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Exorcising the imaginary demon

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A major task before peacemakers in Kovai, Tamil Nadu, is to counter the pernicious propaganda that all Muslims are ‘foreigners’, ‘Pakistanis’

KOVAI

Suspicions bordering on hate, impelling persons to the edges of irrationality, have marked all the violence carried out in the name of faith, defined as communalism in the South Asian context. Irrational and partisan behaviour has been observed in not just the man and woman on the street but have, since the early eighties (especially) permeated and affected, the conduct of men in uniform — the Indian policeman. 

It is this absence of neutrality, witnessed as irrational bias, that violates basic tenets of rigorous training and also the oath of allegiance to the secular Indian Constitution that every public servant is bound to swear. Such behaviour, unfortunately, guided the actions of some sections of the Coimbatore (now renamed Kovai) police in November 1997. These actions resulted in unpardonable misdemeanours against sections of the Muslim minority. (See CC, February 1998).

The actions of the Kovai police had been severely condemned in February 1994, too. In a detailed investigation report, the People’s Union for Civil Liberties (PUCL) had named two senior officers, Thiru Ganesan, the then commissioner of police, Kovai and the then ACP, Thiru Masanamuthu, for “brutal and unlawful attacks on Muslims”. 

In November 1997, aggressive behaviour of the city’s police against some young Muslims was enough to heighten tensions to a fever pitch. The news of one police constable being attacked and killed, allegedly by members of a fanatical outfit, Al Ummah, was enough for the police to go on a revenge rampage. They not only arrested the leader of the group, SA Basha, but also vent their fury against innocent and ordinary members of the Muslim community living in Coimbatore. Three days of hell followed, with the police actively conniving with members of the Hindu fanatical outfit, Hindu Munnani and the RSS.

After police highhandedness came the large scale, and indiscriminate arrests of many innocent ordinary members of the Muslim community. An independent fact–finding team subsequently found that the police was also guilty of ill–treatment, torture and abuse of the victims, leading to further alienation among the minority section of the population.

This is when Abu Backer, a citizen of this town, known hitherto for it’s flourishing textile industry and significant working class population, got involved with the issue of police brutality and partisan behaviour that is so critically linked to myths and stereotypes labelled on to the minority community. He did this through the local unit of the PUCL, of which he was an executive committee member since 1993. 
He, along with a few others, strove hard at a time when suspicions between people had severed deep connections to keep the communication links between ordinary members of the two major communities open, to press for dialogue. Backer, working in a highly polarised environment had a one point agenda – to isolate the politicised elements of both these communities and reach out through constant efforts to touch, to shake and even to shame ordinary Hindus and Muslims from falling for the political trap of hatred and division.

Here follows the account of Abu Backer in his own words:
It was not easy at the time to remind people of our abiding, everyday links because two partisan groups on both sides were bent on articulating difference. But today despite those schisms, Coimbatore is close to normal once again.’

It is surprising and shocking even, but the sad fact is that many of our fellow citizens actually believe that Muslims are outsiders, they are foreigners. It is a measure of the success of motivated propaganda, of course. But it therefore becomes necessary to systematically and painstakingly disabuse ordinary people of these notions. This is actually what we did! We showed how all of us were converts of a few generations, born of this soil, the only difference between us being that we had chosen an alternate faith. I was surprised how shocked people were when they were told the truth.

Another misconception that is widespread is the Indian Muslim’s cursed and alleged link to Pakistan. We constantly hear refrains of, “Go back to Pakistan”, especially during communal aggression or violence. These are, I think the two main crosses that we have to bear. 

In November 1997, the murder of a police constable by some Muslim youth escalated into a full-scale riot in Coimbatore. The violence, interestingly, was not between Hindus and Muslims. It was between two distinct groups trying to project themselves as the sole spokespersons of their respective communities – Hindus and Muslims. They are the Hindu Munnani that has it’s ideological moorings in the RSS and has been ominously visible in Tamil Nadu since 1981 (especially after the nation–wide hue and cry following the Meenakshipuram conversions) and the Al Ummah. 

