Nanavati commission must summon Modi – Argues JSM

Nanavati commission must summon Modi – Argues JSM
The Gujarat High Court Tuesday sought answers from Jan Sangharsh Manch’s (JSM) counsel Mukul Sinha on issue of summoning of Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi and others by Justices (Retd.) Nanavati-Mehta enquiry commission. JSM has been demanding the probe panel summon Modi and others in connection with the 2002 Godhra train carnage incident and the subsequent riots that were triggered across the state. A division bench of the court comprising Chief Justice SJ Mukhopadhaya and Justice Akil Kureshi asked as to whether the high court had jurisdiction under Article 226 of the Constitution to direct a commission of inquiry formed under Commission of Enquiries Act. The bench also questioned as to whether the witnesses before the commission had right to cross-examine and if so then under which provisions of law. Sinha submitted that the high court’s intervention was necessary and the court while exercising the extra ordinary jurisdiction has powers to direct the commission. He also submitted that questioning of Chief Minister Narendra Modi, other ministers and police personnel, was essential by the commission. He submitted that the commission has to enquire the adequacy or inadequacy of the administrative measures taken during the incidents of carnage and riots, role and conduct of the chief minister and others named in their application, and the role of political leaders in dealing with the situation. He stated that only Modi, being in power at that time and being the head of the state, can answer certain questions. JSM has approached the high court after it’s plea was turned down by a single judge bench. Earlier, in April, 2007, the NGO moved an application before the probe panel seeking it to summon Modi and others for questioning, which was later rejected stating the application was premature and lacked merit. The court has now posted the matter for March 14 at 2.30 pm as part heard matter. On that day advocate general Kamal Trivedi is expected to argue the case.

Tehelka Over Narendra Modi

On Tuesday I wrote the following about Narendra Modi after he walked off a talk show when quizzed about the Gujarat riots of 2002: I don’t know whether I should be alarmed that a Chief Minister with national ambitions is so utterly wrapped in cotton wool that he sincerely believes only a couple of people think he has blood on his hands or whether I should read something more sinister into what went down.

Well, it’s Friday now and everything’s come out in the wash. Tehelka, the investigative magazine set up by journalist Tarun Tejpal, has come out with a report that squarely indicts Mr. Modi and his fellow partyworkers of orchestrating a sectarian massacre. It includes secret recordings of several BJP and sister organization VHP activists discussing the events of 2002 and the role they and the chief minister, Narendra Modi, played during those three nightmare days. I’d like to caution readers that clicking on the above link is not for the faint hearted. I’m not being glib here, ladies and gents.Many Indians have long held Mr. Modi responsible for the riots. But his supporters have always chosen to shift the blame elsewhere. At various times they have said:

• There is no direct evidence to link Mr. Modi to the riots
• That the riots were an outpouring of public sentiment after a train bogey carrying Hindu pilgrims was set on fire near the communally sensitive town of Godhra.
• Mr. Modi is an excellent economic administrator
• The BJP, under his leadership, has won other elections in the state since the riots, thus proving that the people of Gujarat were behind him
• Mr. Modi’s detractors are stooges of the Congress Party, commies, lefties and other “Macaulay’s children” not worthy of attention out to defame a hardworking official because he is a proud Hindu

And now that Tehelka has come out with these tapes, the BJP points out that this reveal comes just weeks before a crucial election and further alleges that Tehelka, if not directly in the pay of the Congress, is at least sympathetic to the Congress cause.I’d like to say a few words here – although, if you’re of the rightist, particularly Sangh Parivar, persuasion, you might want to save yourself an ulcer or popped vein or two and skip it because you’re not going to hear anything you like. To start in reverse order:

Tehelka is in the pay of the Congress: Leaving aside the much discussed vendetta carried out by the Vajpayee administration against both Tehelka and its comrade in arms, Outlook, during the Vajpayee administration – a charge by the way that (if memory serves me correctly) the editor, Vinod Mehta, leveled to the face of at least one BJP leader in the Barkha Dutt hosted We the People without being met with any denial whatsoever – let’s say that Tehelka and Tarun Tejpal are Congress toadies as alleged by the BJP.

Are the BJP and VHP “activists” interviewed on camera also Congress toadies? Did they somehow switch parties and neglect to inform anyone? Did Sonia Gandhi or her minions courier a truckload of cash to not one, not two but a whole bunch of BJP and VHP members so they’d admit to murder, rape and loot on camera? So that’s where all the Bofors money is going. No wonder the NDA sat on that investigation while it was in office. Ghoom phir ke isi politician ki economy mein aani hai.

Really, there must be some sort of hidden treasure in Gujarat if the Congress is that desperate to win.

You’re not with us ergo you’re with the Congress: Grow up. I was going to make this huge speech about how there are more things on heaven and earth and blah blah blah – but why bother when it all boils down to this: Grow. Up.

