudes about Hindu and Muslim coexistence. Even in the
aftermath of the Babri Masjid demolition, when communal riots
raged across the country, Muslims were optimistic that the
majority community would see sense and that things would
eventually turn out for the better.
The Gujarat pogrom has extinguished even that flicker of hope.
There is now such despair that you can safely conclude that India
as a nation will never prosper. It will continue to find itself
mired in the quagmire of communal conflagration for another 50
years. It will not be able to douse the fires that have been
stoked by the parochial leaders. For decades we have been told
that the greatest enemy to India’s future security is
Pakistan. That is a lie. India needs no Pakistan to do what it is
doing swiftly and effortlessly: destroying itself.
UmmahNews.com, 2002-03-27
18:58:24
Gujarat rioters did
it by the book
Rathin Das for Hindustan Times
27 March 2002
The manual of rioting is back in circulation. Even as the
Narendra Modi government and the Gujarat Police talk about the
"spontaneous" nature of the riots that followed Godhra,
the pattern of violence can be found in guidelines laid down in a
pro-Hindu booklet.
The booklet - Hinduno Bachao: Akraman ane Kayedo (Save Hindus:
Attacks and Laws) - first surfaced in Gujarat two years ago after
the withdrawal of an order that allowed government employees to
participate in RSS programmes.
The terror manual stated that an organised attack on minorities
could be made to look like a 'spontaneous' reaction by the
public.
The primer illustrated how a crowd had beaten to death a boy and
a girl in Halvad town many years ago in full view of court
officials, but no one was prosecuted as thousands were involved.
The same pattern was followed in the post-Godhra violence in
which rioters escaped under the cover of anonymity.
Apart from guidelines on how to register complaints against
minorities for their 'Vidharmi' (non-believer) acts, the 12-page
booklet advised the Hindu 'samaj' to implicate senior
missionaries in false cases.
"They may not be convicted, but they should be made to go up
and down the courts for months..."
A Gujarat Police official said the recent mob attacks had some
similarities to the guidelines. "Prosecution can be made
difficult by increasing the number of the accused," he said.
"Evidence is weakened in such cases."
However, the joint general secretary of the state VHP, Kaushik
Patel, denied the booklet was issued by them. But he said the
guidelines were issued to the "Hindu samaj" at large
and the VHP wasn't bothered by it.
The booklet illustrates how a large mob can get away with murder
even if committed publicly "Now that we have our own
government, we should take proper advantage of it and get our
work done by it," it states.
UmmahNews.com, 2002-03-27
18:58:24
India: a plea and a
proposal
Balakrishnan Rajagopal for The Hindu
27 March 2002
The tragedy of Gujarat has deeply scarred us. Burning Hindu women
and children on the train, mobs looting and pillaging Muslims'
property, gang rapes of countless Muslim women, systematic and
planned pogroms that slaughter hundreds of innocent Muslims, a
criminally complicit state administration that stood by, watched
and, by some accounts, even participated, a complete failure to
support the traumatised Muslims by the state as well as civil
society, and a shocking partisanship by the state in awarding
compensation that shows that it values Hindu lives more than
Muslim ones.
It is almost too hard to do worse. There is a complete breakdown,
not just of order or Government but of humanity. Yet, there is no
outrage around the world. India is a mini-Rwanda where the
natives are simply expected to slaughter each other in their
primeval fury. The western media is openly anti-Muslim. It plays
up the brutality of the Islamists while ignoring the savagery of
the Sangh Parivar, even when they attack the Orissa legislature.
For its part, the national Government refuses to address a
blatant breakdown of constitutional order and takes refuge behind
the time-tested device of judicial enquiry. It is evident that
the killers will literally get away with it.
Of course, none of this is new. In 1984, the anti-Sikh pogroms
were instigated and supported by the Government and the killers
walked away free. The Mumbai `riots' in 1993 were found by a
judicial enquiry to be the result of official connivance and
complicity with organised thugs and yet no one has paid for it.
It seems as though the Indian state and society are
systematically unwilling or unable to ensure accountability for
massive atrocities involving minorities. It is quite touching to
see faith in the Indian state on the part of intellectuals but
evidence tells us that it is not going to punish and deter those
who commit atrocities against minorities.