Unfortunately, large sections of the media, too, projected it as a communal riot. We formed an investigation team and published a report. Mr Masanamuthu, the then DCP of Coimbatore, was found to be guilty of articulating rabidly anti–Muslim sentiments and actually acting on these. This man has had a history of partisan behaviour (documented in 1994, too). Yet, he continues to wear and flout his uniform.
Inevitably almost, what followed the callous police–Muslim violence of November 1997 were the bomb blasts that ripped the city on February 14, 1998. The blasts heightened the division between ordinary Hindus and Muslims.

Suddenly all Muslims were being held responsible for the actions of two small, fanatical groups, the Al Ummah and Al Jehad. Between the two, they had only 185 members, but the whole community was dubbed terrorists!  More than 40 innocent people from Karunanidhinagar were illegally detained. Another 100 persons were detained ostensibly under another preventive detention provision. 

Each one of these persons was subsequently acquitted. Who pays the price for this gross violation of rights and slur on their character? There was not a single case of conviction from among those indiscriminately arrested. Imagine the deep hurt that was meted out to sections of the Muslim population.

Especially after the bomb blasts, we organised ourselves under the banner of the Federation of All Muslim Jamaat. We represented the victims in the Gokulakrishnan Commission investigating the communal violence and the blasts. Even today, the harassment of the minority community by the police and administration has not entirely stopped. Many persons remain charge-sheeted though they are innocent.

The irony is that a significant section of the Muslim community is being victimised for the actions of a few. The unfair victimisation is due to the prevalence of a widespread anti–Muslim bias. The ultimate irony is that we still need to constantly speak up and disassociate ourselves from acts of vandalism and terrorism carried out by a few in the name of our faith!

When the blasts took place, it was through the Federation of All Muslim Jamaat that we organised an ‘Anti–terrorism Week’. We put out slogans and posters on the streets, including some created by Communalism Combat, to show that we are part of the national, social fabric, that we are Indians. It was ordinary Muslim shop keepers, small traders on the streets of Kovai who sponsored large hoardings carrying these messages that claimed rationality and reminded people of the communal harmony that was being sorely tested and tried. 

We printed posters and organised relief for the victims of the bomb blasts, many of whom were Hindus. We even collected Rs 50,000 from the Muslim community for the family of constable Selvaraj who had been so unfortunately killed, but the money was unfortunately refused.

Today, Coimbatore is quite calm. There are no provocative speeches from either side. The Hindu Munnani, which had become active here after the Meenakshipuram conversions in 1982, has also been restrained due to strict vigilance by the police.

It was the conversions in 1982 that brought these forces to Coimbatore and Tamil Nadu. After the Meenakshipuram conversions, the Munnani leader, Thiru Ramagopalan organised a convention in Coimbatore. Ironically, the only language that was commandeered to oppose conversions was the hurling of abuse against Muslims and the Prophet of Islam! 

This was successfully used by Basha to counterpose Muslim fanaticism and narrow–mindedness and the Al Ummah was born. There could not be a clearer link between the two brands of fanaticism. We have lived and seen through the clear nexus, we have witnessed how ordinary Hindus and Muslims of Kovai have been victimised by both the different brands of fanaticism.

Our work was concerned with re-establishing confidence and trust between the two communities. The rift is never between ordinary people. Yet we fall victim to the engineered suspicion and hatred. The bomb blasts in Coimbatore succeeded in causing a huge rift between ordinary people of different faiths. This is a painful reality to live with, a bitter pill to swallow.

It is this reality that jostles us into continued work in the social sphere even now. It is important for more and more Muslims to be visibly involved in the public and social sphere. In Tamil Nadu at least, I feel there are not enough of us. If we were present in sufficient number, committed and involved in human rights, development, labour or gender issues that concern all communities, our interventions when suspicions run high and hatred reigns can be more effective and more meaningful.

Today, apart from a consistent crusade for rational dialogue and harmony between communities, one of my other priorities is working with an educational society for Muslims — the Tamil Kalvi Sehvai Maiyyam. There is a lot of illiteracy among young Muslims, youngsters have no formal degrees, and the number of school dropouts is very high. Such a situation is ripe for fanatical outfits to benefit from. 

