Never before was the situation for the Muslims in India so awful as today. An accused in terror attack in Mumbai 26/11 Fahim Ansari wants bail to come out and search a lawyer who can defend him. Reason: his lawyer Shahid Azmi has been shot dead by Chhota Rajan gang in the name of "patriotic killing." His move suggests that he accepts the judicial system. Despite its shortcoming he still trusts it to exonerate him ultimately. Azmi himself had gone through the rigmaroles of the judicial system and had successfully overcome hurdles including five years in jail when he completed junior college education and graduation. He knew that the system was biased against the minority and yet he did not lose faith in the institutions of the country. They redeemed him only to be killed as he was fighting for many others like him who were incarcerated. The Sachar commission has already documented that the highest number of inmates everywhere in the country is of Muslims.
Another accused is Saquib Nachan booked for local train blast at Mulund 2003. He has petitioned the SC to investigate all the cases of terrorism since 2002. There is something terribly wrong with conduct of investigation and the judicial system. According to him the Muslim youths are languishing in prisons across the country without trial. He has spent seven years in prison and others have also gone through the same length of time and even more.
The suffering of Nachan and Ansari or the late Azmi must also be viewed as an off shoot of the global strategy of Americans in the region. The gravitational pull that India and Pakistan exercise over the Americans is reflected in local bomb blasts in India.
Of late President Obama has authorized operation Af-Pak; and Marjah in Afghanistan has been baptized in fire. The fall out of this can and does affect situation in India. Muslims as a community in India are unconnected to the war on terror either in Afghanistan or Pakistan or even in Kashmir valley. The Af-Pak strategy and the Pakistan's strategic depth into Afghanistan primarily bring the US into the subcontinent. Every drone attack or ground advance beyond the Khayber pass means more bomb attacks in Pakistan and its spill over into India.
If Pune blast is a consequence of this it proves foreign secretary Nirupama Rao right because she had pointed out at the possibility. “We have to be constantly alert to this possibility.” However if we have not got the clues and found any lead in the matter, it would give away our weakness in the investigation of the matter. In a hurry, as it often happens, to show some breakthrough to the bosses or to affiliates in ideology, it is also possible that more people like Ansari or Nachan would be made to wear the cross. Or, like some of the accused in Malegaon blast of 2006 whose only "crime" was to carry placards depicting Laden denouncing the unjust war on Iraq. The entry of terrorism thanks to America has destroyed what Alexander Pope rejoiced, happy the man whose wish and care a few paternal acres bind, content to breathe his native air in his native town.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Thursday, February 18, 2010
Need to throw the net wider to catch Pune bombers
After the knee-jerk reaction against IM (Indian Mujahideen) there is a belated realization that the Pune blast of February 13, 2010 is a different kettle of fish. It bears the hallmark of another group. It was not for nothing that some conscientious people felt sleepless over the readily prepared and readily available explanation for every next bomb blast on the way.
Could the other group be the still elusive one responsible for Malegaon blast of 2006? That group might have used a couple of SIMI activists but the victims and the people in the town do not buy the argument that SIMI itself was involved. The plain reason is cogent enough. Despite a mammoth population of Muslims there is hardly a mass following of the banned organization. Nor are the people given to terrorism of any sort, notwithstanding, the sporadic outburst of communal riots that take place there.
Lt Col Shrikant Prasad Purohit (the main accused in 2008 Malegaon blast) may be behind the bars but some 500 activists trained at Goa hideout and at Bhonsla Military Schols of Nasik and Pune are still at large. He had stolen 60 kg of RDX from the army stock. Traces of it were found in the house of Sudhakar Chaturvedi in Matunga. Some of it Purohit had kept at his house in Pune. A part of it he had given to one Bhagwan for Samjhauta express incident. Then there is narco test record of the accused in Nanded blats. That analysis shows that explosives were given by Mithun Chakravarth (Purohit?) to the Hindutva activists when they were sent out to their assignment from time to time.
Another source of explosives could be from the scrap collection of Shankar Shelke of Ahmednager. On September 16 2006 the police had seized 195 kg of RDX and some bomb shells. Shelke disappeared without any explanation. May be he wanted to evade arrest. Strangely, he committed suicide on the following day. Aurangabad is often mentioned for the haul of arms and explosives. But little do you know that from the Sarpanch of a village near Aurangabad the police had recovered 300 kg of ammonium nitrate, timers and fusers.
The Superintendent of rural police Mr Rajwardhan had remarked that since Malegaon was a Muslim majority area only Muslims could have planted the bombs. Hindus would not dare to do such a thing. But on record there were Hindus there. They were supposed to be within the cemetery where two bombs had exploded and one did not explode. It is said that eighteen of them received compensations from the government. If this were so how come they were within the graveyard and the mosque located there! All the more puzzling is the fact that the police had assured that beggars would not be allowed to reach the gate or the compound wall. Equally astonishing is that the police were not in sight during the Friday prayer when the bombs went off. Rajwardhan had also said that if any Hindu would have done it he would have planted the bombs at night when the casualty would have been much higher as the crowd would be larger. This is a tell-tale remark. On the day the bombs went off, that is, September 8 2006, a television channel showed repeatedly a rickshaw driver of Pune. He narrated that he had carried two passengers who had reached Pune in the evening. They had come from Malegaon. He heard them wonder why it happened during the day when it was to go off at night. This looks ominous because two years later Sadhvi Pragyasingh Thakur also wondered at the low casualty figure that the bomb explosion at Bhiku chow on September 29 2008 had caused. She was speaking to Ramji Kalsangrah who had planted the bomb and he is still absconding.
It is pertinent to note that even Shiv Sena MLA from the region Dada Bhuse had asserted that Muslims from the town could not have done such a dastardly act. Even so the police who interrogated 20 Hindus let them off. They did not bother to even name them!
Could this be what Kavita Karkare calls (in the context of 26/11 in her foreword to Vinita Kamte's book To the Last Bullet) "shameful acts of cover up"?
All these add up to the relevance of Pune.
There are some reasons why this aspect should be thoroughly explored. The IM did not claim responsibility either before or after the blast. If IM is located in Pune in sizable number the least they would want is to arouse the suspicion of investigation authorities. On the other hand Abhinav Bharat is in a different class of its own. Like Sanatan Sansthan its denial is surely going to be accepted by the media without a hubbub created over it. Who now bothers much about Sanatan Sansthan's involvement in Margao, Vashi, Thane and other blasts?
