[sacw] SACW #2 | 14 Mar. 02

[Harsh Kapoor]

South Asia Citizens Wire - Dispatch #2 | 14 March 2002

* For daily news updates & citizens initiatives in post riots 
Gujarat Check: http://www.sabrang.com
** Also see new information & analysis section on the recent Communal 
Riots in Gujarat on the SACW web site: http://www.mnet.fr/aiindex/

__________________________

#1. Folk Theorem / Modi might soon be the only guy spouting Newton 
(Abheek Barman)
#2. Soul of Ahmedabad, wounded in the mindless violence, on the 
reaction to the mayhem in the city
#3. Cry, The Beloved Country - Reflections on the Gujarat massacre 
(Harsh Mander)
#4. Indian elections: Body blow to the BJP (Praful Bidwai)
#5. Memorandum To The Governor of Gujarat (CPM & AIDWA Delegation)

__________________________

# 1.

http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/articleshow.asp?art_id=3590734
The Economic Times
Wednesday, March 13, 2002 | Updated at 18:59 hrs
Editorial

Modi might soon be the only guy spouting Newton

Folk Theorem / ABHEEK BARMAN

TIMES NEWS NETWORK [ WEDNESDAY, MARCH 13, 2002 1:44:15 PM ]
FANATICAL mobs are taking over the country and the government is 
asking them, "Is that all you guys want? How 'bout a second helping?" 
Through last fortnight the Ayatollahs of 21st century Hindutva have 
stomped across the landscape, a little riot here, a little murder 
there, a whole lotta shaking going on.
Who are these Paramhansas, Acharyas, Togadias and Singhals? Who gave 
them the right to unleash their goons on the nation? What keeps them 
out of jail after they start a riot? What sort of government just 
whimpers a little and rolls over when these thugs take to the streets?
I'm trying to get over my revulsion to the horrors of this last 
fortnight and make some sense of what's happening in India today. 
This places me in a privileged position.
I can sit with a drink and watch other people's homes going up in 
flames, their children maimed or killed, their livelihoods destroyed 
even when their lives are spared. You and me, we're lucky because 
none of these things have happened to us yet. Because Narendra Modi 
is far from where we are.
So we imagine that when the fanatics finally come to knock, it'll 
always be somewhere else. And from our privileged vantage point, 
we'll continue to watch this other bizarre spectacle that's taking 
place: a whole government is getting hijacked, live on TV.
The BJP-led government has been taken over. The takeover has been 
engineered by the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), the Hindu 
fundamentalist holding company of the BJP. The organisation that is 
taking over is the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), another subsidiary of 
the RSS created in 1964 to create trouble in the name of religion, 
staffed by atrociously dressed people who set down deadlines to break 
the law.
Normal governments, faced with takeover attempts, put up a fight. The 
BJP cannot fight because it is being taken over by a sibling. Lie 
back and enjoy it, says the RSS, it'll be over in a minute.
So, home minister L K Advani plays three monkeys as Gujarat burns. 
Law mantri Arun Jaitley is a Rajya Sabha MP from Gujarat. On March 3, 
five days after the Godhra incident, the society page of this 
newspaper carried three photos of him - two at a polo match, one 
playing cricket against a team of judges. He also watched a one day 
cricket match in New Delhi.
On March 10, as riots raged through his state, the number of Jaitley 
photos on our society page came down to one, but we didn't miss him - 
he was on every television channel all the time. And Prime Minister 
Vajpayee took such a long time to say anything that most people lost 
track of what he was saying by the time he finished his sentence.
Meanwhile, the VHP is telling everybody that it's going to bash its 
way into Ayodhya, that faith doesn't care two hoots about 
jurisprudence, that the government let it down.
The RSS is 'mediating' things between the VHP and the government. The 
Shankaracharya of Kanchi is 'mediating' between the VHP and a group 
of Muslims. And the minister of state in the home ministry, one I D 
Swami, is saying that VHP lumpens will be allowed to travel to 
Ayodhya in a 'peaceful' manner.
Only two things stand out clearly: the tilak on Ashok Singal's 
forehead and the holiday mood in the BJP.
This is a terrifying thing, for it shows that the line between 
religion and the state is being wiped out by this regime. Hindutva 
fanatics can do just what they want, for they know that nobody in 
power will lift a finger in protest.
Suddenly, the entire BJP leadership has started looking like Narendra 
Modi and the madmen of the VHP look like they run the show around 
here. This should never have happened. Once you mix up religion with 
governance and the law, an abyss opens up below.
The Romans knew this and Europe learnt this lesson after hundreds of 
years of war and anarchy. By the 12th century, Germany emerged as the 
first country to separate Church and state, followed by most of 
northern Europe.
Historians say this is why the Enlightenment and the commercial and 
industrial revolutions took place in Europe. With religion separate 
from governance, law, business and learning, there's room to think 
and argue things over without getting into trouble with god's 
representatives on Earth.
The Islamic countries - till the 15th century richer than any Western 
nation - didn't get it. So the West came from behind and forged ahead 
and the Caliphates declined. Nor did pre-Independence India, where 
rational enquiry, appearing sporadically, was always swamped by 
superstitious nonsense.
That is why Vedic mathematics remains a figment of Murli Manohar 
Joshi's imagination. And why despite the RSS' claims of inventing 
everything from tissue transplants to aircraft before anybody else, 
India had to wait till the early 19th century for Christian 
missionaries to import the first printing press from Europe. If the 
fundamentalist putsch succeeds, then soon the only guy talking about 
Newton's third law will be Narendra Modi.

