The report from Kanpur says that the BJP will toe the line of RSS and defend sadhvi Pragyasingh Thakur, who had provided her motorbike in the bomb blast in Malegaon on September 29 and hence was part of the conspiracy. The meeting of RSS seniors there has churned out this strategy on which the election would have to be fought. There is no need to have inhibition over what the sadhvi and her accomplices have done. The sangh feels more emboldened today as it enjoys comprehensive support of the Hindu population of the country although it is clearly reprehensible that conspiracy in high places and gross violation of laws do not match with the kind of democracy the country boasts of.
But this should not come as a surprise because we have fallen so low in our own estimate that everything goes in the name of religion and nationalism. After all how many felt outraged over the pogroms of Muslims in Gujarat? Compounding into this nightmare was the specter of the familiar and ubiquitous doppelganger in tunic with beard and cap although post September 29 Malegaon shows that beards and caps and tunics as well as veil for ladies are not in short supply. Do not be shocked by the terrorist at your dining table in the morning.
The coterie at Kanpur bears all the hallmarks of Delhi or Lucknow vintage 1947-48. Rajeshwar Dayal was the secretary in the central government when the deputy inspector general of UP, BLL Jaitley, came to his house with two trunks of documents of details of houses and establishments of Muslims in the western part of the state marked out and with accurate details on how to approach them. RSS had collected the information in a conspiracy to systematically attack and destroy the houses and properties of the Muslims and kill them. RSS chief Golwalker had prepared this sinister plot personally. So serious was the discovery that Dayal called it “incontrovertible evidence of a dastardly conspiracy to create a communal holocaust” and took the matter immediately to the Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Nehru surprised him by not ordering arrest of Golwalker. Instead he wanted the cabinet to discuss the matter. The cabinet dithered and filibustered. But the premier asked Dayal to write a letter to RSS boss Golwalker about the cache. Golwalker got the wind of what was transpiring as RSS had planted moles in the high places and one such tipped him off. He changed his residence frequently to dodge the government missive. The government servant was unable to meet him although he was in the same neighbourhood.
It is highly significant to note that Malegaon blast is connected to Kanpur. The ATS is hunting for a retired colonel in UP who had directly helped in preparing the blast. The chemical analysis links the explosion to the other explosions in Kanpur in recent times.
The police have record of the 400 minutes telephonic conversation of the sadhvi with the accomplices including, serving lieutenant colonel Shasikant Purohit of the army, Ramesh Upadhya who taught the others how to make a bomb and procure RDX. Moreover they had met at the Bhonsla Military school of Nasik on April 16 among them was Sameer Kulkarni who transported the explosives to Maleagoin. The police are in search of Ram Narayan Singh who planted the bomb at Bhiku chowk. There is also report that they had met at the school on September 16, some other papers report that the meeting also took place on September 13. They are members of Abhinav Bharat which in turn was the resurrection of Abhinav Bharat society which Savarkar had found in 1905. Savarkar, Moonje and Hegdewar were captivated by fascism and Savarkar had modeled his organization on the Italian nationalist Giuseppe Mazzini’s Young Italy. Most of the accused in Malegaon blasts are also connected with Pune where Abhinav Bharat is headed by no other than the daughter in law of Savarkar. Himani Savarkar is also the niece of Nathuram Godse hence the slogan of her outfit “kshama yachna nahin ab to ran hoga, sangharsh bada bhishan hoga. This slogan is on posters of the organization in Bhopal. Nasik also occupies a crucial place as the Bhonsla military school is located there where the bombers took training and held meeting. The session court is hearing the case there.
The RSS meeting in Kanpur discussed the Malegaon blast and came out with a cynical assessment that the startling revelations of Malegaon blast would not affect the people who habitually vote BJP. Therefore they are back to square one: Hindutuva extremism. For this and all other matters of religious extremism of the Hindutuva you don’t have to go to Tirupati or Chidambrum or Trivandrum because there is a world of difference between the Hindi heartland and the Dravadian south. UP and Madhya Pardesh are central to deep-rooted antipathy to the ‘other.’ After them comes Gujarat. Sadhvi Pragya was from that part of Madhya Pardesh which is famed for anti-Muslims feeling, Malwa region, for it is the stronghold of Hindutuva. If this were not so Malwa would be like Chidambrum.
Hindu Jagran Mach based in Indore came into existence in 2002 during the trouble in Dhar, MP, over prayer at Bhojshala where Hindus as well as Muslims pray in adjoining place. However, the Hindus were allowed to pray only once a year. As the extreme among the Hindus became ascendant they took to aggression and wanted to pray to Saraswati without any restrictive stipulation. The sadhvi and her accomplices are embedded in HJM for their anti minority activities.
On the other hand Kanpur boasts a much larger presence with 60 supported RSS schools known as Saraswati Vidayalas and Deen Dayal Vidayalas. Indeed one such Saraswati Vidayala of Govind nager also hosts the offices of RSS and VHP. There are some 1,500 branches of RSS in Kanpur region of which 300 are in Kanpur itself. There are also 12,000 Bajrang Dal activists. Given such a massive presence in Kanpur it is bound to be the hub of the extreme Hindutuva activities such as bomb making. Two times in August and October there have been two distinct incidents of bomb explosion. In fact in the explosion on August 24 two Bajrang Dal activists, Rajive Misra and Bhupender Sigh died while handling the bomb. An analysis of the chemicals there and of the September 29 blast in Malegaon could establish similarity. In both the places RDX must be present. As the police officer in Kanpur observed that the storage of the explosives in Kanpur was so large that it could have blown up half of the city!
Friday, October 31, 2008
Thursday, October 30, 2008
The winter of our discontent: provincialism and terrorism
There is the winter of our discontent that has set in. The stock market is in doldrums, protests and violence in the streets, lynching and encounters in the financial capital of the country, war of words between states of the union, involvement of ex-servicemen and a serving lieutenant colonel in terrorism, the slide of the reputed Bhonsla military school of Nasik and Nagpur into the nadir of terrorism, and 25 bomb blasts in Assam, etc.
It is dreadful to think what the situation would be as the winter advances and the long day’s journey into the night winds up. The next day is unwilling to be born into the murky atmosphere. There is no definite beginning to any of the sordid games we Indians are in the habit of playing against each other rather than any enemy from the outside world (at least no one has definitely been caught so far). A judge in Mumbai showed displeasure that the state was head over heels busy in deciphering the Indian Mujahideen email while failing to see the writing on the wall by the Maharashtra Naunirman Sena. Another judge remarked that had the leaders of Bihar and UP used their resources (kickbacks) the migrants would not have flooded the metropolis. Raj Thackeray then chirped in that the state does not understand the language of nonviolence. Then the violence erupted. Thirteen examination centers for the recruitment of candidates for railway jobs were attacked. The northerner youths appearing for the examination were under brutal attack. One Pawan Kumar died in the attack, there is another version that he slipped from a running train and accidentally died. The mobs in Bihar burnt railway property. In tandem came the deaths of Rahul Raj shot dead by the police as he tried to hijack a bus to propagate his grouse against Raj Thackeray and the lynching of Dharmadeo Rai by the Marathi speaking mob in a local train. These events have made tension and violence move in a crescendo as Lalu Prasad called Raj Thackeray a psychopath and Deputy Home Minister RR Patil justifying the killing: “If a madman gets into a bus and goes on a shooting spree, this is the response they will get.” Besides raising the parochial and political temper this situation is fraught with danger to the country. The center cannot hold and things fall apart and anarchy is let loose. The peace that Bihar maintained and its refusal to espouse provincialism in the face of attack on its citizens in Assam 2003 is under strain.
