India: Beginning of the end?

[azeezulla]

Destruction and death were waiting to happen in the tinderbox called India.

Since the last few days, Hindus and Muslims are dying like flies and property is being destroyed in a mad frenzy.

The carnage will stop and the property will be rebuilt in due course of time but the process that has begun cannot be terminated until it reaches its logical end.

This could be the beginning of the end for India.

M N Roy, Indian ambassador in Turkmenistan, sounded sad and perplexed when he phoned me on Friday, March 1.

Earlier in the morning, I had faxed him a condolence message about the sad incident of Godhra in Gujarat state where 57 karsevak passengers were burnt alive in the Sabarmati Express.

He phoned to thank me for the condolence message and expressed the hope that violence would be contained soon.

As a reflex action, certain elements in the Indian government and the press raised an accusing finger at Pakistan.

Daily Milap of India, which doesn't hide its pro-Hindu biases, reported on March 2, quoting Indian home ministry sources, that "initial investigations indicate involvement of the ISI in the Godhra incident." To leave no doubts in the minds of its readers, the paper added "[ministry] officials already suspected that such an incident was in the offing and the modus operandi carries an ISI signature." Daily Pioneer of India carried a statement by D Swami, the Minister of State for Home, on March 1 that "involvement of the ISI could not be ruled out." The minister also added that, "Gujarat is a communally sensitive place and a border state.

It is next door to Pakistan, which is the epicentre of cross-border terrorism.

There is something beyond what meets the eye in the Godhra incident.

In the present scenario, the involvement of ISI cannot be ruled out." As is usual in such cases, armchair pundits have come up with half-baked theories.

Some ascribe the whole thing to ISI and some blame the Indian government (both federal and state) for this bloodbath.

These are both wrong assumptions.

ISI certainly did not have anything to do with it and the Indian government surely did not engineer this massacre.

To identify the reasons for the Godhra phenomenon and to forecast its overall effects on India, we must go back to 1992 and then travel back and forth in time to connect various developments.

If we have to determine the datum line of the present problem, it is the destruction of Babri mosque in Ayodhya in 1992.

To maintain strict objectivity, I would avoid commenting on the Babri mosque incident in my own words.

Instead, here is a quote from a dispatch of Luke Harding, The Guardian correspondent in India.

Harding writes: "The attack on the Babri mosque was well-planned. After months of secret preparation, a group of Hindu zealots climbed the three domes of Ayodhya's most famous Muslim place of worship and set to work. Using sledgehammers and chisels, they started to demolish the elegant 16th-century building. They were watched by cheering crowds — and by politicians who are now in India's coalition cabinet, which is led by the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The demolition on December 6, 1992, changed everything in Indian politics. For most Indians, the destruction marked one of the bleakest days in the country's history. But for India's increasingly strident Hindu rightwing, it meant unfinished business."
To cap his observation, Harding declares unambiguously, "Underlying the party's objectives was a darker theme: India was a Hindu country which had no place for Muslims." Having established this basic premise, let's go back to 1948 — the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi.

Gandhi was also from Gujarat state, the seat of present bloodshed in India.

His assassin Nathuram Godse and co-conspirators Narayan Apte, Vishnu Karkare, Digambar Bagde, Shankar Kishtaiyya , Gopal Godse, Veer Savarkar, D Parchure and Madanlal Pahwa all belonged to the same extremist group whose ideological descendants are now ruling (or misruling) India in the shape of VHP (Vishwa Hindu Parishad), BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party), Shiv Sena and Bajrang Dal.

For an ideological group that can resort to the murder of Mahatma Gandhi, nothing is off limits; no blood is sacred except Hindu blood.

The idea, as pointed out by Luke Harding, is: Hindustan is for Hindus.

All others should either leave India or convert to Hinduism.

Shudhi and Sanghatan movements, featuring forcible conversion to Hinduism, are a part and parcel of BJP and VHP.

Let's see, very briefly, what happened and then try to analyse as to what went wrong and why.

Sabramati Express, carrying mostly Hindu pilgrims from Ayodhya stopped at the Godhra railway station for about five minutes on February 27 and then left for its next destination.

The passengers were mostly pilgrims returning from Ayodhya where a coalition of Hindu hardliner parties is trying to start the construction of a Ram temple on the site vacated by the demolition of Babri mosque.

The devotees traveling in the train were shouting slogans to the effect that Ram temple would be built and down with Muslims, etc.

They had been chanting these slogans at every railway station where the train stopped.

After the train left the Godhra railway station, it was stopped about a kilometer away from the station.

The reason for the halt is not known.

Some reports indicate that the outer signal post displayed a red signal, and some say that someone inside the train pulled the emergency lever.

Whatever the reason, the train stopped in the vicinity of a mob of about 200 Muslims who were chanting counter-slogans.

In the ensuing melee, the train passengers and the mob clashed with each other and some persons set a few bogies of the train on fire that caused 57 deaths.