The remote control blast in Pune reminds the commissioner of Pune Satyapal Singh of Malegaon 2006 blast as well as Mumbai local trains bombing of July 2006. In the graveyard in Malegaon the police had found a toy-circuit neatly packed in a plastic box from a place in the cemetery where the bomb did not explode. It could be because it was intended to go off at night while the other two bombs at the cemetery and at Mushawaratchowk went off at around 1.30 prayer time. A tailor from the shopping complex around the graveyard had picked up a corpse without torso with a false beard. It simply disappeared! How sinister!
However, the most sinister was the remark made by ATS chief KP Raghuvanshi. While reacting to the bombs the Hindus were making in Nanded he said with a smirk they were not meant for pooja!
Could the other group be the still elusive one responsible for Malegaon blast of 2006? That group might have used a couple of SIMI activists but the victims and the people in the town do not buy the argument that SIMI itself was involved. The plain reason is cogent enough. Despite a mammoth population of Muslims there is hardly a mass following of the banned organization. Nor are the people given to terrorism of any sort, notwithstanding, the sporadic outburst of communal riots that take place there.
Lt Col Shrikant Prasad Purohit (the main accused in 2008 Malegaon blast) may be behind the bars but some 500 activists trained at Goa hideout and at Bhonsla Military Schols of Nasik and Pune are still at large. He had stolen 60 kg of RDX from the army stock. Traces of it were found in the house of Sudhakar Chaturvedi in Matunga. Some of it Purohit had kept at his house in Pune. A part of it he had given to one Bhagwan for Samjhauta express incident. Then there is narco test record of the accused in Nanded blats. That analysis shows that explosives were given by Mithun Chakravarth (Purohit?) to the Hindutva activists when they were sent out to their assignment from time to time.
Another source of explosives could be from the scrap collection of Shankar Shelke of Ahmednager. On September 16 2006 the police had seized 195 kg of RDX and some bomb shells. Shelke disappeared without any explanation. May be he wanted to evade arrest. Strangely, he committed suicide on the following day. Aurangabad is often mentioned for the haul of arms and explosives. But little do you know that from the Sarpanch of a village near Aurangabad the police had recovered 300 kg of ammonium nitrate, timers and fusers.
The Superintendent of rural police Mr Rajwardhan had remarked that since Malegaon was a Muslim majority area only Muslims could have planted the bombs. Hindus would not dare to do such a thing. But on record there were Hindus there. They were supposed to be within the cemetery where two bombs had exploded and one did not explode. It is said that eighteen of them received compensations from the government. If this were so how come they were within the graveyard and the mosque located there! All the more puzzling is the fact that the police had assured that beggars would not be allowed to reach the gate or the compound wall. Equally astonishing is that the police were not in sight during the Friday prayer when the bombs went off. Rajwardhan had also said that if any Hindu would have done it he would have planted the bombs at night when the casualty would have been much higher as the crowd would be larger. This is a tell-tale remark. On the day the bombs went off, that is, September 8 2006, a television channel showed repeatedly a rickshaw driver of Pune. He narrated that he had carried two passengers who had reached Pune in the evening. They had come from Malegaon. He heard them wonder why it happened during the day when it was to go off at night. This looks ominous because two years later Sadhvi Pragyasingh Thakur also wondered at the low casualty figure that the bomb explosion at Bhiku chow on September 29 2008 had caused. She was speaking to Ramji Kalsangrah who had planted the bomb and he is still absconding.
It is pertinent to note that even Shiv Sena MLA from the region Dada Bhuse had asserted that Muslims from the town could not have done such a dastardly act. Even so the police who interrogated 20 Hindus let them off. They did not bother to even name them!
Could this be what Kavita Karkare calls (in the context of 26/11 in her foreword to Vinita Kamte's book To the Last Bullet) "shameful acts of cover up"?
All these add up to the relevance of Pune.
There are some reasons why this aspect should be thoroughly explored. The IM did not claim responsibility either before or after the blast. If IM is located in Pune in sizable number the least they would want is to arouse the suspicion of investigation authorities. On the other hand Abhinav Bharat is in a different class of its own. Like Sanatan Sansthan its denial is surely going to be accepted by the media without a hubbub created over it. Who now bothers much about Sanatan Sansthan's involvement in Margao, Vashi, Thane and other blasts?
The remote control blast in Pune reminds the commissioner of Pune Satyapal Singh of Malegaon 2006 blast as well as Mumbai local trains bombing of July 2006. In the graveyard in Malegaon the police had found a toy-circuit neatly packed in a plastic box from a place in the cemetery where the bomb did not explode. It could be because it was intended to go off at night while the other two bombs at the cemetery and at Mushawaratchowk went off at around 1.30 prayer time. A tailor from the shopping complex around the graveyard had picked up a corpse without torso with a false beard. It simply disappeared! How sinister!
However, the most sinister was the remark made by ATS chief KP Raghuvanshi. While reacting to the bombs the Hindus were making in Nanded he said with a smirk they were not meant for pooja!
Friday, February 12, 2010
Shahid Azmi, a career produced and consumed by judicial system
The murder of defense counsel of Fahim Ansari and those accused in Malegaon blast of 2006 is really very disturbing. It brings to mind how some of those alleged to be involved in 1993 serial blasts were bumped off by targeted assassination. The death of Shahid Azmi in the evening of February 11, 2010 is in a series of lawyers thrashed, shot at, injured or killed across the country in the aftermath of bomb blasts. Azmi is the third lawyer killed in Mumbai. In such cases the alleged terrorists were invariably suspected to be Muslims and if any Muslim lawyer showed any desire to defend the accused he was subjected to two heart wrenching problems. One, he would be targeted for engaging himself in antinational activity. Two, he would run mortal risk while discharging a duty that the constitution of the land allows him.
Lawyers daring to defend Muslims allegedly involved in terrorism have had a very awfully difficult and dangerous time. They were attacked and killed, injured and made to go through great hardship. This does not reflect well on the country, a democracy avowed to live by secularism. Many of them were set upon by hooligans and beaten up. This often happened when the police personnel were standing idly and did not do anything to protect the lawyers. Even within the precincts of the courts.