Even more terrifying is the theft of RDX from government ordnance factory. It is now in the hands of the home grown terrorists, to the groups that included Sadhvi Pragysingh Thaku. On the day Sadhvi appeared in a court of Nasik a Marathi daily there carried report that the cross border or Jihad terrorism has RDX from Pakistan military while the home grown terrorists would have only one source, the government of India ordnance factories. But cross border terrorism has been rampant though it cannot be ruled out that home grown terrorism was not very much there. More than twenty five bomb blasts rocked Assam on October 30, 2008 killing more than 50 including military and police personnel and injuring about two hundred. One attack took place quite near the office of the chief minister but the most terrific was at the Ganeshgudi flyover. Rows of cars turned into wreckage in dust and smoke as if the fury of Hiroshima visited Guwahati. The minister of state in home department of the central government Shakeel Ahmed remarked that it was too early to be categorical but October 3-5 saw communal riots in which 54 lost their life. Muslims inhabit the areas affected by bomb explosions where the shopkeepers are Marwari.
Another cause of concern is that the civilian population of the affected areas of Guwahati turned violent against the police and the fire fighters and pelted stones. This is exactly what happened during the serial bomb blasts in Malegaon September 8 2006 and September 29 2008.
Most of the observers believe that only United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA), the Assamese upper caste organization fighting for autonomy, is behind the serial blasts. “ULFA has a history of triggering serial blasts," Assam's health minister
Himanta Biswa Sarma stated soon after the blasts. Organizing such a preplanned attacks requires enormous resources and widespread local support. Some also think that it is Hurkatul Jihad e Islami (HuJI). If it is ULFA then the same concern is evident as in the case of Malegaon Septmber 29 blast. Who supplied the RDX? Is it from the government ordnance stock? There is growing fear that right wing Hindu organizations have long been using ex-service men and institutions like the Bhonsla military school to train Hindu youths in arms and ammunition though under the ruse of personality development. Nagpur Bhonsla military school had allowed even Bajrang Dal to use its premises and the Nasik branch has confirmed that Major Prabhakar Kulkarni is not only the past director but also the secretary of the institution that runs the school. The major is believed to have trained the sadhvi and the others in the use of RDX.
Somebody must have also trained the terrorists behind the Assam attacks. The scale of the attack leaves no doubt that RDX was used. Although much limited in Malegaon the blast has left RDX marks on 19 items. In Assam it could be in hundreds as more than 25 bombs exploded there. If it turns out to be HuJI then there is of course ISI.
The two terrorist outfits have one thing in common: communalism. The explosion allegedly caused by SIMI, IM or HuJI leaves many dead and wounded and that motivates backlash that is equally an act of terrorism. Hence the father of sadhvi Pragyasingh, Chandrapal Singh Thakur justified her part saying that “a reply to terrorist attacks was required. If the government does not act in time, the common people will have to do something about their own security.” But it seems his daughter will fight from jail, an election on the ticket of Uma Bharati's Bharatiya Janshakti Party (BJS) because the saints cannot be what the police is trying to prove. She would be taking on any leader of the BJP, despite the President of BJP Rajnath Singh himself declaring the sadhvi innocent because anyone who adheres to the cultural nationalism of the RSS cannot be terrorist, including serving lieutenant colonel Shrikant Purohit of the army. Given this kind of rationale we are in for a long winter.
It is dreadful to think what the situation would be as the winter advances and the long day’s journey into the night winds up. The next day is unwilling to be born into the murky atmosphere. There is no definite beginning to any of the sordid games we Indians are in the habit of playing against each other rather than any enemy from the outside world (at least no one has definitely been caught so far). A judge in Mumbai showed displeasure that the state was head over heels busy in deciphering the Indian Mujahideen email while failing to see the writing on the wall by the Maharashtra Naunirman Sena. Another judge remarked that had the leaders of Bihar and UP used their resources (kickbacks) the migrants would not have flooded the metropolis. Raj Thackeray then chirped in that the state does not understand the language of nonviolence. Then the violence erupted. Thirteen examination centers for the recruitment of candidates for railway jobs were attacked. The northerner youths appearing for the examination were under brutal attack. One Pawan Kumar died in the attack, there is another version that he slipped from a running train and accidentally died. The mobs in Bihar burnt railway property. In tandem came the deaths of Rahul Raj shot dead by the police as he tried to hijack a bus to propagate his grouse against Raj Thackeray and the lynching of Dharmadeo Rai by the Marathi speaking mob in a local train. These events have made tension and violence move in a crescendo as Lalu Prasad called Raj Thackeray a psychopath and Deputy Home Minister RR Patil justifying the killing: “If a madman gets into a bus and goes on a shooting spree, this is the response they will get.” Besides raising the parochial and political temper this situation is fraught with danger to the country. The center cannot hold and things fall apart and anarchy is let loose. The peace that Bihar maintained and its refusal to espouse provincialism in the face of attack on its citizens in Assam 2003 is under strain.
Even more terrifying is the theft of RDX from government ordnance factory. It is now in the hands of the home grown terrorists, to the groups that included Sadhvi Pragysingh Thaku. On the day Sadhvi appeared in a court of Nasik a Marathi daily there carried report that the cross border or Jihad terrorism has RDX from Pakistan military while the home grown terrorists would have only one source, the government of India ordnance factories. But cross border terrorism has been rampant though it cannot be ruled out that home grown terrorism was not very much there. More than twenty five bomb blasts rocked Assam on October 30, 2008 killing more than 50 including military and police personnel and injuring about two hundred. One attack took place quite near the office of the chief minister but the most terrific was at the Ganeshgudi flyover. Rows of cars turned into wreckage in dust and smoke as if the fury of Hiroshima visited Guwahati. The minister of state in home department of the central government Shakeel Ahmed remarked that it was too early to be categorical but October 3-5 saw communal riots in which 54 lost their life. Muslims inhabit the areas affected by bomb explosions where the shopkeepers are Marwari.
Another cause of concern is that the civilian population of the affected areas of Guwahati turned violent against the police and the fire fighters and pelted stones. This is exactly what happened during the serial bomb blasts in Malegaon September 8 2006 and September 29 2008.
Most of the observers believe that only United Liberation Front of Assam (ULFA), the Assamese upper caste organization fighting for autonomy, is behind the serial blasts. “ULFA has a history of triggering serial blasts," Assam's health minister
Himanta Biswa Sarma stated soon after the blasts. Organizing such a preplanned attacks requires enormous resources and widespread local support. Some also think that it is Hurkatul Jihad e Islami (HuJI). If it is ULFA then the same concern is evident as in the case of Malegaon Septmber 29 blast. Who supplied the RDX? Is it from the government ordnance stock? There is growing fear that right wing Hindu organizations have long been using ex-service men and institutions like the Bhonsla military school to train Hindu youths in arms and ammunition though under the ruse of personality development. Nagpur Bhonsla military school had allowed even Bajrang Dal to use its premises and the Nasik branch has confirmed that Major Prabhakar Kulkarni is not only the past director but also the secretary of the institution that runs the school. The major is believed to have trained the sadhvi and the others in the use of RDX.