Through whatever else that one does in the social sphere, to work for communal harmony, rationality and dialogue in today’s India is a must. This is necessary because when something flares up between two fundamentalist/fanatical groups, we must be visible and present, prepared to show that the flare–up is only between two small and marginalised sections, not between all Hindus and Muslims.

It is important for ordinary people with conviction to stand up and speak out. How else will the rifts that are being so cynically created, be healed? 

(As told to Communalism Combat)

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2001, Anniversary Issue (8th) Year 8  No. 71, Cover Story 3

 

Cop as community worker

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Communities must receive the message from the topmost level in the police force: Gurdwara or masjid or church — he is there, he is available, he is our man. Every community wants the police chief to be there

KARNATAKA

While serving as a police officer at various levels of the police hierarchy — as the SP of a district, as DIG, the commissioner of police, Bangalore and as the DGP — I have had to handle many major communal crises situations. And I have always felt that our ability to react to or control such a situation hinges crucially on our long–term efforts to be part of the community in the normal course of our policing work. 

We need to instil confidence in our force by the calibre of our response. It is how I react to complaints from the community — even if it be the story of a minor theft that will determine whether or not ordinary people will have the faith to approach me, come to me. Whether or not I can communicate with them at times of a crisis is crucial.

I would agree that the image of the police in general on the issue of fair and neutral controlling of communally driven violence has taken a severe bashing. I am with you on that one. There is an urgent need to resurrect not just our image but drastically alter our attitude to regain confidence, rebuild our reputation and image among the entire citizenry. 

Why do communal flare-ups occur? Communal flare–ups are essentially caused by a lack of faith between peoples of different communities. It is when faith is ruptured, by vested interests, by people who want to exploit emotions and ignorance that such violence breaks out. At such a time, whatever be the cause of the conflagration, a strong and inspiring leadership is required.

I was commissioner of police, Bangalore for two years and seven months. Each year December 6, 1992 is observed as a Black Day, a day when emotions run high. Each year, sections of our people need to recall the Babri Masjid demolition. This is natural because they were hurt deeply by that act. It is a day of mourning when many would also like to take advantage of these sentiments to splash the streets with posters and pamphlets and placards, the contents of which are not always unimpeachable. 

Now under these circumstances, who should dissuade them, who should take it upon themselves to tell them that though the day and deed was extremely unfortunate, some self–regulation displayed by the leaders of the community would be in the interests of the community itself?

I faced this dilemma as a senior police functionary every year. Groups of Muslims would announce it as a Black Day and plan programmes. I evolved a simple principle of action. I built direct communication links with the community and attempted, successfully, to persuade them, in their own self–interest, to protest with restraint. The approach worked. 

I had Muslim women, accompanied by social workers from the area, waiting to meet me in the late hours of the night, waiting to take me along, to meet, to shake hands with and to pat the backs of young and angry Muslim youth. We tried, earnestly, and always together with members of their own community to dissuade them against rash acts. It worked.

I recall another incident that occurs with chilling finality every year during Bakri Id and Mahavir Jayanti — two festivals that come within days of each other! 

In 1999, they happened to fall on the same day!  Now Muslims believe in offering sacrifice of a camel or a goat on that day. Part of their faith is in making this sacrifice and distributing the meat. Therefore, we must respect it as a religious practice. 

Some twenty years ago, someone had issued a circular stating that there should be no sale of meat on Mahavir Jayanti. While Muslims are committed to slaughter on that day, Hindus and Jains are determined to stop the practice. Now in the midst of the kind of political situation that we face today, both sides are willing to fight a pitched battle. For a policeman in charge, the question is how do I avert a catastrophe?

The most important thing for us to understand is that during such trying and tense circumstances, when we face two or more very sensitive communities, particularly those living in congested urban areas, no amount of police bandobast or police deployment is the answer. That is not going to solve the problem, we simply cannot have a policeman behind everybody. Neither can we get into the heart of everyone.
What we can do, however, is to keep channels of communication and dialogue open. This is what we did in 1999 and the people of Bangalore, of all communities, will testify to this. For three–four weeks, the Bangalore police were engaged in continuous dialogue, in constant street–level, mohalla–level dialogue with the people to promote a resolution, to prevent a breakdown into violence.