The kind of threats held out to the investigation authorities (like ATS chief Hemant Karkare) or lawyers intending to defend the accused (Shahid Azmi) does not die. It is kept alive with every sporadic bomb blast. No other than MNS chief Raj Thackeray had made such threats. He had issued threats to lawyers who wanted to defend the accused in the 7/11 2006 local train blasts in Mumbai. The advocate general of Maharashtra Mr Ravi Kadam had even given his consent to try Raj Thackeray on criminal charges. Raj had threatened violence while he was paying tribute to more than 180 people killed in the blasts. Such emotive reaction is a rabble rousing technique and instigative of taking law in one's hand and thereby lowering the position of the court and the law. Delhi lawyer Shakeel Ahmed had dared to defend Kamal Ansari, Khalid Shaikh and Mumtaz Chaudhary arrested from Bihar for their alleged involvement in 7/11.
Shahid had been the product of the judicial system of Mumbai. It nurtured him like a mother. But in the end the by product of it claimed him. That by product is the reactionary dark forces unleashed by those who do not want to accept its verdict or countenance it with equanimity. ‘‘It is a very unfortunate incident. He was an upcoming lawyer and very polite in court,’’ said Ujwala Nikam, special prosecutor.
In 1995 Shahid was arrested by Delhi police for being a member of SIM. While serving jail term he graduated and after release completed his law course and started practice. Mostly he took cases of innocent Muslims who were harassed and then arrested and tortured by the police. In the case of the fake encounter and murder of Ishrat Jehan he played a pivotal role to get justice to the bereaved family. Apparently free from narrow sectarianism his work and cause irked the Hindutva groups.
Diametrically opposed to their clamour for more and more draconian laws to deal with terror, he pleaded in court against the application of MOCOCA as well as POTA for his clients. His successful pleading in the Ghatkopar blasts case of 2002 led to the abrogation of POTA. Of the eighteen charged he got nine discharged. Police inspector Sachin Vaze killed Khwaja Yunus and disposed off the body. The remaining eight were acquitted by the POTA special court. Similarly his argument that MOCOCA can be applied in cases of organized crimes but not terror ultimately became instrumental in SC staying the three cases of 2006: 11/7 Mumbai serial blasts in locals, Malegaon bomb blasts, and the Aurangabad arms haul. The section 2 (1)(e) of MOCOCA focuses on "causing insurgency" could not be justified just on the basis of confession unless corroborated by circumstantial and hard evidence. It was a moment for reforming the harsh laws. This naturally brought praise from Ujwala Nikam. Shahid's was successful in preventing the screening of the film Black Friday in order not to prejudice the mind of the public in the 1993 trial. This was also a welcome move in the judiciary system.
What the Americans were doing in Guantanamo, Abu Gharib and Bagram prisons was also going on in the Arthur Road prison under the supervision and direct involvement of the jail superintendent Swathi Sathe. Shahid graphically delineated the torture. The accused were brutally assaulted in the prison with Sathe taking part in it. One had his arm broken and another had his head broken. A son of one of the accused saw his father being taken away in police van with blood still oozing as he waited with a tiffin box he was carrying for his father. The madam wanted them to confess to the crimes the police alleged they had committed. She claimed that they had created insurgency there while they were being transferred to other prisons. Even the transfer of the prisoners was illegal and violated the norms. The judges found it very unbecoming of her and passed stricture against her and she was transferred. Her 'transfer' was without loss of pay or blood while theirs was so sanguinary!
Shahid's brief life of 32 years was potent in works as far as fight for the prisoner is concerned. He was a 'prisoner of conscience' himself, a TADA prisoner who never felt shy about it. He reminds one of the famous English lawyer who founded Amnesty International to free the innocents imprisoned on cooked up charges.
Lawyers daring to defend Muslims allegedly involved in terrorism have had a very awfully difficult and dangerous time. They were attacked and killed, injured and made to go through great hardship. This does not reflect well on the country, a democracy avowed to live by secularism. Many of them were set upon by hooligans and beaten up. This often happened when the police personnel were standing idly and did not do anything to protect the lawyers. Even within the precincts of the courts.
The kind of threats held out to the investigation authorities (like ATS chief Hemant Karkare) or lawyers intending to defend the accused (Shahid Azmi) does not die. It is kept alive with every sporadic bomb blast. No other than MNS chief Raj Thackeray had made such threats. He had issued threats to lawyers who wanted to defend the accused in the 7/11 2006 local train blasts in Mumbai. The advocate general of Maharashtra Mr Ravi Kadam had even given his consent to try Raj Thackeray on criminal charges. Raj had threatened violence while he was paying tribute to more than 180 people killed in the blasts. Such emotive reaction is a rabble rousing technique and instigative of taking law in one's hand and thereby lowering the position of the court and the law. Delhi lawyer Shakeel Ahmed had dared to defend Kamal Ansari, Khalid Shaikh and Mumtaz Chaudhary arrested from Bihar for their alleged involvement in 7/11.
Shahid had been the product of the judicial system of Mumbai. It nurtured him like a mother. But in the end the by product of it claimed him. That by product is the reactionary dark forces unleashed by those who do not want to accept its verdict or countenance it with equanimity. ‘‘It is a very unfortunate incident. He was an upcoming lawyer and very polite in court,’’ said Ujwala Nikam, special prosecutor.
In 1995 Shahid was arrested by Delhi police for being a member of SIM. While serving jail term he graduated and after release completed his law course and started practice. Mostly he took cases of innocent Muslims who were harassed and then arrested and tortured by the police. In the case of the fake encounter and murder of Ishrat Jehan he played a pivotal role to get justice to the bereaved family. Apparently free from narrow sectarianism his work and cause irked the Hindutva groups.