Somebody must have also trained the terrorists behind the Assam attacks. The scale of the attack leaves no doubt that RDX was used. Although much limited in Malegaon the blast has left RDX marks on 19 items. In Assam it could be in hundreds as more than 25 bombs exploded there. If it turns out to be HuJI then there is of course ISI.
The two terrorist outfits have one thing in common: communalism. The explosion allegedly caused by SIMI, IM or HuJI leaves many dead and wounded and that motivates backlash that is equally an act of terrorism. Hence the father of sadhvi Pragyasingh, Chandrapal Singh Thakur justified her part saying that “a reply to terrorist attacks was required. If the government does not act in time, the common people will have to do something about their own security.” But it seems his daughter will fight from jail, an election on the ticket of Uma Bharati's Bharatiya Janshakti Party (BJS) because the saints cannot be what the police is trying to prove. She would be taking on any leader of the BJP, despite the President of BJP Rajnath Singh himself declaring the sadhvi innocent because anyone who adheres to the cultural nationalism of the RSS cannot be terrorist, including serving lieutenant colonel Shrikant Purohit of the army. Given this kind of rationale we are in for a long winter.
Wednesday, October 29, 2008
Multi headed hydra monstrosity of the sangh parivar
We have failed to fully account for the role the so-called cultural organization RSS has played and is still playing in violent acts. Why does this need arise from time to time? It is primarily because the extreme right wing organization has meddled into politics of the country from time to time and by not recognizing Muslims as part of it. Or, as is its assertion from time to time that Muslims have to forgo their allegiance to the foreign faith they have embraced and be sanskritized. This is not only ridiculous but also simply impossible. The RSS indoctrinates its cadres in such a way that they view the Muslims as their enemy and trains them to fight the Muslims. Moreover from much earlier time the organization has indulged in prevarication, secrecy and conspiracy. These are not the stuff on which to build democratic structure. They are outrageously and offensively wrong, hence monstrosity. Multi headed ! Thanks to juggling of words. The police first said it was Hindu Jagran Manch behind the Malegaon September 29 blast and then said it was Rashtriya Jagran Manch. Remember Hindu Jagran Manch is anti minority. It owned up the terrible attacks on Christians and Muslims in Gujarat and other parts of the country. It is also fact that the accused were from Durga Vahini who had links with Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad. Samir Kulkarni was from Abhinau Bharat, but also from Abhinav Bharat Sansthan as well as ABVP.
Mahatma Gandhi’s assassins were from RSS and Hindu Mahasabha. In his letter to Syam Prasad Mukherji, Sardar Patel wrote in July 1948 about the assassination of Gandhi: “our reports do confirm that, as a result of the activities of these two bodies, particularly the former, an atmosphere was created in the country in which such a ghastly tragedy became possible.” Nathuram Godse was baudhik karyavah or intellectual worker of RSS and made five known attempts to assassinate. In fact Gopal Godse asserted: “All the brothers were in the RSS. Nathuram, Dattatreya, myself and Govind. You can say we grew up in the RSS rather than in our home. It was like a family to us”. Can such inveterate and committed person change his party before assassinating Gandhi? What had gone into the making of Nathuram is a matter of years of ideological stockbreeding. What was equally serious about the affair was what the IAS officer told Justice Jeevan Lal Kapoor inquiry commission that the right wing organizations had secretly made plans of subverting the established government and taking over the reigns of the government.
Sadhvi Pragyasingh Thakur’s involvement in the bomb blast is no less serious than what was the case at the time of the assassination of Gandhi. She and Major Ramesh Upadhya and Major Y D Sahasrabuddhe and even a serving armyman, posted at Panchmarhi in Madhya Pradesh had established a network of terror across states involving groups as strategic as ex-service personnel, Bhonsle Military Schools and men in ordance factory or defence services who could pass on RDX as scrap. Does it require any more proof to show that this is sedition? Even the letter of Santosh Kumar Rai National Organising Secreatry AKHIL BHARAT HINDU MAHASABHA (Mo. 09818334959) appeals “to all Hindu community please come in support of SADHWI and UNITE to make BHARAT as HINDU NATION.”
The kind of atmosphere built up over the last six months was such that it could have led to upheaval in the society on unprecedented scale. Amar Singh feared that Muslims might rebel against their repression and oppression on account of the innumerable arrests of many innocent members of the community. It is for such an eventuality that the RSS is training its cadres in arms and ammunition. They would take over the reign. Tarun Tejpal asked the people to pause and think coolly in the wee time of the lull before the storm. It is most opportune that the Maharashtra police did what would become another historic milestone in the administrative service of the country. Their investigation may not fulfill all the expectations of the people of different groups but the nation can legitimately heave a sigh of relief. Bombs will not stop exploding but investigation would be not one sided. Those who admire Hitler could also use the techniques of Hitler of burning the parliament in order to arouse strong nationalist feelings and hatred against the Jews and minorities. Today’s Jews in India are the Muslims hunted and haunted as their Semite brethren of yore. People will be wary now.
There are enough reasons why one should be wary and of what. First what the right wing leaders including the prime ministerial candidate say. It is interesting to note that LK Advani is now saying that the sadhvi had left the sangh parivar’s Durga Vahini. She was a member of several such outfits. This is what Advani has been saying about Nathuram, too. The national convener of Bajrang Dal also told the same about Rajive Misra and Bhupender Singh who blew themselves up while making or assembling bomb in Kanpur on August 24. In the case of the Nanded blast of February 2007 the police tried to hide the identity of the man killed, later it was found out that he was Shiv Sena lealder of Nanded. People should also be wary of fire crackers bursting or biscuit cartons exploding not only in Nanded but also in Rajasthan and elsewhere.
Thus some policemen and the right wing organizations try to hide the fact that Hindu extremists are involved in blasts. Even officers with science background do not behave with honesty and integrity because of the mindset created by RSS ideology. For example look at how a lady doctor treats a Muslim suspect Noorulhoda of Malegaon September 8, 2006 blasts case:
“During the test I was given electric shocks. I was beaten so much on my ears and forehead that I still feel the pain in my brain nerves and bones of the chest. Bangalore’s lady doctor Malini told me “speak up what police is asking you to say otherwise they will implicate you in two or three more such cases.” She too was threatening in the same way and on my repeated refusal she used to give me electric shocks on my ear.”
There is also a schismatic deflective device of the Hindu extremists when members of one organization are caught, first they are either disowned or are made out to have left the organization. But it is not long when other organizations jumped in to defend the accused or arrested. The extremists among the Hindutva group in Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat as well as Shiv Sena leaders want to defend the sadhvi. Manohar Joshi believes that the Islamic terrorism is responsible for forcing the sadhvi to take to terrorism. Hindus were so much enraged by jihad terrorism that they were forced to react the same way. Some say that this should be treated an aberration rather than the norm of the Hindu community. They labour under the illusion that terrorism is a matter of faith and not of the character of the people. In fact the editorial in Samna goes to say that given Jihad terrorism it would be no surprise if all Hindus take to terrorism. This is sure recipe for subversion.