Domestic legal sanctions do exist in Indian law to punish and
deter these horrific crimes but time and again, they have not
been used. The frustrated citizens of India and those who support
Indian democracy and pluralism, both in India and abroad, are
increasingly asking how they can do something to prevent India
from sliding into more mayhem, and even civil war or
Talibanisation.
An important way to go forward is to take individual
accountability seriously as a legal principle. The ideal response
to the Gujarat atrocity is domestic legal and political sanction.
But the state and central administrations are both controlled by
the BJP and it is unlikely that effective measures will be taken
against the perpetrators of the Gujarat atrocities. So far, the
indications are not hopeful. Even if some political or legal
sanction is taken against the Modi regime - which looks unlikely
- it still won't touch those who actually killed, raped,
pillaged, planned and instigated the violence.
This is bizarre in an age when the international trend is to
attach legal responsibility to individuals when they commit
atrocities. If the mass killers of the Balkans and Rwanda can be
prosecuted internationally, why not those of Gujarat? The crimes
committed in Gujarat certainly qualify as crimes against humanity
in their scale and savagery compared to massacres elsewhere
during the recent past.
Sceptics of this approach may object: that what happened is a
riot and not a deliberate mass attack, that the Gujarat
government did not commit it and is therefore not culpable, that
domestic remedies exist and that internationalising this issue
will mean a violation of India's sovereignty.
For important reasons, the sceptics would be wrong. First, it
would be a mistake to characterise the violence in Gujarat as a
mere riot. What happened was a state-sponsored, supported and
even state-directed orgy of ethnic cleansing. The killers seem to
have been very well organised and seem to have had no
interference from the police at all. As such, the Gujarat
violence is as much ethnic cleansing as in former Yugoslavia.
Second, while it may be true that the Gujarat government did not
personally commit the violence (though there are reports of State
officials' involvement), failing to prevent the violence makes it
complicit. The question is: at what point does the government's
complicity give rise to legal responsibility?
There is a great deal of jurisprudence, both old and new on this
issue that indicates that complicity in human rights atrocities
may result in individual civil and criminal liability and may
also result in collective liability of an organisation.
It is now well established under international law that a
Government's failure to ensure a `right to remedy' for human
rights violations will result in legal liability. This right to
remedy, guaranteed under the International Covenant on Civil and
Political Rights to which India is a party, is especially
important in the case of massive atrocities and will lead to
individual liability. After World War II, leading German
businesses such as the Krupp corporation were prosecuted in
Allied tribunals for complicity in the Holocaust. More recently,
companies have been sued for complicity in human rights abuses in
Myanmar (Unocol) and Nigeria (Royal Dutch Shell). It is clear
that complicity in human rights abuses can give rise to legal
liability.
Third, the existing domestic remedies have a track record of
failure when it comes to crimes against minorities. While some
have been arrested for the Godhra train incident, there is
nothing to indicate that the perpetrators of the communal orgy
will be pursued.
Indeed, it may be useful to think about how best to pursue
Narendra Modi and other Government and VHP officials through
legal processes in other countries. Belgium has adopted a law
based on universal jurisdiction for pursuing mass killers
anywhere. Under that law, four Rwandan nuns were recently
convicted of genocide. An arrest warrant issued by a Belgian
judge against Mr. Modi or senior VHP officials can be served in
any other country. The Indian Government itself may decline to
accede to such a request, but other countries such as the U.K.
may do so. In addition, the VHP as an organisation as well as Mr.
Modi and other senior officials in their individual capacity can
be sued in the U.S. under the Alien Tort Statute for civil
damages. This law has been repeatedly used to pursue dictators
such as Radovan Karadzic, Marcos and others.
Finally, it is a mistake to suppose that thinking of an
international law remedy for the Gujarat atrocities will result
in a violation of India's sovereignty. India has voluntarily
become a party to numerous human rights treaties that limit its
sovereignty. Also, it is a rather absurd understanding of
sovereignty to object to an attempt to support India's
constitutional order by pursuing those who pose a threat to it.
Whose sovereignty are we protecting?
It is increasingly obvious that violence against minorities in
India won't end unless its perpetrators are compelled to pay
wherever they may find themselves around the world. The principle
of accountability in international human rights law demands as
much. More importantly, the heart-wrenching tragedy in Gujarat
demands that the citizens of India do more than simply criticise
the Government. The victims and Indian democracy deserve better.
(The writer is Director, MIT programme on Human Rights and
Justice.)
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