Diametrically opposed to their clamour for more and more draconian laws to deal with terror, he pleaded in court against the application of MOCOCA as well as POTA for his clients. His successful pleading in the Ghatkopar blasts case of 2002 led to the abrogation of POTA. Of the eighteen charged he got nine discharged. Police inspector Sachin Vaze killed Khwaja Yunus and disposed off the body. The remaining eight were acquitted by the POTA special court. Similarly his argument that MOCOCA can be applied in cases of organized crimes but not terror ultimately became instrumental in SC staying the three cases of 2006: 11/7 Mumbai serial blasts in locals, Malegaon bomb blasts, and the Aurangabad arms haul. The section 2 (1)(e) of MOCOCA focuses on "causing insurgency" could not be justified just on the basis of confession unless corroborated by circumstantial and hard evidence. It was a moment for reforming the harsh laws. This naturally brought praise from Ujwala Nikam. Shahid's was successful in preventing the screening of the film Black Friday in order not to prejudice the mind of the public in the 1993 trial. This was also a welcome move in the judiciary system.
What the Americans were doing in Guantanamo, Abu Gharib and Bagram prisons was also going on in the Arthur Road prison under the supervision and direct involvement of the jail superintendent Swathi Sathe. Shahid graphically delineated the torture. The accused were brutally assaulted in the prison with Sathe taking part in it. One had his arm broken and another had his head broken. A son of one of the accused saw his father being taken away in police van with blood still oozing as he waited with a tiffin box he was carrying for his father. The madam wanted them to confess to the crimes the police alleged they had committed. She claimed that they had created insurgency there while they were being transferred to other prisons. Even the transfer of the prisoners was illegal and violated the norms. The judges found it very unbecoming of her and passed stricture against her and she was transferred. Her 'transfer' was without loss of pay or blood while theirs was so sanguinary!
Shahid's brief life of 32 years was potent in works as far as fight for the prisoner is concerned. He was a 'prisoner of conscience' himself, a TADA prisoner who never felt shy about it. He reminds one of the famous English lawyer who founded Amnesty International to free the innocents imprisoned on cooked up charges.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
Intra civilization clash
Bernard Lewis was the most remarkable critic of Islam for he never saw any good either in the faith or the people who live by it. It was he who had counselled George W Bush to attack Iraq because he thought that the Muslims were primitive people of barbaric practices incapable of any refinement of civilization. His hatred for the Muslim fuelled his epithet, The Clash of Civilization. Much after him Samuel Huntington developed it into an elaborate theory which the likes of Tony Blair and AB Vajpayee very eagerly bought outright.
However, as it turned out the clash of civilizations is rather intra than inter civilizations. As Attorney General Eric Holder of US said about Abdulmuttallab case : "There’s a desire to ignore the facts to try to score political points. It’s a little shocking.” This present trend in US of neo cons opposing the upholders of the civil laws and liberties is intra civilization clash. Much of the violations of human rights and collateral damages inflicted on civilians in Iraq, Afghanistan as well as the extraordinary renditions, manoeuring intelligence reports to prepare for war and water boarding are the works of Dick Cheny, George W Bush, Paul Wolfwitz, Elizabeth Cheny and British Prime Minister Tony Blair, etc. Eric Holder and Samantha Power among many others would like to turn against use of drones killing innocents or what transpired in the case of Dr Aafia Siddiqui and her two missing children.
Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab boarded a plane on Christmas day 2009. He was cleared by ICTS International security agency (founded by Shin Bet, Israel's civil security agency) at Schipho airport at Amsterdam. There was no passport with him. Strangely enough he bought first class ticket. He had a bomb sewn in the underwear. The security agency could see his crotch very well in the x-ray and yet it cleared him. He tried to blow up the plane but it failed because there was no blasting cap attached to it. The initial report did not mention about the Israeli company clearing him. Nor was it revealed that the amount of explosive could hardly destroy the arm rest. By the time it came out the harm was done. His name and alleged link to al Qaeda had been the headline news around the world. The purpose behind this is clear: stereotyping him as a fanatic Muslim terrorist. This happened notwithstanding the fact that his own father had alerted CIA station chief in Nigeria about it. What was not disclosed at first was that his father was a banker who oversaw defence deal with Israeli Defence Forces personnel to train Nigerians in security. FBI said that the radical Yemeni cleric Anwar al-Awlaki had told Abdulmutallab to blow the bomb. But there is no proof that he ever went to the cleric or had any contact with him. Thus he was made to fit in the pattern of 9/11 hijackers who were trained in San Diego, New Mexico (where Awlaki was born) and Mjor Nidal Hasan who were inspired by the cleric.
In India we have the cross fertilized breed. Far too long the IB and RAW and local investigation agencies in tandem with the police had been creating false impression. Their objective was more or less communal. When the truth dawned upon some it was stunningly shocking. It is pertinent to remember what the Union home secretary Gopal Krishna Pillai said on December 9 2009 about Hindu fringe groups' involvement when bombs went off in mosques in Hyderabad, Malegaon, Delhi and elsewhere. "It took us a few years to convince the system that we need to look out, and we were able to finally lay our hands on the Colonel Purohit (of the Malegaon blasts) network," Similarly, there have been several inputs that showed that terror against India has tentacles outside Pakistan. He said some of the emails and communication linked to Indian Mujahideen had originated from the US.
Inaddition to the truth that home secretary asserted there are other dark forces represented by RSS, Shiv Sena Shri Ram Sena in India who simply refuse to accept the truth. They vehemently opposed ATS chief Hemant Karkare and hinted darkly that unless he stopped in his track he would be in grave trouble. What happened thereafter is now history. These people are like Jack and his bloody hunters in "Lord of the Flies." In contrast Karkare was like Ralph the epitome of brilliance of mind and social harmony and commitment to civil laws. Both these groups are the product of the same civilization.
Bal Thackeray, Narendra Modi and VHP were breathing down the neck of Karkare when he caught sadhvi Pragyasingh Thakur and Purohit, etc. But when Karkare was killed they totally changed their stance and started calling him a martyr. Shiv Sena and Uma Bharti even offered Purohit tickets in the election. Shiv Sena wanted to pay for the lawyer who would defend Purohit and Sadhvi. On the other hand they openly threatened lawyers of any Muslim accused of the similar crimes. In most other cases like Samjhauta express incident the police and the investigating agencies fabricated all kinds of lies to blame Muslims when it was becoming clear that Purohit and Abhinav Bharat were behind them.