Another device is subterfuge or trick to escape trouble. The sangh parivar is master in subterfuges. The VHP leader Ramvilas Vedanti had got his disciples email letters to him on August 30 2008 threatening his life. The emails were sent in the name of SIMI and Indian Mujahideen. The police in UP found out the truth that the fake letters were used to get z security cover to Vedanti but the police did not take action against the disciples or Vedanti. The Malegaon blast provides another instance of subterfuge and deflective device. The Ahemdabad police have arrested general secretary of VHP of Ahmedabad, Ashwin Patel. The police have this to say in the FIR: "Since the last two to two and a half months, derogatory and defamatory SMSes were doing the rounds about Narendra Modi and his government. Besides there were SMSes to mislead about the Malegaon, Modasa and Ahmedabad blasts and the language used could provoke communal passions". It would take some more time to unearth the whole meaning but it is beyond doubt that the three incidents of bombing had one common purpose: inciting communal passion that could produce backlash. The obvious beneficiary would be, of course, BJP. But the question is not of that party, what about the country? Theft of RDX in the name of sale of scrap ends up in the hands of the extremists of well-spread and well-organized organizations who in the name of defending the country are in fact engaged in terrorism.
Mahatma Gandhi’s assassins were from RSS and Hindu Mahasabha. In his letter to Syam Prasad Mukherji, Sardar Patel wrote in July 1948 about the assassination of Gandhi: “our reports do confirm that, as a result of the activities of these two bodies, particularly the former, an atmosphere was created in the country in which such a ghastly tragedy became possible.” Nathuram Godse was baudhik karyavah or intellectual worker of RSS and made five known attempts to assassinate. In fact Gopal Godse asserted: “All the brothers were in the RSS. Nathuram, Dattatreya, myself and Govind. You can say we grew up in the RSS rather than in our home. It was like a family to us”. Can such inveterate and committed person change his party before assassinating Gandhi? What had gone into the making of Nathuram is a matter of years of ideological stockbreeding. What was equally serious about the affair was what the IAS officer told Justice Jeevan Lal Kapoor inquiry commission that the right wing organizations had secretly made plans of subverting the established government and taking over the reigns of the government.
Sadhvi Pragyasingh Thakur’s involvement in the bomb blast is no less serious than what was the case at the time of the assassination of Gandhi. She and Major Ramesh Upadhya and Major Y D Sahasrabuddhe and even a serving armyman, posted at Panchmarhi in Madhya Pradesh had established a network of terror across states involving groups as strategic as ex-service personnel, Bhonsle Military Schools and men in ordance factory or defence services who could pass on RDX as scrap. Does it require any more proof to show that this is sedition? Even the letter of Santosh Kumar Rai National Organising Secreatry AKHIL BHARAT HINDU MAHASABHA (Mo. 09818334959) appeals “to all Hindu community please come in support of SADHWI and UNITE to make BHARAT as HINDU NATION.”
The kind of atmosphere built up over the last six months was such that it could have led to upheaval in the society on unprecedented scale. Amar Singh feared that Muslims might rebel against their repression and oppression on account of the innumerable arrests of many innocent members of the community. It is for such an eventuality that the RSS is training its cadres in arms and ammunition. They would take over the reign. Tarun Tejpal asked the people to pause and think coolly in the wee time of the lull before the storm. It is most opportune that the Maharashtra police did what would become another historic milestone in the administrative service of the country. Their investigation may not fulfill all the expectations of the people of different groups but the nation can legitimately heave a sigh of relief. Bombs will not stop exploding but investigation would be not one sided. Those who admire Hitler could also use the techniques of Hitler of burning the parliament in order to arouse strong nationalist feelings and hatred against the Jews and minorities. Today’s Jews in India are the Muslims hunted and haunted as their Semite brethren of yore. People will be wary now.
There are enough reasons why one should be wary and of what. First what the right wing leaders including the prime ministerial candidate say. It is interesting to note that LK Advani is now saying that the sadhvi had left the sangh parivar’s Durga Vahini. She was a member of several such outfits. This is what Advani has been saying about Nathuram, too. The national convener of Bajrang Dal also told the same about Rajive Misra and Bhupender Singh who blew themselves up while making or assembling bomb in Kanpur on August 24. In the case of the Nanded blast of February 2007 the police tried to hide the identity of the man killed, later it was found out that he was Shiv Sena lealder of Nanded. People should also be wary of fire crackers bursting or biscuit cartons exploding not only in Nanded but also in Rajasthan and elsewhere.
Thus some policemen and the right wing organizations try to hide the fact that Hindu extremists are involved in blasts. Even officers with science background do not behave with honesty and integrity because of the mindset created by RSS ideology. For example look at how a lady doctor treats a Muslim suspect Noorulhoda of Malegaon September 8, 2006 blasts case:
“During the test I was given electric shocks. I was beaten so much on my ears and forehead that I still feel the pain in my brain nerves and bones of the chest. Bangalore’s lady doctor Malini told me “speak up what police is asking you to say otherwise they will implicate you in two or three more such cases.” She too was threatening in the same way and on my repeated refusal she used to give me electric shocks on my ear.”
There is also a schismatic deflective device of the Hindu extremists when members of one organization are caught, first they are either disowned or are made out to have left the organization. But it is not long when other organizations jumped in to defend the accused or arrested. The extremists among the Hindutva group in Madhya Pradesh and Gujarat as well as Shiv Sena leaders want to defend the sadhvi. Manohar Joshi believes that the Islamic terrorism is responsible for forcing the sadhvi to take to terrorism. Hindus were so much enraged by jihad terrorism that they were forced to react the same way. Some say that this should be treated an aberration rather than the norm of the Hindu community. They labour under the illusion that terrorism is a matter of faith and not of the character of the people. In fact the editorial in Samna goes to say that given Jihad terrorism it would be no surprise if all Hindus take to terrorism. This is sure recipe for subversion.
Another device is subterfuge or trick to escape trouble. The sangh parivar is master in subterfuges. The VHP leader Ramvilas Vedanti had got his disciples email letters to him on August 30 2008 threatening his life. The emails were sent in the name of SIMI and Indian Mujahideen. The police in UP found out the truth that the fake letters were used to get z security cover to Vedanti but the police did not take action against the disciples or Vedanti. The Malegaon blast provides another instance of subterfuge and deflective device. The Ahemdabad police have arrested general secretary of VHP of Ahmedabad, Ashwin Patel. The police have this to say in the FIR: "Since the last two to two and a half months, derogatory and defamatory SMSes were doing the rounds about Narendra Modi and his government. Besides there were SMSes to mislead about the Malegaon, Modasa and Ahmedabad blasts and the language used could provoke communal passions". It would take some more time to unearth the whole meaning but it is beyond doubt that the three incidents of bombing had one common purpose: inciting communal passion that could produce backlash. The obvious beneficiary would be, of course, BJP. But the question is not of that party, what about the country? Theft of RDX in the name of sale of scrap ends up in the hands of the extremists of well-spread and well-organized organizations who in the name of defending the country are in fact engaged in terrorism.
Monday, October 27, 2008
Malegaon is at it again!
Malegaon/Communalism/Pressure on police
Once it was the pride of Hindu Muslim unity, mutual respect and trust. Even the riots in the sixties and seventies did not dent into the harmonious relationship between the various sections of the society. But the 1980s and 1990s changed all that. With the rise of right wing BJP and its newly won respectability of its extreme view the town began to feel strain of being pulled in opposite directions. Since then Malegaon has become captive of communalists.