I don’t know if they actually believe this “logic” or whether this is the catchiest thing they could come up with for the TV cameras but either way it’s absurd. There are those of us out there in the wilderness that don’t believe in a single thing that the Congress or the Left believes in, that are very happy and proud of their nationality, culture and religion – and feel absolutely no desire whatsoever in campaigning for a Hindu rashtra, feel belligerent about events that went down 800 years ago or want to shoot the next Muslim we meet.

I know the leaders of the Sangh Parivar think highly of Indira Gandhi’s leadership qualities, but take it from me: nobody bought it 30 years ago when she tried to tell us she was India and we’re not about to buy that you’re India either and that voting against you makes us anti-national. Mrs. Gandhi is what is commonly called a cautionary tale, people. She fucking lost her marbles and got booted out of office for it. Ask Atal Behari Vajpayee about it: I’m sure he remembers a few things from that time.

Modi wins elections: I have an option here. I could remind you of some other people who’ve won elections after doing despicable things or I could remind you that a large part of Gujarat, a large Muslim part of Gujarat, has been effectively disenfranchised since the riots. And this is a state of matters that goes on with the complicity of all parties in the state, including the Congress. Hmmm, options, options.

Modi can do business: Yes he can. And your point is? Have we begun to shine so brightly as a nation that economic success will now absolve a person of all crimes? Let’s get rid of laws that target white collar crime then. Better still, let Salman Khan walk free. After all, not only is he doing some great PR work for India by acting in Bollywood blockbusters that screen around the world but his movies rake in some major cash, supporting the Lord only knows how many film technician families in Mumbai.

In any case, Mr. Modi comes with a handicap in the business arena: he can gladhand whoever comes to India or to his state but the diplomatic snub he received from the United States should tell you something: he’s going to find it terribly hard to wheel and deal without the wheel-and-deal-ee being accused of hobnobbing with shady characters.

There’s also the little information that came out recently that proved Gujarat Shining wasn’t immune to the deadly farmer suicide epidemic that’s been sweeping India for some years now. According to official figures released under the Right to Information Act, at least 489 farmers have killed themselves since 2003. Disparity in economic growth really is a national phenomenon.

No direct evidence & public sentiment: Watch the video. Oh wait, that’s right – you can’t coz the Modi administration has blocked all news channels that are broadcasting news of the sting. That’s exactly what a person with nothing to hide would do – if their name was Indira Gandhi. How did that turn out for her again?

Lucky you, chances are, if you can read this blog then you can see the sting played out over the internet.

Finally, can we please put an end to this “party with a difference” tag that everybody’s been kicking around for so long re: the BJP? By now it should be fairly obvious that this is basically the Congress with a Hindutva slant and no Nehru Gandhi clan to give it weightage at the center.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India?

Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India?

Narendra Modi attends a First Convocation ceremony of Gujarat National Law University in Gandhinagar, near Ahmedabad, on March 28, 2010. – Photo by AFP.

A big race, probably the biggest that India is mandated to hold, was kicked off last week. It could usher Narendra Modi or Rahul Gandhi as prime minister in 2014 when elections are due, if not before. And since Modi has the unqualified support of major industrialists who know the art, shall we say, of financing parties, lobbying for MPs, and influencing key policies, there is little reason to doubt who the corporate media would be backing when push comes to shove.

Gandhi, with his limited experience of NGOs in Amethi and Rae Bareli might find himself as the back-up. He is untested. Modi, on the other hand, has shown his worth to those who run democracy in India.

In any case no one is required to win a majority in parliament any longer and nobody probably ever will in the increasingly disparate polity called India. The last time a single party had a clear majority it was the largest majority ever. In 1984, Rajiv Gandhi got more than three fourths of the Lok Sabha seats but that was in the wake of his mother’s assassination and the communal wave which came with sympathy. No party has got a clear majority ever since. The task to make up for the shortages is left to post-electoral “arrangements” to be managed by veteran specialists with the needed wherewithal to make the right offer to get the arithmetic right. This has been the pattern since 1991.

That was when a handful of MPs representing the tribespeople of Jharkhand – the kind who are rallying the war against Maoists today – accepted a small bribe to save the trust vote for Prime Minister P.V. Narasimha Rao’s minority Congress government. Only after his five-year term was complete and over were they jailed. He escaped of course by some legal callisthenics to hand over the reins of power to the Congress’ most preferred upper caste alternative – the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), albeit for 13 days to begin with.

Without going into deep history, suffice it to say that just last week, the legislative assembly in the border state of Assam sent two Congress candidates to the Rajya Sabha by indulging in “cross-voting”, euphemism for shady deals. The BJP suspended its MLAs for betraying its whip, but the deputies may yet remain members of the house because the majority and the presiding officer belong to the Congress who may reward the men, not punish them. This incidentally is the same assembly that has consistently elected Prime Minister Manmohan Singh as Rajya Sabha MP since 1992. After the Supreme Court changed the rules, he is no longer required to give an affidavit of being a permanent resident of Assam! He needed to do so in the past.