The recent report of arrest of Shahzad Ahmad has again refocused attention on the pattern of lies. Now we are told that he had fired a single bullet at inspector Mohan Chand Sharma. Till his capture we were told that Atif Ameen and Sajjad had fired from their guns and that caused the death of Sharma. Even the NCHR had bought this claim and accepted it. The neighbours in Batla house have maintained that there is one exit with two doors opening on the samd place and if Shahzas and Junaid had escaped the peple should have seen them. They did not see anyone escape. The cops who rushed up at hearing the shooting would have surely met and apprehended Junaid and Shahzad. They did not apprehend them. Then reports of Shahzad attending a flying course in Banglore to mount a 9/11 in India was leaked to media by the police obviously. The phobia rose in a crescendo. The route of escape Shahzad and Junaid took is another cocktail of lies. According to Indian Express the duo went to the bus station on foot and boarded a bus to Badarpur. Then they took train to Mumbai without knowing where it was bound. The Times of India carries two versions. One, the two went to Aligarh by train or bus, then to Lucknow and finally to Azamgarh. Two, they went to Aligarh, then to Bulundsaher, Lucknow, Khalispure, Jaipur, Jodhpur and finally to Mumbai.
The police did not make an inventory of bullets and cartridges,etc. The scene was also without any residual evidence there much like the incident of Aafia Siddiqui. In her case she was accused of assaulting eight American military officers at Bagram prison in Afghanistan. She was too feeble to lift a gun let alone snatching it from the burly soldiers and belabouring them and then shooting them. Neither the soldiers nor the site gave any trace of the shoot out on July 18 2008. The American ambassador to Pakistan Anne Patterson had been denying till then that Aafia was even held by the Americans. In fact she, a US citizen as well as her two children, was kidnapped from Pakistan on March 30 2003 and put through the ignominious extraordinary renditions and taken to Bagram. She was raped and tortured for five years. She wailed so loudly in the lonely nights that her cries were heard ringing in the air far and wide. The US soldiers started calling her Lady Gray of Bagram. The ambassador would arrange luxurious parties and brief the journalists the version that the army gave out. In this way falsehoold was deliberately spread.
Her wailing and agonized shrieks would remind people here how Khawaja Yunus was tortured and given water boarding punishment in Mumbai. His mother also wept and cried in the stillness of the night in Parbhani. Police Inspector Vaze disposed off the body of Yunus much the same way Vanzara had done the body of Kauserbi, wife of Sohrabuddin in Gujarat. In all such cases the forces of evil were at work, forces which would like to use the extreme extent of terrorizing their hapless victims.
To oppose such evils there are people like Karkare and of late Chidambrum who would be upright and more responsive to human rights. This kind of clash is within the homeland culture of a country.
Currently Mumbai is a witness to this. The police and intelligence agencies have never bothered about the fiefdom over which Bal Thackeray ruled like a feudal lord. On the eve of the serial bomb blasts in locals on 7/11, the Shiv Sainiks had burnt vehicles and vandalized shops and commercial establishments protesting over the alleged mud slung at the statue of Thackeray's wife. When Annad Dighe, Shiv Sena pramukh of Thane, died, the sainiks had vandalized the Singhania hospital where Mr Singhania's aeroplane was also kept. In the emergency wards of the hospital there were very serious cases in ICUs. They had a hell of a time. There was also the murder case of Ramesh Kini in which a finger of suspicion pointed at the Thackerays. To show solidarity with the victims of medieval revenge even the prime minister, VP Singh, had visited the widow of Kini. This last captures the clash between the people who let loose the law of the jungle and those who abide by the rule of law. In the countdown to the release of My Name is Khan we wait with baited breath what might the hordes shouting My Name is Thackeray would do. Would they again set upon the hapless North Indians commuting long distances for jobs, interviews, examinations, driving their taxis, etc.
Monday, February 8, 2010
Chidambrum blows new spirit of national unity
It has been ages since we have had a home minister who is unfettered by either communalism or bias. This augurs well for a new approach and also a renewed commitment to national unity.
In the conference of chief ministers of states and governors of central territories on February 7, 2010 PC Chidambrum remarked that the home department had no ideology except national unity and security. This is welcome sign of self assertion as he has now made it necessary for all investigation and security agencies including National Security Advisor to report to him every day. That too together, so that they can all sort out with mutual consultation and cross questioning matters that relate to our country.
Erstwhile, it was the prerogative of the NSA to directly brief the Prime Minister who may or may not hold the home portfolio. No one could cross check him on his report and inputs. In the new dispensation the whole set up of the home ministry will have to verify and cross check the sources of information and the basis of it.
This was in the offing as the home minister used his mental lancet to pry open the basis of the report on the 50 paragliders that Lashkar-e-taiba had acquired. The place and number was deliberately changed to create phobia in the country at the time of the Republic day. What was truly alarming was that for the first time in nineteen years the tricolour was not unfurled at the Lal chowk in Srinager. It was given a space on the third page while the print media as well as the electronic media upfronted the doctored paraglider news. That hardly served our national interest except creating 'obfuscation upon obfuscation' ala IB's fond bedfellows, FBI.
Chidambrum also pulled up the chief minister of Maharashtrta on the carpet. There were laws already available to govern the state in the face of unruly and very communal and divisive stand of the Shiv Sena and MNS during the showdown over the issue of north Indians in Mumbai. The police failed to register any case against them. Bal Thackeray's front page abusive and violent language of retaliation against the Muslims led to the bloodbath in Bombay in 1992-93. He as at it again when Rahul Gandhi visited Mumbai on February 5, 2010. He remarked, and what saamna fronpaged, "'Lokmut'" chya vatvaghdhacha landa dhanda." The derogative word landa refers to Muslims. Seventeen years after 1992-93 he has not changed nor will he change as he knows that the police are in his pocket. He is above the law of the land. Seventeen years after that turbulent time the police can arrest another accused of Muslim community involved in the serial bomb blasts. But they have not taken any action against Thackeray. Nor have the courts been that fair in trying him.
Chidambrum marks a change. By asserting that his home department is more sensitive and responsive to human rights violation he is instilling a sense of accountability that would be surely tested in the days to come.
The gimmicks of Narendra Modi also did not cut any ice. By repeatedly telling the nation that four times his state assembly passed the bill on organized crimes (GUJCOC), he failed to oblige the home minister to give his consent. Modi not only applied POTA most discriminately against the Muslims, but he also registered under POTA all the sundry crimes which Muslims had allegedly committed. No one, not even Babu Bajrangi, has been booked under POTA!