The police in Malegaon must be under tremendous strain. This is borne out by two recent incidents. Raj Thackeray’s arrest and the police action against those who were barricading the high way and forcing shutting down of shops on October 21-22 and the people pelting stones and manhandling the police in the aftermath of the bomb explosion on September 29 are dissimilar in nature. The people attacked the police in Bhiku chowk on the spur of the moment and several policemen were injured. But the police prevailed upon the situation and even opened fire on the riotous mob in which two persons died and many were injured. They even declared curfew but within minutes called it off. The police who described the blast as gas cylinder explosion when it was clearly bomb blast incensed the mob all the more because people had informed about the abandoned motorcycle(later found to be property of Poornachetanand or sadhvi Pragya) to the police more than an hour before the explosion. They ignored it.
The police did not make ignominious retreat (padta bhui) as is claimed by a Marathi daily columnist. If it were only that perhaps it would not be much, after all we have right to have personal view of events. But then the writer goes on to say that the police should not have thrashed the MNS activists in Hindu areas after how the cops were beaten up by the Muslim mob and after their abject retreat from the Muslim ghetto of Bhiku chowk. This is fine-tuning of communalism where it does not and should not exist. And exhorting to police to keep the avatar or appearance of god (permatmachi roop) is expecting too much. It could be instigating, rather.
Maharashtra Navnirman Sena also boasts of having Muslims in it. However, the supporters of Raj Thackeray did not go into the old town where Muslims live. The Muslims kept themselves busy in the midst of their marriage season. They of course had read news paper report about how the Maharashtra police on October 13 arrested Lalit Kolhe, the Corporator from MNS in Jalgaon . About 16 swords were reportedly seized from his place at the height of the communal riots in Dhule and instances of arson in Jalgaon. So the old township in the east was astir with activities and business as usual.
In the other incident there was a press conference where a district level police officer in the aftermath of the bomb explosion had allegedly stared down at the Urdu reporters (two of whom had nailed the lie of the home minister that no one was injured in police firing) and remarked ominously that a bullet cost 150 rupees and he would not waste government money. Though the import was clear but it was not made out to be communalist expression. This is a tribute to the good sense which the people in Malegaon otherwise have. At the time of both bomb blasts there was no communal flare up and Hindus had helped in by donating blood and treating Muslim victims.
Thus the police otherwise generally believed by Muslims to be biased against them are also stigmatized by the majority community who look at them in the manner of the big brother. Look at what happens during religious processions how the routes and time are observed. They do not want to feel constrained by police regulations because of their surge in emotion and devotion. For two years Malegaon police have had tough time during the elephant god procession. Some who contravene the security norms are habitually extradited from the town but pressure builds up on the police. The show down between the members of the majority community and the police is of a different hue from the Muslim going berserk at perceived injustice or act of cruelty.
According to the influential group of the majority community the police arrested the protesters and took them back to the highway and handed over the protesters to the commandoes who beat them mercilessly. This they perceive is how the police settle old score. That of course is their grouse that their exuberance at the time of religious procession or political protests should be untrammeled by regulatory procedure of the police. As the irascible behaviour of the mob in the Bhiku chowk the disgruntlement of the majority is a chink in their armour. All this in addition to the whopping pressure on the cops to investigate the bomb explosions!
Once it was the pride of Hindu Muslim unity, mutual respect and trust. Even the riots in the sixties and seventies did not dent into the harmonious relationship between the various sections of the society. But the 1980s and 1990s changed all that. With the rise of right wing BJP and its newly won respectability of its extreme view the town began to feel strain of being pulled in opposite directions. Since then Malegaon has become captive of communalists.
The police in Malegaon must be under tremendous strain. This is borne out by two recent incidents. Raj Thackeray’s arrest and the police action against those who were barricading the high way and forcing shutting down of shops on October 21-22 and the people pelting stones and manhandling the police in the aftermath of the bomb explosion on September 29 are dissimilar in nature. The people attacked the police in Bhiku chowk on the spur of the moment and several policemen were injured. But the police prevailed upon the situation and even opened fire on the riotous mob in which two persons died and many were injured. They even declared curfew but within minutes called it off. The police who described the blast as gas cylinder explosion when it was clearly bomb blast incensed the mob all the more because people had informed about the abandoned motorcycle(later found to be property of Poornachetanand or sadhvi Pragya) to the police more than an hour before the explosion. They ignored it.
The police did not make ignominious retreat (padta bhui) as is claimed by a Marathi daily columnist. If it were only that perhaps it would not be much, after all we have right to have personal view of events. But then the writer goes on to say that the police should not have thrashed the MNS activists in Hindu areas after how the cops were beaten up by the Muslim mob and after their abject retreat from the Muslim ghetto of Bhiku chowk. This is fine-tuning of communalism where it does not and should not exist. And exhorting to police to keep the avatar or appearance of god (permatmachi roop) is expecting too much. It could be instigating, rather.
Maharashtra Navnirman Sena also boasts of having Muslims in it. However, the supporters of Raj Thackeray did not go into the old town where Muslims live. The Muslims kept themselves busy in the midst of their marriage season. They of course had read news paper report about how the Maharashtra police on October 13 arrested Lalit Kolhe, the Corporator from MNS in Jalgaon . About 16 swords were reportedly seized from his place at the height of the communal riots in Dhule and instances of arson in Jalgaon. So the old township in the east was astir with activities and business as usual.
In the other incident there was a press conference where a district level police officer in the aftermath of the bomb explosion had allegedly stared down at the Urdu reporters (two of whom had nailed the lie of the home minister that no one was injured in police firing) and remarked ominously that a bullet cost 150 rupees and he would not waste government money. Though the import was clear but it was not made out to be communalist expression. This is a tribute to the good sense which the people in Malegaon otherwise have. At the time of both bomb blasts there was no communal flare up and Hindus had helped in by donating blood and treating Muslim victims.
Thus the police otherwise generally believed by Muslims to be biased against them are also stigmatized by the majority community who look at them in the manner of the big brother. Look at what happens during religious processions how the routes and time are observed. They do not want to feel constrained by police regulations because of their surge in emotion and devotion. For two years Malegaon police have had tough time during the elephant god procession. Some who contravene the security norms are habitually extradited from the town but pressure builds up on the police. The show down between the members of the majority community and the police is of a different hue from the Muslim going berserk at perceived injustice or act of cruelty.
According to the influential group of the majority community the police arrested the protesters and took them back to the highway and handed over the protesters to the commandoes who beat them mercilessly. This they perceive is how the police settle old score. That of course is their grouse that their exuberance at the time of religious procession or political protests should be untrammeled by regulatory procedure of the police. As the irascible behaviour of the mob in the Bhiku chowk the disgruntlement of the majority is a chink in their armour. All this in addition to the whopping pressure on the cops to investigate the bomb explosions!
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Post September 29th Terrorism Scenario
Terrorism/Propaganda/Cultural Hegemony/Communalism
As 9/11 turned out to be the familiar hunting cry of going after Muslim groups in the ‘war’ on terrorism in which India also jumped on the bandwagon, 29/11 is proving a mockery of all the endeavours that investigation agencies, the police and the media have made to create hoopla over terror.