The principle we followed was simple. Muslims and Jains both said that they had deep respect for each other. How then, we asked, do we get pushed and reduced to such intransigent positions?
We encouraged regular, intense but public dialogue between respectable people of both communities, from the mohalla level right up to the state level, finally the discussions resonated even in the Vidhan Soudha.

How did this happen? We discussed the principles of both faiths, their essence, what could be negotiated, what must be held sacred. For the Jains, on Mahavir Jayanti, what is prohibited is the slaughter of living beings. For the Muslims, this slaughter need not be done in public. What is banned for the Jains is the eating of meat, which is a private part of their religious belief. Also, for Jains, the believers in the non–violence of Mahavira, peace must be a primary objective, and to arrive at a position satisfactory to both sides must be the goal.

Therefore, to ensure peace between two different sets of believers, we must have a bit of sacrifice on both sides. Why not do the slaughter, which symbolises sacrifice in private, and do the distribution of meat only the following day? For the Muslims, we said that since sacrifice is a must, it must be done at home. At moments like these, accommodation and tolerance must guide both sides; blatant provocation must be avoided.

We found after heated deliberations that provocations are often created and fomented, they are not essentially there. 

After three to four weeks of hard work, we were rewarded with a mammoth gathering at the Idgah Maidan where 15,000 Muslims had gathered. For the first time in the history of the city, and in my experience serving as a policeman, it was a Jain priest who recited the first prayer on the morning of Bakri Id. It was a prayer to non-violence. After this, a joint delegation of Muslims and Jains paid a visit to the then governor, Khurshid Aslam Khan. And once again, later the same day, Hindus and Muslims participated in joint celebrations.

A prominent leader from the Jain community addressed the gathering, took them into confidence, explaining how peace was found. Then he and his Muslim counterpart exchanged their traditional headgear, with the Muslim donning a turban and the Hindu wearing a prayer cap.

It is when every community celebrates the other’s festival that one community starts feeling responsible for the other community. We were able to celebrate non-violence in a socially vibrant manner through community leaders, not merely by uttering it as a matter of principle.

These kinds of achievements require dynamism and foresight from the police. Communities must receive the message from the topmost level in the force: Gurdwara or masjid, he is there, he is available, he is our man. Every community loves and wants the police chief to be there. Do we send out the message that we are theirs? 

A smile and warm shake of the hand is all they want; unfortunately, too few of us wish to extend these simple gestures that are deeply felt by people.

Another time comes to mind. It was 1998, Bangalore. Jaya-nagar is the biggest urban extension in Asia. It is an affluent area that has a prominent road leading up to a very busy shopping complex. In the midst of this razzmatazz, there is a site, with an Idgah with attached land piled up with rubble. The administration had wanted to remove this for the past three decades; Muslims had been resisting, demanding a kabrastan (graveyard) there.

To be honest, the demand for a graveyard at this location was illogical. The obstruction is ugly, it obstructs the road. But it is an accident of development; not part of any deliberate design of the Muslims to cause accidents as it began to be portrayed by some forces!

Now on that day in 1998, a girl, Janaki Laxmi Bai, was hit by a state transport bus and, unfortunately, she died on the spot. I was on my daily rounds with the joint commissioner and we reached the spot after messages about the usual agitated, post-accident crowd gathered were beeped to us. Knowing the history of this dispute, familiar with the patterns of public behaviour, we arrived there expecting the worst. 

By the time we reached there, tensions had escalated, dialogue between the two sides had ceased and the throwing of stones had begun. There were rumours of a mosque being desecrated that angered the Muslims. And there were rumours on the other side that Muslims had gathered inside the mosque to attack Hindus. 