____

#2.

Straight Answers
Times News Network [ Wednesday, March 13, 2002 12:00:04 Am ]
SOUL OF AHMEDABAD, WOUNDED IN THE MINDLESS VIOLENCE, ON THE REACTION 
TO THE MAYHEM IN THE CITY
Where were you when terror struck the city?
I have no answer for this, actually. February 27 onwards is a time I 
would like to forget. I was somewhere buried amongst the hate, pain 
and anger. I lost my voice in the screams and gunshots as they went 
on systematically killing innocent people. I was only a mute 
witness... nobody thought of me.
Why has the city of Gandhi turned into a city of violence and cruelty?
The city seems to have lost its values, like no respect for human 
life and moral principles. Democracy has become an alien word. There 
is no space for dissent. More importantly, nobody cares for the 
principles Gandhiji stood for.
You seem to be stripped of everything sane. How do you feel about that?
I feel hurt and humiliated. I wish I had not seen the carnage. But I 
hope, somebody will wake up and make an attempt to change society. 
And put an end to this kind of mindless violence.
What do you think needs to be done to make that much-needed difference?
The differences have to be buried. There has to be respect for human 
values. People have to look beyond man-made barriers. This process 
has to start from every nook and corner of the city. The spirit of 
'live and let live' should be given due prominence. So that we can 
give a better tomorrow to our children.

_____

#3.

[13 March 2002]

CRY, THE BELOVED COUNTRY
Reflections on the Gujarat massacre

By Harsh Mander

Numbed with disgust and horror, I return from Gujarat ten days after
the terror and massacre that convulsed the state. My heart is
sickened, my soul wearied, my shoulders aching with the burdens of
guilt and shame.

As you walk through the camps of riot survivors in Ahmadabad, in
which an estimated 53,000 women, men, and children are huddled in 29
temporary settlements, displays of overt grief are unusual. People
clutch small bundles of relief materials, all that they now own in
the world, with dry and glassy eyes. Some talk in low voices, others
busy themselves with the tasks of everyday living in these most basic
of shelters, looking for food and milk for children, tending the
wounds of the injured.

But once you sit anywhere in these camps, people begin to speak and
their words are like masses of pus released by slitting large
festering wounds. The horrors that they speak of are so macabre,
that my pen falters in the writing. The pitiless brutality against
women and small children by organised bands of armed young men is
more savage than anything witnessed in the riots that have shamed
this nation from time to time during the past century.

I force myself to write a small fraction of all that I heard and saw,
because it is important that we all know. Or maybe also because I
need to share my own burdens.

What can you say about a woman eight months pregnant who begged to be
spared. Her assailants instead slit open her stomach, pulled out
her foetus and slaughtered it before her eyes. What can you say
about a family of nineteen being killed by flooding their house with
water and then electrocuting them with high-tension electricity.
What can you say?

A small boy of six in Juhapara camp described how his mother and six
brothers and sisters were battered to death before his eyes. He
survived only because he fell unconscious, and was taken for dead. A
family escaping from Naroda-Patiya, one of the worst-hit settlements
in Ahmedabad, spoke of losing a young woman and her three month old
son, because a police constable directed her to `safety' and she
found herself instead surrounded by a mob which doused her with
kerosene and set her and her baby on fire.