There is a chemistry of change in dealing with terrorism. The media and the police and the investigating agencies have balked from going full steam in their disclosures and presentation of terrorism in India in the aftermath of the startling revelation that sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur of Hindu Jagran Manch of Indore and Surat owned the motor cycle that carried the bomb that exploded in Malegaon. She along with her three accomplices (Sham Sahu, Dilip Nahar and Shivnarayan Singh from Indore and Dharmendra Bairagi from Dewas) are arrested and sent to custody till November 3. this has dismayed some who are still harping on jihad terrorism despite the fact that terrorism unleashed by LTTE in SriLanka and India was the precursor of the suicide bombing of the Palestinians. Such is the vainglory of some that they do not want to accept that Hindus can be terrorists, even the extremist among them. This is strange for the proverbial tolerance of the Hindus got a jolt with the demolition of the Babri mosque at Ayodhya and violence subsequent to it and the pogroms of Muslims in Gujarat 2002.
It would be wrong to assert that pre 29/11 was in its entirety the handiwork of Jihad terrorism. Malegan blasts of September 8, 2006 militate against the biased perception and twisted theories of terrorism juggernaut of 9/11. This is true even when the accused are all Muslims. Those accused are languishing in jail with hardly any credible evidence found against them because they were not involved. The affidavits they have submitted shows that they were either in prison (Shabeer Masiullah) or at home and mosque (Noorulhoda) or leading Friday prayer more than five hundred miles away.
The former chief of ATS Raghuvanshi had remarked that the bombs that the Bajrang Dal activists of Nanded were making were not for pooja. They had been already used three different times at mosques in Purna, Jalna, Parbhani. One of the ones meant for Aurangabad railway station mosque accidentally exploded 1.30 am Thursday night rather than 1.30 pm Friday group prayer time like all the other mosques including Mecca mosque of Hyderabad and Jama masjid of Delhi. The home made bombs manufactured with the help of retired army officers had also been used at the mosque in Panvel by activists of Hindu Janjagran Samiti and Sanatan Sanstha. These of course preceded September 29, 2008 Modasa and Malegaon blasts. In the sophistry of the right wing Hindu organizations everything is okay and can be connived at by sweeping them under the carpet of safeguarding religion. Moreover they are sophisticated(?) enough not to blare out in their manifesto that their intent is like that of the intrepid Al Qaeda.
Till the time of the Delhi high court special tribunal hearing there was no evidence whatsoever which the government could put before the tribunal in its appeal for continuing the ban on SIMI(Students Islamic Movement of India). People even on suspicion of being connected to it have been arrested and are languishing in jail day in and day out. On the other hand, Bajrang Dal was conceived and created as the the sword arm of Hindutva to carry out its violent campaign aginst the minorities, quintessentially Muslim minority. Who but they were the youths with saffron bands tied to their foreheads scaling and systematically tearing down the walls and domes of the mosque at Ayodhya.
If Muslims are caught for any trivial crime and also for not having any criminal background their profiling includes if they had any link to SIMI. Let alone that their beard and long tunic and skullcap lands them into trouble as it happened, among other places, the north east. After 29/11 there is no attempt to standardize the profiling of terrorism of the sangh privar in terms of their cultural symbols although the RSS boasts of being just a cultural organization.
Hindu Janjagrun Manch of Indore, Bajrang Dal, VHP, Hindu Janjagran Samiti, Shiv Sena, Sanatan Sanstha, Durga Vahini, Akhil Bharti Vidyarthi Parishad are different organizations whose members have now been found to be making bombs and exploding them in mosques or in Muslim ghettoes. It makes no sense that extremist Hindus who are caught should be tried as miscreants irrespective of their organizational affiliation. Many but not the masses of Hindus are members of one or more of such organizations. They receive training in arms and ammunition and explosives periodically in a highly organized manner. Former members of armed forces train them. How can it be that Hindus who are caught in terror crime should be tried as individuals and not as members of the numerous affiliates of the sangh parivar. Nathu Ram Godse and Dr Parchure of Indore were members of the RSS and were sworn enemies of Mahatma Gandhi. The prevailing ethos of these organizations is characterized by proneness to violence, secrecy, and conspiracy. Their patriarch Moonje wanted to find out means where by many people can be killed in one go, his obvious target were Muslims, though it is also relevant to note that the Christians too have come under the attack of the extremist Hindu organizations. Therefore the nature of the organizations and their exhibited practice and material in possession must also be considered as causes of terrorism today. On October 19, 2008 RSS cadres displayed guns, swords and other weapons in a public during their parade through the Ashok nager of Indore city. This was done in flagrant violation of the code of conduct in force in Madhya Pradesh for the coming election. Some of them had allegedly used guns to kill Muslims during the agitation for grant of land for the Anant nag yatra. Therefore organizations and the nature of their known activities give enough proof of how such organizations are involved in terrorist acts.
There are statements that political leaders make and they give enough clues for what is the critical mass. The police of course record but conveniently do not act or provide correct feedback. VHP leader Parveen Togadia had made a speech to the lusty cheering of his audience that Hanuman had come to Godhra, Ravana had set his tail on fire and Hanuman had visited Naroda Patia, etc. Those who had ignited fire in Gujarat were causing terror as well as those who assassinated Mahatma Gandhi. Their affiliation to organizations supplies the ideological motivation. They are the variant versions of Sheikh Yasin. For example this is what Bal Thackeray told Shekhar Gupta : “To understand me, you have to go back to 1948, or even before that. Have you ever thought of Godse’s action, why he decided to kill? He got annoyed, upset, very upset. Even after giving a chunk of our land to Muslims, you were giving Rs 55 crore to them. Godse thought that if this old man lives any longer then he will ruin the country.” Or Narendra Modi hectoring his audience that Hindus can’t be terrorists and if they take to terrorism they would finish off Pakistan. Such is the plosive stuff that can set the ball rolling.
Howsoever we may question the premise that all terrorists are Muslims, what is unquestionable is that all terrorism is propaganda. Exploding bombs in theatres showing Aamhe Pachpute or Jodha Akbar, burning train to Pakistan, or exploding bombs on shabebarat or around shabeqader propagates a message. This could be that there are organizations that are devoted to establish a narrow kind of nationhood and/or maintain cultural hegemony.
As 9/11 turned out to be the familiar hunting cry of going after Muslim groups in the ‘war’ on terrorism in which India also jumped on the bandwagon, 29/11 is proving a mockery of all the endeavours that investigation agencies, the police and the media have made to create hoopla over terror.
There is a chemistry of change in dealing with terrorism. The media and the police and the investigating agencies have balked from going full steam in their disclosures and presentation of terrorism in India in the aftermath of the startling revelation that sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur of Hindu Jagran Manch of Indore and Surat owned the motor cycle that carried the bomb that exploded in Malegaon. She along with her three accomplices (Sham Sahu, Dilip Nahar and Shivnarayan Singh from Indore and Dharmendra Bairagi from Dewas) are arrested and sent to custody till November 3. this has dismayed some who are still harping on jihad terrorism despite the fact that terrorism unleashed by LTTE in SriLanka and India was the precursor of the suicide bombing of the Palestinians. Such is the vainglory of some that they do not want to accept that Hindus can be terrorists, even the extremist among them. This is strange for the proverbial tolerance of the Hindus got a jolt with the demolition of the Babri mosque at Ayodhya and violence subsequent to it and the pogroms of Muslims in Gujarat 2002.
It would be wrong to assert that pre 29/11 was in its entirety the handiwork of Jihad terrorism. Malegan blasts of September 8, 2006 militate against the biased perception and twisted theories of terrorism juggernaut of 9/11. This is true even when the accused are all Muslims. Those accused are languishing in jail with hardly any credible evidence found against them because they were not involved. The affidavits they have submitted shows that they were either in prison (Shabeer Masiullah) or at home and mosque (Noorulhoda) or leading Friday prayer more than five hundred miles away.