The coordination – (an alliance would look unconvincing among make-believe rivals) – between the Congress and the BJP involves brisk floor crossing. Many a Congress leader has joined the BJP and so many more left the BJP to join the Congress that it’s often confusing to tell one from the other. This bonding peaked recently when they came together to create the illusion of women’s empowerment by seeking to corner 33 per cent safe parliamentary constituencies for primarily upper caste women behind the cloak of gender equality. The bill is expected to struggle to pass the Lok Sabha. Barring the semantics there is complete understanding between the two parties on a range of vital issues – from the neo-liberal shepherding of foreign and economic policies to their alliance at home which is rock solid in the militarist prescriptions towards the tribespeople and their coveted natural resources. The use of vigilante groups backed by paramilitary or even the army to break up resistance groups in crucial states is a method they both pursue assiduously.

So what was the big race that began last week and how did it get kicked off? It began when the Congress and the corporate media feigned to attack the BJP. It was a race triggered by the Congress in order to revive the foundering rightwing party as its main challenger. BJP leader Lal Kishan Advani who was mothballed after his party failed to win last year’s parliamentary elections was thus catapulted onto the centre-stage. Suddenly, out of the blue, a court case that was dragging on against him since the 1992 demolition of the Babri mosque became the subject of screaming headlines. A woman police officer who was present at the site on 6th December 1992 declared (not for the first time) that she saw the BJP leaders including Advani making inflammatory speeches, which set off the destruction of the mosque. Will he and his cohorts be jailed, if so to what avail?

Adolf Hitler too was jailed for leading the Beer Hall Putsch against the government in Bavaria in 1923. He was sentenced to five years in prison by a friendly judge, but was released in nine months during which he wrote Mein Kampf. The implications in this for a pusillanimous government that the Congress runs are horrific. But this is not the end of the matter. A special investigating team (SIT) was ordered by the Supreme Court to interview Narendra Modi for his role – which should have been an open and shut case really – in the anti-Muslim pogroms of 2002. Where the SIT will take the tragic story of Zakia Jafri, the brave and lonely widow of the brutally murdered former MP Ahsan Jafri, who has been chasing the case against Modi in every possible court, is implicit in the nameplate that hangs outside the SIT office in Gujarat. It is looking into “Godhra Riots”, announces the placard, so-called after the death of scores of Hindu passengers for which Modi’s government arrested and jailed local Muslims. It was a trigger to the pogroms, not a riot.

There is nothing essentially wrong about seeking legal remedies against injustices of the state. We should not belittle the efforts of Teesta Setalvad, Zakia Jafri and many others for keeping faith in the judicial process. However, we have to be realistic about what the state can or would do to arrest its own rightward slide. In this regard, the Congress and the BJP flaunt their own set of injustices to make spurious populist appeals. The BJP plays up the Delhi massacre of Sikhs by Congress hoodlums. The Congress blames the BJP for its criminal role in Ayodhya and for the carnage of Muslims in Gujarat among other outrages. Both sides had their chance to right the wrongs that they were so worked up about, with political and judicial remedies. They didn’t.

Meanwhile, a real winner for communal polarisation was let loose last week. The Supreme Court said it would allow the state of Andhra Pradesh to reserve job quotas for low caste Muslims. The BJP will pounce on it. It badly needs to go to the four corners of the country with its unique street fighting capability. Communal polarisation helps the Congress take the secular high ground and the BJP finds in it much needed nutrition to galvanise a Hindu revivalist agenda. It thus helps cut the ground from under the feet of the middle of the road parties such as the Left and assorted backward caste-based socialists like Laloo and Mulayam Yadav.

In August 1993, addressing the nation from the ramparts of the Mughal-built Red Fort, Prime Minister Narasimha Rao promised to rebuild the demolished mosque in Ayodhya. It was a foolish and dangerous statement to make. Moreover it lacked sincerity, which was not such a bad thing, given the lethal consequences had he been earnest. Job reservations for low caste Muslims may be a logical thing to do, provided there is a consensus in the country, and there are jobs to be handed out. When Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in a manner of speaking that Muslims had the first right on the state’s resources, he was roundly criticised by the BJP and other rightwing parties for appeasing Muslims. No appeasement is happening. Muslims like a majority of other Indians will continue to be marginalised and ghettoised if a spurious two-party system is enforced to keep the status quo. The system works well for the big business and Narendra Modi is a better bet for them than anybody on the horizon. All he has to do is to pretend to be mellow as Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Advani did after causing untold harm to Indian secularism. Prime Minister Modi will thus have exemplary role models to emulate. Does Rahul Gandhi have an ace up his sleeve to trump him? Yes, perhaps, by becoming more like the BJP.