This flop of Modi has to be understood in the context of the wind of change that is blowing from the home department. Chidambrum has surely equated communalism with terrorism as a threat to the country. It is not enough that Gujarat has filled up all the police vacancies unlike UP (2,04,021 vacancies to be filled up)or Maharashtra. What the nation would and should test in the coming days is whether the police in Gujarat book the criminal thugs let loose by Modi and whether the principle of chain of command does lead to him. That he is brought to book for the pogrom of 2002. The day it happens it would be a litmus test. It would also be the "last expression of the mind of the parliament."
In the conference of chief ministers of states and governors of central territories on February 7, 2010 PC Chidambrum remarked that the home department had no ideology except national unity and security. This is welcome sign of self assertion as he has now made it necessary for all investigation and security agencies including National Security Advisor to report to him every day. That too together, so that they can all sort out with mutual consultation and cross questioning matters that relate to our country.
Erstwhile, it was the prerogative of the NSA to directly brief the Prime Minister who may or may not hold the home portfolio. No one could cross check him on his report and inputs. In the new dispensation the whole set up of the home ministry will have to verify and cross check the sources of information and the basis of it.
This was in the offing as the home minister used his mental lancet to pry open the basis of the report on the 50 paragliders that Lashkar-e-taiba had acquired. The place and number was deliberately changed to create phobia in the country at the time of the Republic day. What was truly alarming was that for the first time in nineteen years the tricolour was not unfurled at the Lal chowk in Srinager. It was given a space on the third page while the print media as well as the electronic media upfronted the doctored paraglider news. That hardly served our national interest except creating 'obfuscation upon obfuscation' ala IB's fond bedfellows, FBI.
Chidambrum also pulled up the chief minister of Maharashtrta on the carpet. There were laws already available to govern the state in the face of unruly and very communal and divisive stand of the Shiv Sena and MNS during the showdown over the issue of north Indians in Mumbai. The police failed to register any case against them. Bal Thackeray's front page abusive and violent language of retaliation against the Muslims led to the bloodbath in Bombay in 1992-93. He as at it again when Rahul Gandhi visited Mumbai on February 5, 2010. He remarked, and what saamna fronpaged, "'Lokmut'" chya vatvaghdhacha landa dhanda." The derogative word landa refers to Muslims. Seventeen years after 1992-93 he has not changed nor will he change as he knows that the police are in his pocket. He is above the law of the land. Seventeen years after that turbulent time the police can arrest another accused of Muslim community involved in the serial bomb blasts. But they have not taken any action against Thackeray. Nor have the courts been that fair in trying him.
Chidambrum marks a change. By asserting that his home department is more sensitive and responsive to human rights violation he is instilling a sense of accountability that would be surely tested in the days to come.
The gimmicks of Narendra Modi also did not cut any ice. By repeatedly telling the nation that four times his state assembly passed the bill on organized crimes (GUJCOC), he failed to oblige the home minister to give his consent. Modi not only applied POTA most discriminately against the Muslims, but he also registered under POTA all the sundry crimes which Muslims had allegedly committed. No one, not even Babu Bajrangi, has been booked under POTA!
This flop of Modi has to be understood in the context of the wind of change that is blowing from the home department. Chidambrum has surely equated communalism with terrorism as a threat to the country. It is not enough that Gujarat has filled up all the police vacancies unlike UP (2,04,021 vacancies to be filled up)or Maharashtra. What the nation would and should test in the coming days is whether the police in Gujarat book the criminal thugs let loose by Modi and whether the principle of chain of command does lead to him. That he is brought to book for the pogrom of 2002. The day it happens it would be a litmus test. It would also be the "last expression of the mind of the parliament."
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
Parochial terrorism
A healthy debate can and does churn up interesting aspects of life and its complex problems. In the context of the debate going on regarding north Indians vis-à-vis Marathi manoos what has come to the fore is that Indians have to pass through the linguistic shibboleth if they have to cross into Mumbai or into the north east, particularly Assam.
In the Bible the word shibboleth means 'ear of corn'. The Jews had difficulty in pronouncing the word and thus they were identified and persecuted. So etymologically the word has a context of terrorizing a whole community.
In our national context ostracizing is still the functional use of the shibboleth. In the ancient time it was used as a tool to determine the nationals of Judaism. Our society is passing through national and intra-national aspects of this phenomenon. However, terror is the heart of the matter.
Shiv Sena and MNS use the word manoos for men as a composite noun with 'Marathi'. This gives them a kind of sense of identifying with the land of birth. This is rather supra-logical as a section of people in Indore (Madhya Pradesh), Barkatpura (Hyderabad), Vadodra (Gujarat) also speak Marathi. The Thackeray family should know it well. For, by anglicizing their name they are nowhere near the sophistication of the English novelist born in Bengal, William Makepeace Thackeray. Nor have they shed crudity which migrating back and forth between Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh should have brought about. It has also failed to instill the kind of national ethos of being together which is essential for the integrity of the nation. Using patriotism for the cricket pitch and playing it for an exclusivist sub linguistic culture smacks of what Dr Samuel Johnson so famously said that patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel. The culture of taking on the different language groups from time to time--Tamils at one time, North Indians now--is fraught with danger. It also flies in the face of the other dominant ideology of 'cultural nationalism' of which Rajnath Singh and his saffron groups are so proud of.
BJP and RSS have had a divisive look at the migrants' issue. In Assam they vociferously cry foul at the Bengali speaking migrants as Bangladeshi even if all the Bengali speaking people are not Bangladeshi. Many of the migrants are Indian Muslims of Bengali origin. The saffron groups do not say anything about the Tamil speaking migrants who are displaced in Sri Lanka and sneak into India as refugees. For them the shibboleth is the litmus test of faith of the migrants. Not language but religion is the main component of 'cultural nationalism'.
This is even more ominously brought out in the present controversy when Bal Thackeray and his son Uddhav mouth the bravado of saving Hindi speakers (read, Hindus but not bhayas) in the communal riots of 1992. Similarly, the 'Italian mummy' who is so 'Indianised' not only in dress and language and dot on forehead but also eating arhar ki dal and having married an Indian cannot have a right to say that Mumbai belongs to her.