I have never known a riot which has used the sexual subjugation of
women so widely as an instrument of violence in the recent mass
barbarity in Gujarat. There are reports every where of gang-rape, of
young girls and women, often in the presence of members of their
families, followed by their murder by burning alive, or by
bludgeoning with a hammer and in one case with a screw driver. Women
in the Aman Chowk shelter told appalling stories about how armed men
disrobed themselves in front of a group of terrified women to cower
them down further.

In Ahmedabad, most people I met - social workers, journalists,
survivors - agree that what Gujarat witnessed was not a riot, but a
terrorist attack followed by a systematic, planned massacre, a
pogrom. Everyone spoke of the pillage and plunder, being organised
like a military operation against an external armed enemy. An
initial truck would arrive broadcasting inflammatory slogans, soon
followed by more trucks which disgorged young men, mostly in khaki
shorts and saffron sashes. They were armed with sophisticated
explosive materials, country weapons, daggers and trishuls. They
also carried water bottles, to sustain them in their exertions. The
leaders were seen communicating on mobile telephones from the riot
venues, receiving instructions from and reporting back to a co-
ordinating centre. Some were seen with documents and computer sheets
listing Muslim families and their properties. They had detailed
precise knowledge about buildings and businesses held by members of
the minority community, such as who were partners say in a restaurant
business, or which Muslim homes had Hindu spouses were married who
should be spared in the violence. This was not a spontaneous upsurge
of mass anger. It was a carefully planned pogrom.

The trucks carried quantities of gas cylinders. Rich Muslim homes
and business establishments were first systematically looted,
stripped down of all their valuables, then cooking gas was released
from cylinders into the buildings for several minutes. A trained
member of the group then lit the flame which efficiently engulfed the
building. In some cases, acetylene gas which is used for welding
steel, was employed to explode large concrete buildings. Mosques and
dargahs were razed, and were replaced by statues of Hanuman and
saffron flags. Some dargahs in Ahmedabad city crossings have
overnight been demolished and their sites covered with road building
material, and bulldozed so efficiently that these spots are
indistinguishable from the rest of the road. Traffic now plies over
these former dargahs, as though they never existed.

The unconscionable failures and active connivance of the state police
and administrative machinery is also now widely acknowledged. The
police is known to have misguided people straight into the hands of
rioting mobs. They provided protective shields to crowds bent on
pillage, arson, rape and murder, and were deaf to the pleas of the
desperate Muslim victims, many of them women and children. There
have been many reports of police firing directly mostly at the
minority community, which was the target of most of the mob violence.
The large majority of arrests are also from the same community which
was the main victim of the pogrom.

As one who has served in the Indian Administrative Service for over
two decades, I feel great shame at the abdication of duty of my peers
in the civil and police administration. The law did not require any
of them to await orders from their political supervisors before they
organised the decisive use of force to prevent the brutal escalation
of violence, and to protect vulnerable women and children from the
organised, murderous mobs. The law instead required them to act
independently, fearlessly, impartially, decisively, with courage and
compassion. If even one official had so acted in Ahmedabad, she or he
could have deployed the police forces and called in the army to halt
the violence and protect the people in a matter of hours. No riot
can continue beyond a few hours without the active connivance of the
local police and magistracy. The blood of hundreds of innocents are
on the hands of the police and civil authorities of Gujarat, and by
sharing in a conspiracy of silence, on the entire higher bureaucracy
of the country.

I have heard senior officials blame also the communalism of the
police constabulary for their connivance in the violence. This too
is a thin and disgraceful alibi. The same forces have been known to
act with impartiality and courage when led by officers of
professionalism and integrity. The failure is clearly of the
leadership of the police and civil services, not of the subordinate
men and women in khaki who are trained to obey their orders.

Where also, amidst this savagery, injustice, and human suffering is
the `civil society', the Gandhians, the development workers, the
NGOs, the fabled spontaneous Gujarathi philanthropy which was so much
in evidence in the earthquake in Kutch and Ahmedabad? The newspapers
reported that at the peak of the pogrom, the gates of Sabarmati Asram
were closed to protect its properties, it should instead have been
the city's major sanctuary. Which Gandhian leaders, or NGO managers,
staked their lives to halt the death-dealing throngs? It is one more
shame that we as citizens of this country must carry on our already
burdened backs, that the camps for the Muslim riot victims in
Ahmedabad are being run almost exclusively by Muslim organisations.
It is as though the monumental pain, loss, betrayal and injustice
suffered by the Muslim people is the concern only of other Muslim
people, and the rest of us have no share in the responsibility to
assuage, to heal and rebuild. The state, which bears the primary
responsibility to extend both protection and relief to its vulnerable
citizens, was nowhere in evidence in any of the camps, to manage,
organise the security, or even to provide the resources that are
required to feed the tens of thousands of defenceless women, men and
children huddled in these camps for safety.