We talked to both sides, incessantly, sitting on the bonnet much against the advice of our officers who warned us that we could get hurt in the stone pelting. Now a policeman in charge on the spot, in the midst of a heated situation, simply has to take the risk. I was clear about my motives when I spoke to the crowd gathered. I am not going to leave by simply dispersing the crowd, that would be too easy, I told them. I am not a road builder but I am with you and I want to be with you, with both sides, to solve the problem, I added.

The mosque was vacated by the Muslims themselves and rumours thus dispelled. All the Muslims and Hindus that had gathered there went with us to a nearby club to discuss the matter through. The first bits that emerged through rational discussion was that over the years, a total of 10 deaths had taken place because of the traffic obstruction. But this had been distorted by some forces to spread the propaganda that 100 people had died!

During our conversations at the club, the first thing I did was to telephone the chief minister and insist that we, the entire delegation, wanted to meet him because we wanted an intervention at the very highest levels. We also insisted that we required swift and prompt action from him. After establishing within the group that the matter was urgent, requiring solution, we went over the respective positions on both sides. I first spoke to both the sides separately.

The Muslims spoke. On the site there stood an ancient dargah, in the adjoining land there were old graves, we simply want to confirm and assert our rights over the land, they said. But, as far as the road widening is concerned, we too are citizens and would like to see it made possible.

Then we spoke to the other side. We had to be careful and sensitive. We had to settle the issue without making them feel that Muslims had been favoured.  On the other hand, if it was decided at the end of discussions to hand over the land for the Bangalore Municipal Corporation Muslims should not feel they had been bulldozed!

In this case, the land had been transferred to the Waqf Board after a former Maharaja of the city had gifted the land where the Idgah stands for prayers. Therefore, Muslims had legitimate and legal control of the land. But despite this history, allegations of ‘appeasement’’ of Muslims were deliberately spread by a certain element within the Hindus. They wanted to make a propaganda that prime property of 10–15 acres right in the middle of town was with the Muslims!

Therefore, the secret and sensitive negotiations that carried on well past midnight were critical. Due to the sincerity and sensitivity of our efforts, a 30–year–old problem, a flash point, that had been the cause of several riots and dozens of deaths, was finally solved. 

How did we do it? The flash point, in this case, the irritant was itself removed. How? The Muslim leaders took it upon themselves to convince the whole community that their legal and rightful claims to the land was being given up in the civic interests of the city. The whole process took thirty days, but the files were kept secret. 

Decisions were taken silently and secretly but different sections of the leadership, down to the ground level, were apprised of the top–level decisions each and every day. They were kept in confidence to minimise distrust and avoid any speculation that leads to rumours and outright tension.

I must add that the media, the press, also displayed very good sense because we took them into confidence. They did not get into the by-line competition by publishing sensational and ‘exclusive’ news! No speculative news reports appeared in that tense period.

It was a great diplomatic exercise for me, a police officer used to functioning differently. Do you know what many of my close Muslim friends said to me after the crisis was settled through a mutually agreeable settlement? They said, “The commissioner of police should be sent as India’s ambassador to Pakistan!”

What was the key to the solution? We had to be patient. We had to be clear and make it clear to all concerned that we were not in an indecent hurry, that there could be no instant solutions. Both sides had to be listened to but fair play and justice could not be sacrificed.

The result of the goodwill that I have earned through all these efforts is this. When I go, dressed in my uniform, to attend Id celebrations every year in Bangalore, I am overwhelmed by the cordiality and warmth with which I am received. If you were to see it, it would bring tears to your eyes. 

The minority in any society is a particularly insecure community. There is a feeling of insecurity among them in our country. And are we really surprised, given the circumstances? The best thing that we can do under the circumstances is to ensure with a fair and open heart and mind that at all times they have access to and experience proximity with the powers that be. 

If, as commissioner of police I go to them, be among them, my subordinates, too, will go. If I go, I will be first–hand witness to what happens there, they would honour me because there is so much warmth. It is this kind of intermingling that builds trust and cordiality between citizens and the police. And this is what is lacking among the police, the desire to build long–term and solid foundations of trust and respect. The police in general lack this sensitivity, unfortunately.