In a way the innuendos used by Thackeray senior often border on sexual prowess or macho self delusion. Much like the kechdi eating Gujarati whom Babu Bajrangi wanted to show their virility by raping and murdering Muslim girls and women. Thackeray says that since Rahul Gandhi cannot grow physically, he has grown horns and wisdom tooth. This is washing Rahul's dirty linen in the public by making out the youthful leader as a cuckold. Who is frustrated by what is difficult to say.
But what is not so difficult to know is that this violation of modesty is sheer terror. It is an outrage as terror is an outrage. What the FBI lady interrogator did to Fahim Ansari, accused in 26/11, is the nearest in comparison. Did she do to Ansari what the prostitute in Catcher in the Rye of late JD Salinger do to Holden Caulfield, jab at his crotch in frustration?
The Marathi manoos would truly enjoy this boisterous jab as pure fun. But if the hordes of Saniks lunge at Bihari students and UP migrant workers in railway station, examination centres or work places it would be pure terror. The cops who shot dead the Bihari youth wielding a gun in the Mumbai bus few months back made no mistake in going for their kill. Hope, the volunteers in khaki chaddi and holding lathis would not hear clarion call from Ram Madhav.
Fortunately, in the present scenario the opponents are only sparring for the time being.
In the Bible the word shibboleth means 'ear of corn'. The Jews had difficulty in pronouncing the word and thus they were identified and persecuted. So etymologically the word has a context of terrorizing a whole community.
In our national context ostracizing is still the functional use of the shibboleth. In the ancient time it was used as a tool to determine the nationals of Judaism. Our society is passing through national and intra-national aspects of this phenomenon. However, terror is the heart of the matter.
Shiv Sena and MNS use the word manoos for men as a composite noun with 'Marathi'. This gives them a kind of sense of identifying with the land of birth. This is rather supra-logical as a section of people in Indore (Madhya Pradesh), Barkatpura (Hyderabad), Vadodra (Gujarat) also speak Marathi. The Thackeray family should know it well. For, by anglicizing their name they are nowhere near the sophistication of the English novelist born in Bengal, William Makepeace Thackeray. Nor have they shed crudity which migrating back and forth between Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh should have brought about. It has also failed to instill the kind of national ethos of being together which is essential for the integrity of the nation. Using patriotism for the cricket pitch and playing it for an exclusivist sub linguistic culture smacks of what Dr Samuel Johnson so famously said that patriotism is the last refuge of the scoundrel. The culture of taking on the different language groups from time to time--Tamils at one time, North Indians now--is fraught with danger. It also flies in the face of the other dominant ideology of 'cultural nationalism' of which Rajnath Singh and his saffron groups are so proud of.
BJP and RSS have had a divisive look at the migrants' issue. In Assam they vociferously cry foul at the Bengali speaking migrants as Bangladeshi even if all the Bengali speaking people are not Bangladeshi. Many of the migrants are Indian Muslims of Bengali origin. The saffron groups do not say anything about the Tamil speaking migrants who are displaced in Sri Lanka and sneak into India as refugees. For them the shibboleth is the litmus test of faith of the migrants. Not language but religion is the main component of 'cultural nationalism'.
This is even more ominously brought out in the present controversy when Bal Thackeray and his son Uddhav mouth the bravado of saving Hindi speakers (read, Hindus but not bhayas) in the communal riots of 1992. Similarly, the 'Italian mummy' who is so 'Indianised' not only in dress and language and dot on forehead but also eating arhar ki dal and having married an Indian cannot have a right to say that Mumbai belongs to her.
In a way the innuendos used by Thackeray senior often border on sexual prowess or macho self delusion. Much like the kechdi eating Gujarati whom Babu Bajrangi wanted to show their virility by raping and murdering Muslim girls and women. Thackeray says that since Rahul Gandhi cannot grow physically, he has grown horns and wisdom tooth. This is washing Rahul's dirty linen in the public by making out the youthful leader as a cuckold. Who is frustrated by what is difficult to say.
But what is not so difficult to know is that this violation of modesty is sheer terror. It is an outrage as terror is an outrage. What the FBI lady interrogator did to Fahim Ansari, accused in 26/11, is the nearest in comparison. Did she do to Ansari what the prostitute in Catcher in the Rye of late JD Salinger do to Holden Caulfield, jab at his crotch in frustration?
The Marathi manoos would truly enjoy this boisterous jab as pure fun. But if the hordes of Saniks lunge at Bihari students and UP migrant workers in railway station, examination centres or work places it would be pure terror. The cops who shot dead the Bihari youth wielding a gun in the Mumbai bus few months back made no mistake in going for their kill. Hope, the volunteers in khaki chaddi and holding lathis would not hear clarion call from Ram Madhav.
Fortunately, in the present scenario the opponents are only sparring for the time being.
Monday, February 1, 2010
Gadkari's espousing Moditva: early straw in the wind
Most egregious folly took place years ago when the portrait of VD Savarkar was installed into the august hall of the Parliament of India. What Nitin Gadkari said is a foot note to it. The people did not comprehend the full significance of the event. Such is the low level awareness that many do not know that the assassins of Mahatma Gandhi had visited Savarkar sadam (house) before they set out on their heinous journey to Delhi to kill Gandhi. That some of them had also carried guns for Savarkar to inspect whether it would be suitable for them to carry it on their journey. That he had given them money for ticket to travel. That act of putting the portrait of Savarkar in the parliament made the killer look as respectable as the killed.
That impunity in putting Savarkar's portrait was made possible because of the respectability BJP acquired after it came to power as a result of deepening of the communal gulf as a result of the demolition of Babri mosque. The people were carried away by the turmoil of the nineties. So committed are Vajpayees and Advanis in the flanks of the RSS that they would dare break any government for their ideology.
Though the BJP took several decades to accept Gandhism it never accepted his nonviolence because it was committed to violence in the name of its cultural nationalism. The founder member of RSS Dr Munje had travelled to Italy to learn how large numbers of people could be killed as the traditional stick RSS volunteers carry is not capable of killing many in a single blow. The ideology based cadres of BJP would use violence against those who do not subscribe to their ideology. They believe that the minorities are second class citizens of the country and have no future in the country. The minorities exist at the sufferance of the majority. This trend of violence and its justification by the likes of Arun Shourie has continued and has acquired more menacing hues in the figures of Lt Col Shrikant Prasad Purobit and others.