The only passing moments of pride and hope that I experienced in
Gujarat, were when I saw men like Mujid Ahmed and women like Roshan
Bahen who served in these camps with tireless, dogged humanism amidst
the ruins around them. In the Aman Chowk camp, women blessed the
young band of volunteers who worked from four in the morning until
after midnight to ensure that none of their children went without
food or milk, or that their wounds remained untended. Their leader
Mujid Ahmed is a graduate, his small chemical dyes factory has been
burnt down, but he has had no time to worry about his own loss. Each
day he has to find 1600 kilograms of foodgrain to feed some 5000
people who have taken shelter in the camp. The challenge is even
greater for Roshan Bahen, almost 60, who wipes her eyes each time she
hears the stories of horror by the residents in Juapara camp. But
she too has no time for the luxuries of grief or anger. She barely
sleeps, as her volunteers, mainly working class Muslim women and men
from the humble tenements around the camp, provide temporary toilets,
food and solace to the hundreds who have gathered in the grounds of a
primary school to escape the ferocity of merciless mobs.

As I walked through the camps, I wondered what Gandhiji would have
done in these dark hours. I recall the story of the Calcutta riots,
when Gandhi was fasting for peace. A Hindu man came to him, to speak
of his young boy who had been killed by Muslim mobs, and of the depth
of his anger and longing for revenge. And Gandhi is said to have
replied: If you really wish to overcome your pain, find a young boy,
just as young as your son, a Muslim boy whose parents have been
killed by Hindu mobs. Bring up that boy like you would your own son,
but bring him up with the Muslim faith to which he was born. Only
then will you find that you can heal your pain, your anger, and your
longing for retribution.

There are no voices like Gandhi's that we hear today. Only
discourses on Newtonian physics, to justify vengeance on innocents.
We need to find these voices within our own hearts, we need to
believe enough in justice, love, tolerance.

There is much that the murdering mobs in Gujarat have robbed from
me. One of them is a song I often sang with pride and conviction.
The words of the song are:

Sare jahan se achha
Hindustan hamara.

It is a song I will never be able to sing again.

(Harsh Mander, the writer, is a serving IAS Officer,
who is working on deputation with a development organisation)

______

#4.

"The News on Sunday", March 10, 2002

Indian elections: Body blow to the BJP

By Praful Bidwai in New Delhi

Whatever happens, the writing on the wall can't be missed. And that 
spells the BJP's decline. In terms of its share of the national vote, 
the party peaked in 1998 at 26 per cent. Since then, it has been 
going downhill. The latest verdict will only accelerate this movement

Nothing seems to be going right for the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) 
of late. After its dismal performance in the Parliament by-elections 
and local body elections in 2000-2001 came the Unit Trust scandal, 
involving a big state-owned mutual fund, in which over 50 million 
small investors lost almost half their life's savings while corporate 
investors profiteered. Amidst growing disillusionment with its 
misgovernance and corruption, the party's own loyal middle-class 
supporters began to desert it.

The fractious 27-party National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government 
led by the BJP ruling in New Delhi saw September 11 and December 13 
as opportunities to capitalise on the 'anti-terrorism' climate the 
world over, and particularly in South Asia. But even that did not 
help it much politically -- despite the mobilisation of 700,000 
troops at the border with Pakistan at an enormous economic cost and 
high military risk.

And now comes a scathing indictment from voters in four states which 
elected their legislative assemblies late last month, including the 
bellwether state of Uttar Pradesh. This setback has since been 
further compounded by the Union budget, which has antagonised large 
chunks of the middle class, as well as the poor majority of Indians.

The election results have politically unhinged the BJP, especially in 
UP. The party has been reduced to the Number Three position in the 
Assembly, or shrunk to half its size, with a vote-swing of over 12 
per cent against it. This is the biggest setback it has suffered 
since 1991. Its magnitude goes well beyond any 'anti-incumbency' 
disadvantage. The popular rejection of the BJP is far more powerful 
and decisive than the infamous defeat of the Congress in the 
post-Emergency election of 1977.

