Re-examination of fundamentalism of BJP and Modi

Re-examination of fundamentalism of BJP and Modi

This is actually an article I wrote long time back. In the recent times of Gujarat election coverage of the media, I was tempted to post in it my blog. But waited till the results as back them it would have appeared more like promotion.

It is now become a fashion in many english media to write about growing Hindu “fundamentalism” and demonize BJP and Sangh as fuelling hatred towards other religions to the level that they are trying to kill every non-Hindu at the earliest possible moment. Enough opinion pieces have been written. I don’t want to lend credence to these “opinions” by doing the same. Instead I choose to let the facts do the talking.

In the five years of NDA rule, nothing of the sort which the commies predicted has taken place. There were no large scale killing of Muslims, there was no destruction of Muslim places of worship nor was there a temple build at Ayodhya forcefully.

So let’s get down to basics and look at the statistics instead of the scaremongering by media. Communal violence in India occurred in each and every year from 1954 to 1985. The total number of communal incidents in those 31 years was 8,449 (an annual average of 273), the total number of persons killed in that period was 7,229 (an annual average of 233), and the number of persons injured in those incidents was 47,321 (an annual average of 1,526). (statistics quoted from here)

After 1985, communal riots have also occurred in every year from 1986 to 1995, once in 1997, twice in 2002 and once in 2003. Thus if you see the only moment of low point in the incidents of communal violence is post 1997, which include six years of BJP in power.

All these statistics are of both Hindus AND Muslims died. I remember reading in a book that in the early fifties, Jayaprakash Narayan tabled a Home Ministry report which has investigated riot incidents and found that 22 out of total 23 were initiated by Muslims. Of late the government is not releasing the details of the dead in communal violence from sixties.

The only case against the BJP & Modi is the Gujarat riots in 2002. But even here the statistics do not prove any “Hindutva laboratory”. Contrary to the screams that thousands of Muslims being killed in those riots, the official figure is around 900. The case against Modi is not about killing the Muslims, but of official-willful-negligence, the same which is against Rajiv Gandhi for Sikh riots. Negligence does not make the mistakes right, but it is surely a LOT different from enthusiastic killing.

Moreover, how accurate is it to throw the blame on BJP alone for that when many congress workers also participated. Quoting from August 9, 2003 edition of Times of India:

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But when it comes to the involvement of its own party cadre in the killings, 10 Janpath maintains a deafening silence…

According to the JUH, "most Congress corporators" and some Congress leaders of Gujarat had actively participated in last year's riots.

Mahmood As'ad Madani, JUH general secretary told The Times of India: "We wrote letters to Congress president Sonia Gandhi, gave a list of Congress leaders involved in the riots, asked her to take action against them but to no avail."

On April 29, 2002, for example, the JUH received a list of 25 Congress leaders from its Gujarat chapter, which was promptly forwarded to her. This included a former Congress minister, a sitting MLA and a former MP.

Then on August 20, Madani reminded Gandhi: "Similarly our appeal forwarded to you in respect of involvement of Congress MLAs, corporators and workers in Gujarat carnage along with the list of culpable names remains disregarded." when it comes to the involvement of its own party cadre in the killings, 10 Janpath maintains a deafening silence.

According to the JUH, "most Congress corporators" and some Congress leaders of Gujarat had actively participated in last year's riots.

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Riots happen in a state- the state machinery takes 3 days to get law and order back. Later some member of BJP and Congress are accused of their participation the riots… and what’s the conclusion we are supposed to draw – that BJP is communal and congress the secular force fighting those communal groups!!! I leave that to the intelligence of the reader.

I am not putting these points to say that Modi is a messiah of communal tolerance. But there is no case of Modi ‘plotting’ to kill Muslims either. The point I am trying to make is one cannot dub this as a trend and attitude of sangh to persecute Muslims. Modi did not win because of Gujarat riots, but won in spite of them. If Gujarat voted him again, it is not coz the Gujarat has suddenly become “communal”, but coz (1) they think that there is not much a CM could have done to control the rage during riots; after all he is a CM, not an omnipotent god to just say halt and all those people full of rage suddenly dropping their violence (2) the overall benefits they got far outweigh the shortfalls that those mistakes can be forgiven.