This is the core incident around which the present Indian tragedy is built.

It raises certain questions.

If one were to believe the statements of the Indian government that ISI was involved in this hideous act, the question arises: why no action was taken to prevent this? A mob of 200 is not exactly a needle in a haystack.

An angry mob, waiting suspiciously along the railway tracks, should have attracted the attention of the law enforcement agencies.

Moreover, who informed the mob that the train would arrive on time and would be carrying pilgrims chanting anti-Muslim slogans? It takes some time to collect 200 angry young men.

Did the mob start assembling in the early afternoon or did they assemble in some secret place and emerge all of a sudden near the railway train? According to some reports, some agitators in the mob were carrying firebombs in their pockets.

This indicates no spontaneous action.

In a sensitive state like Gujarat, at a time when Ram temple is the hot issue, the ignorance of the law enforcement agencies about such plans and their total absence from the scene of the crime seems mighty suspicious.

When this crime happened, an analyst friend of mine sent me an e-mail message.

Part of his message forecast that the Gujarat government would stay put for a day or two to provide the Hindus an opportunity to 'get back.' Unfortunately, his forecast was only partially true.

The Gujarat government not only provided opportunity for Hindus to 'settle the score' but also extended wholehearted support to the general massacre.

In an article titled "Curfew ties victims, frees killers", published in The Hindustan Times on March 1, Vinay Menon informs that: "In the mayhem that they have unleashed in Ahmedabad over the past 48 hours, the VHP's hoodlums have had an important ally — the city's police force.

There are allegations that curfew was imposed selectively over the city — pinning the Muslim population of the walled city inside their homes, even as Hindu mobs were allowed to run amok elsewhere." Daily Inquilab, in its editorial of March 2, clearly spelled out that, "It is not necessary to investigate as to which individuals and organisations are responsible for this carnage.

The Gujarat strike [which resulted in mass murder of Muslims] was called by VHP and was officially endorsed and supported by the state government of Gujarat whose chief minister Narinder Modi is a protégé of L K Advani.

In other words, the strike [and accompanying carnage] was organized by VHP and the Gujarat government." Prime Minister Vajpayee, who is known as 'right man in wrong party', admitted this much when he issued an official statement that the eruption of the Hindu-Muslim violence in Gujarat state was a "disgrace to the nation".

In all honesty, it can be said that the state government of Gujarat is fully responsible for the massacre.

As for the long term effects of this catastrophe, we can see various roads opening out of this quagmire, some short and some circuitous, but all leading to one final conclusion: total destruction of India as we know it today.

The Union Government of India is also responsible, though indirectly.

By deploying its armed forces along the borders, it has created war hysteria.

The rhetoric of L K Advani, Fernandes and others has sprayed gasoline on the flames.

Immature and irresponsible Indian politicians have continuously been pumping their voters to hate Pakistan.

The hate, when the chance arose, was automatically directed at the most convenient group of people who can be associated with any image of Pakistan.

Another factor that led to the high death toll is that most of the army units who were familiar with local terrain and geography were deployed along the borders.

Gujarat was practically empty of army troops.

The government had to reassign army units from other areas who were not familiar with the geography or terrain.

A survey conducted by The Hindustan Times concludes that more than 60 per cent of readers blame the Gujarat government for this tragedy.

Another survey by The Hindustan Times informs that more than 67 per cent participants opine that Vajpayee should order unconditional suspension of the construction of a Ram temple.

This sudden change of opinion is only the tip of the iceberg.

The present deployment of Indian army along the Indo-Pak border is not child's play.

Keeping an army in a state of readiness is expensive business.

The Indian economy cannot sustain it for more than six months at most.

Internal troubles warrant extraordinary vigilance on the part of law and order agencies — another expensive undertaking.

The present trouble is costing Rs. 500 crores loss per day in terms of lost business in Gujarat alone.

It is difficult but not impossible to imagine as to what kind of havoc is being wreaked on the Indian economy by Hindu extremists.

When the economy weakens, the state becomes vulnerable to internal and external threats.

In India's case, external threats will not be necessary because internal troubles are enough to split the country into 21 or more independent states.

It may happen sooner rather than later.

This is the brainchild of high caste Hindus who are a minority in their own country.

Muslims are about 14 per cent of the population, whereas Dalits are about 40 per cent.

Add to that Sikhs and Christians and you are talking of almost 78 per cent of India.

The Sikhs have found a peaceful way to promote their cause.

Over the years, they have managed a sizeable lobby in the American Congress and Canadian government.

The Dalits are also working slowly but surely on these lines.

The Kashmiris have suffered a temporary setback but their moral advantage remains as strong as ever.

The Hindu middle class is now disenchanted with BJP and their honeymoon with the hardliners is over.

Even the original architect of this carnage, L K Advani, is lying low at the moment.

Whether it happens in one year or five or 50, the Balkanisation of India is going to happen.