In the other three states (Punjab, Uttaranchal and Manipur) too, the 
BJP has done abysmally. Its allies, especially the Akalis in Punjab, 
now find it is more a liability than an asset.

Recent qualitative opinion surveys suggest that the BJP's defeat must 
be explained in terms of a comprehensive rejection by the people -- 
not only of its brand of religion-politics mix, but also of its World 
Bank-IMF style market-fundamentalist economic policies, and its 
ultra-conservative postures on a range of issues, from personal law 
to freedom of information, and from Hindutva to terrorism.

Above all, it is a vote against the BJP's appalling misgovernance, 
which manifested itself in 16 hour-long power cuts and non-payment of 
salaries to government employees in UP, neglect of people's needs and 
development issues in Uttaranchal, massive corruption in Punjab, and 
near-collapse of public services in all four states.

The impact of the latest electoral defeat is likely to be enhanced by 
the BJP's gross partisanship and mishandling of the communal 
situation in Gujarat// 'Hindutva's laboratory' and the only state 
where it rules with a majority of its own. Many BJP allies, in 
particular the Telegu Desam (Andhra), Trinamul Congress (West 
Bengal), Samata Party (Bihar-UP), and Janata Dal (United-UP) are 
displeased with the BJP to the point of being openly critical of it.

Defence Minister Fernandes (Samata) has just declared after visiting 
Gujarat that there are 'no tall men', and 'there is no civic 
leadership' in Gujarat; there are 'only politicians struggling for 
power' as hundreds of people perish in one of India's worst pogroms.
The BJP is in serious political trouble despite deep divisions in the 
Opposition to it.

Earlier, its allies would criticise it, even desert it, only to 
return eventually to the NDA's fold -- as happened with the Trinamul 
and the southern MDMK. Today, things may be different. The Ayodhya 
issue is driving a major wedge between the BJP and the rest of the 
NDA.

A lot of what happens to the NDA will depend on UP, where Mulayam 
Singh Yadav's Samajwadi Party is better placed than the BJP to form a 
government -- if the Congress supports it. However, the BJP could be 
invited to form a government in UP -- thanks to the partisanship of 
an RSS-loyalist Governor. But this can only happen if the BJP allies 
with the Bahujan Samaj Party and a few fractious, split-prone allies. 
This is unlikely either to be durable or bring the BJP much credit or 
clout. The last time the BJP allied with the preponderantly Dalit 
BSP, a good chunk of its hardcore upper caste-Hindu base eroded.

The electoral verdict's impact will be felt in domestic politics as 
well as foreign policy-making. As the NDA gets weakened, the Vajpayee 
government will be able to claim less and less convincingly that 
there is a consensus behind its positions on international issues, 
including the coming Phase II of the US 'war on terrorism', probably 
targeting Iraq, and its 'strategic partnership' with Washington. 
(India has good relations with Iraq. And an all-too-cosy strategic 
alliance with the US won't be popular in India where the public takes 
a sceptical view of American power).

With the economy continuing to be in the doldrums, the NDA will find 
it harder than before to push through right-wing policies which 
please global capital and the US but are domestically unpopular.

The latest election results will have a greater, indeed far-reaching, 
impact on Indian politics though they will not immediately 
destabilise Vajpayee's government. Most important, they will erode 
the NDA's and Vajpayee's -- already diminished legitimacy and moral 
authority. The BJP is increasingly turning out to be dysfunctional as 
the core of a national-level alliance. Vajpayee's so-called 'star 
campaigning' has proved hopelessly ineffectual in shoring up the NDA 
in election after election. This happened in Vajpayee's own 
Parliamentary constituency, Lucknow, in the recent Assembly elections.

The BJP, the 'party with a difference', which used to boast of 
'principled' politics and 'discipline' thanks to its RSS roots -- now 
stands utterly discredited. Vajpayee's own ratings have rarely been 
lower and are falling as he fumbles and vacillates on Ayodhya and 
Gujarat.

The BJP's reduced strength will immediately alter the composition of 
Parliament's Upper House. This means that the NDA won't be able to 
get controversial legislation (e.g. Prevention of Terrorism 
Ordinance, or harsh labour laws) easily approved in Parliament. The 
NDA will be poorly placed in the presidential elections which are due 
in July. In India, the President's is not an executive office, but it 
is not a purely decorative position either. He does exercise a degree 
of moral influence and offers some weighty counsel on many issues. 
This matters in a situation of political turmoil. The BJP is likely 
to be the loser here.