The former chief of ATS Raghuvanshi had remarked that the bombs that the Bajrang Dal activists of Nanded were making were not for pooja. They had been already used three different times at mosques in Purna, Jalna, Parbhani. One of the ones meant for Aurangabad railway station mosque accidentally exploded 1.30 am Thursday night rather than 1.30 pm Friday group prayer time like all the other mosques including Mecca mosque of Hyderabad and Jama masjid of Delhi. The home made bombs manufactured with the help of retired army officers had also been used at the mosque in Panvel by activists of Hindu Janjagran Samiti and Sanatan Sanstha. These of course preceded September 29, 2008 Modasa and Malegaon blasts. In the sophistry of the right wing Hindu organizations everything is okay and can be connived at by sweeping them under the carpet of safeguarding religion. Moreover they are sophisticated(?) enough not to blare out in their manifesto that their intent is like that of the intrepid Al Qaeda.
Till the time of the Delhi high court special tribunal hearing there was no evidence whatsoever which the government could put before the tribunal in its appeal for continuing the ban on SIMI(Students Islamic Movement of India). People even on suspicion of being connected to it have been arrested and are languishing in jail day in and day out. On the other hand, Bajrang Dal was conceived and created as the the sword arm of Hindutva to carry out its violent campaign aginst the minorities, quintessentially Muslim minority. Who but they were the youths with saffron bands tied to their foreheads scaling and systematically tearing down the walls and domes of the mosque at Ayodhya.
If Muslims are caught for any trivial crime and also for not having any criminal background their profiling includes if they had any link to SIMI. Let alone that their beard and long tunic and skullcap lands them into trouble as it happened, among other places, the north east. After 29/11 there is no attempt to standardize the profiling of terrorism of the sangh privar in terms of their cultural symbols although the RSS boasts of being just a cultural organization.
Hindu Janjagrun Manch of Indore, Bajrang Dal, VHP, Hindu Janjagran Samiti, Shiv Sena, Sanatan Sanstha, Durga Vahini, Akhil Bharti Vidyarthi Parishad are different organizations whose members have now been found to be making bombs and exploding them in mosques or in Muslim ghettoes. It makes no sense that extremist Hindus who are caught should be tried as miscreants irrespective of their organizational affiliation. Many but not the masses of Hindus are members of one or more of such organizations. They receive training in arms and ammunition and explosives periodically in a highly organized manner. Former members of armed forces train them. How can it be that Hindus who are caught in terror crime should be tried as individuals and not as members of the numerous affiliates of the sangh parivar. Nathu Ram Godse and Dr Parchure of Indore were members of the RSS and were sworn enemies of Mahatma Gandhi. The prevailing ethos of these organizations is characterized by proneness to violence, secrecy, and conspiracy. Their patriarch Moonje wanted to find out means where by many people can be killed in one go, his obvious target were Muslims, though it is also relevant to note that the Christians too have come under the attack of the extremist Hindu organizations. Therefore the nature of the organizations and their exhibited practice and material in possession must also be considered as causes of terrorism today. On October 19, 2008 RSS cadres displayed guns, swords and other weapons in a public during their parade through the Ashok nager of Indore city. This was done in flagrant violation of the code of conduct in force in Madhya Pradesh for the coming election. Some of them had allegedly used guns to kill Muslims during the agitation for grant of land for the Anant nag yatra. Therefore organizations and the nature of their known activities give enough proof of how such organizations are involved in terrorist acts.
There are statements that political leaders make and they give enough clues for what is the critical mass. The police of course record but conveniently do not act or provide correct feedback. VHP leader Parveen Togadia had made a speech to the lusty cheering of his audience that Hanuman had come to Godhra, Ravana had set his tail on fire and Hanuman had visited Naroda Patia, etc. Those who had ignited fire in Gujarat were causing terror as well as those who assassinated Mahatma Gandhi. Their affiliation to organizations supplies the ideological motivation. They are the variant versions of Sheikh Yasin. For example this is what Bal Thackeray told Shekhar Gupta : “To understand me, you have to go back to 1948, or even before that. Have you ever thought of Godse’s action, why he decided to kill? He got annoyed, upset, very upset. Even after giving a chunk of our land to Muslims, you were giving Rs 55 crore to them. Godse thought that if this old man lives any longer then he will ruin the country.” Or Narendra Modi hectoring his audience that Hindus can’t be terrorists and if they take to terrorism they would finish off Pakistan. Such is the plosive stuff that can set the ball rolling.
Howsoever we may question the premise that all terrorists are Muslims, what is unquestionable is that all terrorism is propaganda. Exploding bombs in theatres showing Aamhe Pachpute or Jodha Akbar, burning train to Pakistan, or exploding bombs on shabebarat or around shabeqader propagates a message. This could be that there are organizations that are devoted to establish a narrow kind of nationhood and/or maintain cultural hegemony.
Thursday, October 23, 2008
Why queasy about Raj Thackeray being a terrorist
Why only the nephew? Call a rose by any other name; it will give the same smell. Howsoever you anglicize your name your essence of sub continental origin stinks to the outsider. This complexity rebounds on you when you are terribly obsessed by provincialism.
Of late Raj Thackeray has been in the news for attempting to wear the saffron garb of his uncle and thereby trespassing his domain. That has raised alarm because of the elections round the corner. Fighting election in the name of fighting terrorism is not every body’s cup of tea, though you can fool some for sometimes or others for all the time, as Narendra Modi has at succeeded in doing. But the truth will have to emerge as Chanderyaan emerged in the clear sky over Sriharikotla after leaving the cloud of smoke behind on September 22 2008.
The virtual shut down of Mumbai on October 21 2008 on account of the nephew is of the vintage of the hay day of the uncle in 2000. After all he is the chip of the old block. Hold the metropolis to ransom by the awesome muscle power is terrorism localized. What Maharashtra Navnerman Sena is doing now is the repetition of what Shiv Sena did before and is doing on the sly to keep it afloat. Shopkeepers, commuters, students, drivers are too terrified to stir out. It is not a civil boycott but enforced quarantine where you risk your limb and life if you go against the dictates of the shakha pramukhs. Their collecting of fund for the party and other programmes smacks of involuntary submission to their fiefdom where the satraps hold their sway and of course it extends to the neighbouring police station. There you negotiate through them to strike a deal.
Where is civic sense and fair play in such a set up?
The skimpy youths from north India appearing for exams of railway are from the most wretched families without much hope of a future eager to go out wherever they are posted to eke out existence. They are ready to jettison everything much like the south Indians of the bygone time. The MNS activists entered 13 centers of examination and physically assaulted them leading to death and injury. That is terrorizing.
Primarily the question of the north Indians seeking job is a constitutionally justifiable matter. This, irrespective of the fact of how much corruption is in any state for no state is without it. No need to say who is holier than the other. Nor is the amount of bribe and kick back available for the public good. Since Mumbai is the financial capital of the country it is inevitable that people would strive for their share of what they earn by the sweat of their brows. The police at the instance of the government maintain law and order. When both of them look the other way what happens is what has been happening for quite sometimes in Mumbai as elsewhere in the country. One kind of terrorism cannot innately preclude other acts of terrorism.