Gadkari is the enamoured of Mohan Bhagwat personally and of RSS generally. He is now playing with gusto for the gallery who has accolades showered on him. In his speech Gadkari gave the impression of a Mark Antony praising the conspirators who had killed Julius Caesar although Antony's brief was to quietly bury Caesar so that no commotion breaks out. The new president of BJP remarked: "Modi had digested well the ideology of Gandhiji and Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya, one of the founders of the BJP. Development of villages was Gandhiji's aim and is Modi's aim too."
Whittling down Gandhism and augmenting Moditva is just behind the surface. What Modi has done in his state as far as the record of pogrom against Muslim and other minorities is concerned and subverting justice, is so well entrenched that even the apex court of India has failed to bring within its ambit to try and punish all the criminals. The role of the police in unearthing the total enormity of crimes committed there is abysmal. To give justice to the victims will require not just "regime change" but Nuremberg type of trial. For that our young republic has to mature for some more time. Even after lapse of many years we do not have the text of the letter that President KR Narayanan had written to Prime Minister AB Vajpayee regarding the massacre of 2002. Conspiracy of silence in the matter of one is matched by the audacity of propagating the falsehood in the other.
When Gadkar and Modi were holding the tamasha of unveiling the statue of Deendayal Upadhya in Porbandar on the anniversary of the assassination of Gandhi the survivours of the Gulberg society were petitioning against special judge B U Joshi, charging him with harbouring a bias against them. In the trial of the special court Imtiyaz Khan Pathan and Rupa Dara Modi had identified the accused murderers standing at the back of the court on Thursday January 28, 2010. Joshi did not allow others to continue identifying them. The session court of GB Shah rejected the petition even when it had power to intervene. Such pettifogging delaying tactics is calculated to deny justice. This medieval conception of the dispensation of justice prevails in Modi's Gujarat. Who is sweeping this under the carpet and why?
It is well known by now that Modi had harboured the ace killer of 2002, Babu Bajrangi. He got a government bungalow in Mount Abu for Bajrangi against whom the commissioner of police PC Pande had issued arrest warrant and shoot at sight order. In addition to mass killing he was also the man who had cut open the stomach of a Muslim woman and pierced her foetus with a spear. Not just that he even gloated over it. To shield this low inhuman beast Modi changed judges one after another until he lighted upon pliant justice Akshay Mehta who freed Bajrangi from jail.
Even on the day Gadkari compared Modi with Gandhi, the chief minister had ordered detention of Arjun Modwadia, the sitting MLA of Congress from Porbander who was also erstwhile leader of the opposition. To make the official ceremony event free if Modi could do this what else could he have not done to Ehsan Jafri!
That impunity in putting Savarkar's portrait was made possible because of the respectability BJP acquired after it came to power as a result of deepening of the communal gulf as a result of the demolition of Babri mosque. The people were carried away by the turmoil of the nineties. So committed are Vajpayees and Advanis in the flanks of the RSS that they would dare break any government for their ideology.
Though the BJP took several decades to accept Gandhism it never accepted his nonviolence because it was committed to violence in the name of its cultural nationalism. The founder member of RSS Dr Munje had travelled to Italy to learn how large numbers of people could be killed as the traditional stick RSS volunteers carry is not capable of killing many in a single blow. The ideology based cadres of BJP would use violence against those who do not subscribe to their ideology. They believe that the minorities are second class citizens of the country and have no future in the country. The minorities exist at the sufferance of the majority. This trend of violence and its justification by the likes of Arun Shourie has continued and has acquired more menacing hues in the figures of Lt Col Shrikant Prasad Purobit and others.
Gadkari is the enamoured of Mohan Bhagwat personally and of RSS generally. He is now playing with gusto for the gallery who has accolades showered on him. In his speech Gadkari gave the impression of a Mark Antony praising the conspirators who had killed Julius Caesar although Antony's brief was to quietly bury Caesar so that no commotion breaks out. The new president of BJP remarked: "Modi had digested well the ideology of Gandhiji and Pandit Deendayal Upadhyaya, one of the founders of the BJP. Development of villages was Gandhiji's aim and is Modi's aim too."
Whittling down Gandhism and augmenting Moditva is just behind the surface. What Modi has done in his state as far as the record of pogrom against Muslim and other minorities is concerned and subverting justice, is so well entrenched that even the apex court of India has failed to bring within its ambit to try and punish all the criminals. The role of the police in unearthing the total enormity of crimes committed there is abysmal. To give justice to the victims will require not just "regime change" but Nuremberg type of trial. For that our young republic has to mature for some more time. Even after lapse of many years we do not have the text of the letter that President KR Narayanan had written to Prime Minister AB Vajpayee regarding the massacre of 2002. Conspiracy of silence in the matter of one is matched by the audacity of propagating the falsehood in the other.
When Gadkar and Modi were holding the tamasha of unveiling the statue of Deendayal Upadhya in Porbandar on the anniversary of the assassination of Gandhi the survivours of the Gulberg society were petitioning against special judge B U Joshi, charging him with harbouring a bias against them. In the trial of the special court Imtiyaz Khan Pathan and Rupa Dara Modi had identified the accused murderers standing at the back of the court on Thursday January 28, 2010. Joshi did not allow others to continue identifying them. The session court of GB Shah rejected the petition even when it had power to intervene. Such pettifogging delaying tactics is calculated to deny justice. This medieval conception of the dispensation of justice prevails in Modi's Gujarat. Who is sweeping this under the carpet and why?
It is well known by now that Modi had harboured the ace killer of 2002, Babu Bajrangi. He got a government bungalow in Mount Abu for Bajrangi against whom the commissioner of police PC Pande had issued arrest warrant and shoot at sight order. In addition to mass killing he was also the man who had cut open the stomach of a Muslim woman and pierced her foetus with a spear. Not just that he even gloated over it. To shield this low inhuman beast Modi changed judges one after another until he lighted upon pliant justice Akshay Mehta who freed Bajrangi from jail.
Even on the day Gadkari compared Modi with Gandhi, the chief minister had ordered detention of Arjun Modwadia, the sitting MLA of Congress from Porbander who was also erstwhile leader of the opposition. To make the official ceremony event free if Modi could do this what else could he have not done to Ehsan Jafri!
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