However, the verdict's biggest impact will be felt in national 
coalition-making. For instance, if the Samajwadi Party and Congress 
come together even for limited, tactical reasons in UP, they will 
potentially generate a new national alliance, tilting the balance 
against the NDA. If, on the other hand, the BJP and the BSP join 
hands in Lucknow, then the NDA will get a temporary, transient, 
national boost.

Whatever happens, the writing on the wall can't be missed. And that 
spells the BJP's decline. In terms of its share of the national vote, 
the party peaked in 1998 at 26 per cent. Since then, it has been 
going downhill. The latest verdict will only accelerate this 
movement.--end--

____

#5.

MEMORANDUM TO THE GOVERNOR OF GUJARAT
March 12 2002

Communist Party of India (Marxist)
27-29 Bhaivir Singh Marg
New Delhi
Camp office:Prarthna Samaj,
Raikhad,
Ahmedabad

To
The Governor
Raj Bhavan
Gandhinagar
Gujarat

Dear Rajyapal ji

A CPI(M) delegation along with leaders of the All India Democratic 
Women's Association have visited various relief camps and affected 
areas in Ahmedabad and Godhra on March 10, 11 and 12. The team 
comprised of Member of Parliament and Central Committee member, 
Subodh Roy, Central Committee member Brinda Karat, Subhashini Ali, 
Kiran Moghe and Mariam Dhawale accompanied by Arun Mehta, State 
Secretary, CPI(M). The delegation met about a thousand people 
including citizens living in affected areas, victims of the communal 
carnage, administrative officials, members of various NGOs and 
intellectuals. It is difficult to recall any parallel with what has 
happened in Gujarat since March 27. It can only be described as State 
sponsored violence directed against a particular community. We have 
also been shocked to hear of the Chief Minister's claim that the 
violence has been "controlled within 72 hours"-the implication is 
that this is a reflection of efficiency when in fact seventy two 
hours is itself a long enough period to destroy a whole community 
spread over the State. Moreover the violence continued at least a 
week after the initial incidents. The official estimates of the 
violence are a gross underestimation both in terms of the numbers 
killed, injured or the
extent of property looted and burnt.

We give below some of the main findings of the delegation:

1. The Godhra incident on 27th February has outraged the whole 
country. Our delegation visited the site of the terrible atrocity 
committed on passengers of the Sabarmati Express. It is reported 
there is an anti-terrorist squad investigating the incident and a 
Commission of Enquiry has also been set up. The delegation found 
widespread disquiet amongst citizens about the nature of the enquiry 
as also the credentials of the individual heading it. His past record 
shows a communal bias therefore his appointment requires 
reconsideration.
Secondly, the delegation was shocked to find that the investigating 
agencies involved have made no effort to protect the crucial evidence 
in the railway carriage itself. There is easy access to the affected 
carriage which means that valuable evidence can be tampered with. For 
example, we saw quantities of foodgrains, stoves and jerry cans in 
the compartment which points to the possibility of the presence of 
inflammable material inside the compartment. It is essential to 
immediately cordon it off. According to the information we gathered 
the urgency on the part of the State Government required to enquire 
into an atrocity of this magnitude is completely absent.

2. We were impressed by the fact that the situation in Godhra town 
itself was well under control except for a few incidents of arson and 
looting in the morning of the 27th. This challenges the 
controversial, and to us highly objectionable, justification by the 
Chief Minister of Gujarat that the communal carnage, arson and 
looting that occurred in the State particularly in the capital, 
Ahmedabad, was only a "spontaneous reaction" to the Godhra incident. 
If this was true, the first place to have been affected would have 
been Godhra where the incident actually occurred. The sequence of 
events in Godhra and comparison with what happened elsewhere, makes 
it very clear that swift and firm administrative action made the 
crucial difference.

3. We would like to stress this point as it substantiates the 
already strong prima facie evidence available from the patterns of 
violence in Ahmedabad and later in other parts of the State. The 
violence was in fact planned, organised and led by organisations like 
the Vishwa Hindu Parishad backed by the State administration 
including the police. The most widely publicized example of this was 
the burning to death of former MP, Ehsan Jafri in spite of the fact 
that he had repeatedly informed senior administrative officials that 
his house and colony had been surrounded by an ever-increasing, 
violent and well-armed mob. Another example is from Naroda Patiya 
where some of the worst incidents took place including the burning of 
women and children. The police refused to listen to the repeated 
appeals for help of the Muslim residents. They arrived only after the 
mayhem. The most telling examples were those where even Muslim 
dominated areas were razed to the ground. Areas like Bapu Nagar, 
Sone ki Chali, Madina Chali, Ansar Nagar, Akbar Nagar etc. all areas 
neighbouring each other were cordoned off and then attacked by huge 
mobs that burnt and looted all the shops and most commercial 
establishments and many houses. Religious structures like a mosque 
and madarsa were burnt, broken and desecrated. It is also a 
commentary on the conept of justice that although it was the Muslim 
community which has been targeted they also have been the victims of 
police atrocities and firing.