Raj or Swaraj himself sough a definition of a terrorist. Or was he asking for it with tongue in cheek? Anyone who uses brutal force for a political cause by creating fear in others should know what it is. Force means violence and bloodshed, he did it once only recently and wants to perpetuate it at will whenever he wants to appropriate the sovereignty of the state.
Raj Thackeray has opened the bottle and let the genii out and now it is not within his control to call the genii back. The burning of railway stations across Bihar and other parts of north India threatens to derail the country itself.
Of late Raj Thackeray has been in the news for attempting to wear the saffron garb of his uncle and thereby trespassing his domain. That has raised alarm because of the elections round the corner. Fighting election in the name of fighting terrorism is not every body’s cup of tea, though you can fool some for sometimes or others for all the time, as Narendra Modi has at succeeded in doing. But the truth will have to emerge as Chanderyaan emerged in the clear sky over Sriharikotla after leaving the cloud of smoke behind on September 22 2008.
The virtual shut down of Mumbai on October 21 2008 on account of the nephew is of the vintage of the hay day of the uncle in 2000. After all he is the chip of the old block. Hold the metropolis to ransom by the awesome muscle power is terrorism localized. What Maharashtra Navnerman Sena is doing now is the repetition of what Shiv Sena did before and is doing on the sly to keep it afloat. Shopkeepers, commuters, students, drivers are too terrified to stir out. It is not a civil boycott but enforced quarantine where you risk your limb and life if you go against the dictates of the shakha pramukhs. Their collecting of fund for the party and other programmes smacks of involuntary submission to their fiefdom where the satraps hold their sway and of course it extends to the neighbouring police station. There you negotiate through them to strike a deal.
Where is civic sense and fair play in such a set up?
The skimpy youths from north India appearing for exams of railway are from the most wretched families without much hope of a future eager to go out wherever they are posted to eke out existence. They are ready to jettison everything much like the south Indians of the bygone time. The MNS activists entered 13 centers of examination and physically assaulted them leading to death and injury. That is terrorizing.
Primarily the question of the north Indians seeking job is a constitutionally justifiable matter. This, irrespective of the fact of how much corruption is in any state for no state is without it. No need to say who is holier than the other. Nor is the amount of bribe and kick back available for the public good. Since Mumbai is the financial capital of the country it is inevitable that people would strive for their share of what they earn by the sweat of their brows. The police at the instance of the government maintain law and order. When both of them look the other way what happens is what has been happening for quite sometimes in Mumbai as elsewhere in the country. One kind of terrorism cannot innately preclude other acts of terrorism.
Raj or Swaraj himself sough a definition of a terrorist. Or was he asking for it with tongue in cheek? Anyone who uses brutal force for a political cause by creating fear in others should know what it is. Force means violence and bloodshed, he did it once only recently and wants to perpetuate it at will whenever he wants to appropriate the sovereignty of the state.
Raj Thackeray has opened the bottle and let the genii out and now it is not within his control to call the genii back. The burning of railway stations across Bihar and other parts of north India threatens to derail the country itself.
Malegaon shows the way:On the right track fighting terror
Though the police might have fought shy of going formally public but initial report that Hindu extremists were behind Modasa and Malegaon bomb blasts of September 29 2008 is a welcome albeit belated acceptance of truth. Someone higher up with RSS link must have been maneuvering to mislead investigation or else how come the police could not register crimes against Hindu extremists for so long when accusing finger was pointing at them all the while. As Nathu Ram Godse was reportedly circumcised before the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi so that Muslims would bear the brunt of the backlash of national anger and violence so were all the blasts blamed on Muslims. The right wing Jan Sang and its new avatar BJP are par excellent in this game of camouflaging because of their ideological indoctrination.
The truth was an open secret accepted at all hands that the bomb blasts were benefiting exclusively BJP politically and were fitting in the scheme of things of the ideology of its right wing paternal body. The most ironical was the crying wolf by the BJP leaders like the prime ministerial candidate LK Advani who never introspected as to what havoc the harsher laws would produce when the present laws were themselves so grossly misused. The victims of the Batla house of Jamia nager encounter had gun wounds on the skull as if shot from above like fake encounter victims of Gujarat. This is one of the many facts which point to a heinous design insidiously adopted to fight terror. It could be one of the reasons why most of the investigations into terrorism ended up in a blind alley. If the present laws allow shooting and killing two or three, the more stringent laws would lead to wiping out the whole Jamia nager! Perhaps that is what the BJP would like to see.
This is no matter of exaggeration for what happened in Dhule after the visit of the home minister and the patron minister in the first week of October is fraught with such dangerous possibility. Dhule was burnt in the name of terrorism.
Malegaon was seized with the apprehension of dread and insecurity on September 29 2008 because of the Delhi blasts of September 13. How could the people forget September 8 2006-blasts that came on the heels of 7/11 local train blasts in Mumbai? But such is the wont of the police and the investigative agencies that they would go according to the worldview, weltanschauung, on jihad terrorism. The Hindu Jagran Manch of Indore is believed to be behind last month’s bombing. Their fellow accomplices were from the Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad. It is a telltale that the former owner of the LML Freedom, the death carrier, is a lab assistant of a college in Nashik. However the police found out that the vehicle had many assembled parts of different two wheelers for hiding identity of the vehicle and ownership. It was also part of camouflage that it was parked under the first floor office of SIMI rather than in front of the police chowki across the road much like the SIMI sticker found on the two-wheeler in Modasa.
The disclosure is breath of fresh air after all these suffocating years of chasing the HUJi and IM.
The truth was an open secret accepted at all hands that the bomb blasts were benefiting exclusively BJP politically and were fitting in the scheme of things of the ideology of its right wing paternal body. The most ironical was the crying wolf by the BJP leaders like the prime ministerial candidate LK Advani who never introspected as to what havoc the harsher laws would produce when the present laws were themselves so grossly misused. The victims of the Batla house of Jamia nager encounter had gun wounds on the skull as if shot from above like fake encounter victims of Gujarat. This is one of the many facts which point to a heinous design insidiously adopted to fight terror. It could be one of the reasons why most of the investigations into terrorism ended up in a blind alley. If the present laws allow shooting and killing two or three, the more stringent laws would lead to wiping out the whole Jamia nager! Perhaps that is what the BJP would like to see.
This is no matter of exaggeration for what happened in Dhule after the visit of the home minister and the patron minister in the first week of October is fraught with such dangerous possibility. Dhule was burnt in the name of terrorism.
Malegaon was seized with the apprehension of dread and insecurity on September 29 2008 because of the Delhi blasts of September 13. How could the people forget September 8 2006-blasts that came on the heels of 7/11 local train blasts in Mumbai? But such is the wont of the police and the investigative agencies that they would go according to the worldview, weltanschauung, on jihad terrorism. The Hindu Jagran Manch of Indore is believed to be behind last month’s bombing. Their fellow accomplices were from the Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad. It is a telltale that the former owner of the LML Freedom, the death carrier, is a lab assistant of a college in Nashik. However the police found out that the vehicle had many assembled parts of different two wheelers for hiding identity of the vehicle and ownership. It was also part of camouflage that it was parked under the first floor office of SIMI rather than in front of the police chowki across the road much like the SIMI sticker found on the two-wheeler in Modasa.
The disclosure is breath of fresh air after all these suffocating years of chasing the HUJi and IM.
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