4. The brutality of the killings has been shocking, the number of 
dead, appalling. Women, children and infants have been killed in the 
most vicious fashion. Many have been burnt to death. We have also 
heard reports of cases of rape. Others have seen their family 
members being burned before their eyes. The delegation has first hand 
witness accounts from the traumatised survivors. The delegation was 
extremely disturbed to find the number of children who have been 
separated from their parents. The children in particular have been 
extremely traumatised and require umgent help.
In such a situation it is incumbent on the administration to 
immediately ensure that the criminals are arrested and charged so 
that the victims can at least feel that justice is being done. The 
delegation, however, has been shocked to find no action is being 
taken in this direction.. Relatives of those killed are today in 
refugee camps, many of which are far from their areas of residence. 
They are either too frightened or unable to reach the thanas where 
their reports can be registered. Members of the delegation were told 
by the District Administration that the Police Commissioner had made 
arrangements to post police officers to each camp to file the 
complaints but this has not been done anywhere. Victims from Akbar 
Nagar which was situated just behind the H Division ACP office are 
presently in the Bapu Nagar camp just across the road . They are able 
to go and file their FIRs but while there are more 300 FIRs to be 
filed, they are being registered at the rate of about 20 a day. What 
this means is that evidence of crimes will be destroyed, the number 
of dead will never be officially accepted, compensation will be 
denied and the criminals will go scot-free. Even worse, in cases 
where the police has been forced to register FIRs in which BJP, VHP 
and Bajrang Dal leaders, including the brother of the State Home 
Minister, have been named no arrests have been made.

5. The loss of property has been staggering and very widespread. 
All over the city, on the highways and all along the route to Godhra, 
the delegation saw that hotels, restaurants, shops, factories, carts, 
houses, workshops, petrol pumps, trucks, vehicles , homes and 
religious establishments of Muslims had been targetted and 
systematically destroyed. While this large-scale and systematic 
destruction could not have occurred without State complicity, it 
reveals that the economic back-bone of a whole community has been 
broken and this cannot but have disastrous consequences. Not only has 
arson and loot been resorted to but, because of administrative 
inaction, all traces of many of these establishments and structures 
are being removed; buildings are being completely razed and the empty 
spaces levelled out as if the building that once occupied them never 
existed as has been done in Ramol. This will not only make 
compensation impossible to claim but will actually lead to 
expropriation of the property of an entire community.
Religious structures like mosques have, in some place, been converted 
into temples and in others have had all traces removed. The worst 
example of the latter is the tomb of the poet, Wali Gujerati, revered 
by all communities, that has not only been destroyed and levelled but 
which has had a paved road built over it. These are direct attacks on 
the constitutional right to freedom of worship and on our composite 
culture.

6. The delegation visited the following relief camps in Ahmedabad: 
Shah Alam, Bapu Nagar Aman Chowk, Sunderamnagar, Juhapura, Kankariya 
Municipal Schools 7 and 8; and in Godhra: lqbal Primary School. 
While the camps had started functioning on the 28 February, the GR on 
relief was issued only on March 5 giving details of the ration to 
be issued to each person in the camps but except for the camp in 
Godhra which has been receiving the rations, even five days later the 
order has not been implemented. The Shah Alam camp where there are 
more than 8000 people has received only 1500 kgs of rice, some tins 
of cooking-oil and a few hundred packets of powdered milk when this 
falls short of even its daily requirements. The Bapu Nagar Aman Chowk 
camp had also received 1500 kgs of rice only once. The other two 
camps had received no rations from the Government at all.

7. It is a measure of the complete callousness of the State 
Government that even ten days after the camps started not a single 
Minister or senior official has visited the camps which are in dire 
need of immediate and massive help.
When the delegation visited the Kankaria camp, there was a banner on 
the gate proclaiming it to be a Government relief camp and the 
organisers said that since March 4 they had been receiving their 
daily requirements from the Government. This camp is inhabited by 175 
Hindu families. This camp is mainly of poor scheduled caste families 
who reported that 40 of their houses have been burnt. Urgent action 
is required for their rehabilitation. It is good that these poor 
people are at least receiving some attention including a visit from 
the Chief Minister. Why can the other camps not receive similar 
attention?
The other camps required medical help and supplies. The delegation 
met scores of injured including women and children. But doctors are 
few in number and stayed for only two hours and did not include any 
lady doctors although there are many women in the camps many of whom 
are pregnant, ill, wounded or suffering from burns. The toilet 
facilities provided by the Municipal Corporation are highly 
inadequate and there has been no effort made by the administration to 
clean the camps. The danger of an epidemic breaking out cannot be 
ruled out. The delegation was witness to the tremendous work being 
done by a number of voluntary organisations and individuals apart 
from the help of the community institutions, without whom the plight 
of the over one lakh persons displaced persons presently in the camps 
all over Gujarat would have been unimaginable.

8. All the points raised above need to be acted upon immediately by 
the State Government. The priority, however, has to be strong steps 
to stop the violence which is still being spread in an organized 
manner to the rural areas. In many districts of the State like 
Kheda, Dahod, Panchmahal etc., homes of Muslims in villages are 
being burned down and all the Muslim villagers who are able to save 
their lives are forced to take shelter in camps at the taluka 
headquarters. In the camp and in the General Hospital at Godhra, the 
delegation met survivors from villages like Randhikpur (Dahod 
District), Pandharwada (Panchmahal). All the Muslims have had to 
leave their land and shops in these villagers. Not only have members 
of their families been subjected to the most unspeakable atrocities 
including rape of women but many of them have been hunted down by 
communally inflamed people. At least one family from Randhikpur had 
16 of its members, including a 2 day old infant girl, murdered 
several kilometres away from their village, four days after they had 
been forced to run away by people who had followed them in a vehicle. 
As late as on March 5, the Muslims of Anjanwa village (Panchmahal 
District) were attacked. In the Godhra General Hospital, the 
delegation met Maksuda Bibi who had been attacked and thrown into a 
well with 4 other women and 2 children. She was the only survivor. 
This diabolical process of "cleansing" rural areas of their Muslim 
population has still not ended. Even on the 10th March there were 
reports of attacks being carried out in villages in Chhota Udaipur 
District.

Obviously, in such a situation, even the concept of rehabilitation 
becomes a mockery. It is, therefore, imperative that the violence be 
stopped at all costs. More army and para-military personnel are 
urgently required and their deployment in all sensitive areas must be 
ensured. In the coming days, apart from the tension that is 
escalating because of uncertainty and fear about what will happen on 
March 15 in particular and that has been generated by the VHP on the 
Ayodhya issue in general, important religious events like Moharram 
and Holi are also going to take place towards the end of the month. 
In view of all this, presence of the army and para-military forces 
becomes essential to the maintenance of peace. The delegation was 
horrified to learn that the State Government is actually thinking of 
removing the army from sensitive areas. This will be nothing less 
than an open invitation for genocide. It is also shocking that 
kaesevaks are being allowed to proceed towards Ayodhya even though 
the UP Government has declared all such movement illegal. Such 
movement should be immediately stopped.

9. The Government of Gujarat has completely failed to discharge its 
duty of ensuring law and order, peace and justice. Its Chief 
Minister, Narendra Modi, is intent on pursuing his own agenda of 
Hindutva for political gains unmindful of the cost that this entails. 
In fact, he has been justifying all the horrors that have occurred 
since 27 March in ways that make his complicity in their perpetration 
only too obvious. When you were Governor of Bihar, after one attack 
in one village in which valuable lives were lost, you had recommended 
removal of the State Government and imposition of President's rule. 
In a situation in which thousands have been killed in acts of 
State-sponsored terrorism and carnage and are still continuing to be 
killed, the least that can be done is the removal of the present 
Chief Minister Narendra Modi. This is the very least which must be 
done to ensure that the writ of the constitution of India runs in 
Gujarat.

Citizens of this country have been concerned and also disturbed at 
your deafening silence on the terrible events in Gujarat.

Yours sincerely,
Subodh Roy (Member of Parliament, Lok Sabha) ,
Brinda Karat, Subhashini Ali, Kiran Moghe, Mariam Dhawale, Arun Mehta

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