When I left Bangalore as CP and assumed my next post as DG (prisons), the goodwill and trust that I had earned followed me there. Do you know how? My best friends from all communities followed me to the prisons: Christmas, Id and Sankrant began to be celebrated there. The humanitarian work from all three communities flowed into the prisons I was in charge of. There were 30-40 NGOs with whom I worked closely.

I still remember the day when I handed over charge as CP of Bangalore. I was simply overwhelmed by the sentiments expressed by the more than hundred Muslims who came to see me. There were 50–60 cars belonging to members of the community lined up outside my office; they had come to present sweets to me. But what touched me most was when they took me to the mosque to pray for me and to give me blessings! I felt one of them and they trusted me as one of theirs.

This kind of trust can be created only when they are sure that we will stand by them. The police simply must stand by all sections of the population. When a Muslim or Christian woman experiences fair treatment and justice, the sentiment slowly grows into how the whole community feels. This sort of building of confidences cannot come overnight. But once this is done, it can be of immense help to a policeman whenever there is a burning issue, because your access to the community is already assured.

The only way to get there is to pass the test. We cannot be self–seekers, not carry or convey the arrogance of authority. We need to be available at all times whenever access is requested. The leader of the force, the man in charge of the thana, the sub-divisional officer, SP or CP – each one of us must think he is the one for this job. Expectations from within on each one of us, of ourselves, must be high!
When frenzy breaks out, the lack of faith that this violence manifests must be restored by the police. It is such a small thing but so difficult! Actually it is a very big thing! Whoever the officer is and wherever he is placed, must be just and seen to be just! There must be no room for rumours to spread!

December 6, 1992 is a bad dream for the community that haunts its consciousness. On that fateful day, I was serving as IG with the Karnataka Detectives Corps department, an equivalent of the CID. I was an officer working in plainclothes. 

But when things started going out of hand, I was asked to go to Mangalore, a very communally sensitive town. Earlier, some BJP MLAs had been elected from here but they were defeated in the recent elections, in 1992. In 1990, there had been communal trouble in Purakkal, following the rathyatra. After December 6, 1992, there was a three-day riot in Mangalore. That’s when I was sent there because I had been DIG there previously and my close relations, oneness and bonds, with all sides, had remained intact. 

It is so critical at times of communal frenzy to reinforce the bonds that bind us. Because at times like these, the very forces that hold us together get weakened! And the cancerous cell of suspicion and venom eats into the fabric. 

I remember the day I reached Mangalore three days after the demolition. People were burning vehicles! What did I do? From morning to evening all I did was talking, and more talking. Simply talking. Endless talking. What did I want to convey through this talking? That we are not for violence, we are not for settling matters through force. It required a lot of patience. It was exhausting. I addressed some 20–25 meetings. What I desired was simple — communication lines should be kept alive, human relationships must survive such crises.

An agitated mob acts like one body but it is a scattered brain that functions with irrational and disparate acts. Some parts are talking, others are stabbing, yet others are throwing stones. It is the innocent ones at the front who get sacrificed.

Anyway, after reaching Mangalore, 95 per cent of situation was controlled within 24 hours. Unfortunately, it was only in one pocket that we failed. My men were getting injured; we shot and killed a man. It was unfortunate but the right decision at the time. Eventually my instinct, built on experience to talk and keep talking was justified. Within 36–40 hours the dialogue paid dividends. In 90 per cent of the case, it is only dialogue that pays dividends. Only in 10 per cent of the cases do we need to use force.

Maintaining this balance is crucial, between the two options. But for me to carry the weight of my decisions — to dialogue and not use force — my policemen should have faith in me. This faith can only be established, if at ticklish and dangerous times, a senior policeman leads from the front. 

In Mangalore, I was in the front. I could have been killed but if I remained in the rear, I would have inspired no faith. It is when you are in the intimate know of things that the decisions you make are made with careful calculation. In Mangalore, too, the decision was made. Conciliation, was the first option; only if this failed, would force be used.

A mob in a communally volatile situation is schizophrenic. It often needs to be administered a shock and it is the different reactions that need to be balanced and acted upon. 
It was after this that I came to Bangalore! I see myself as a policeman but also as a community man, in charge of a sensitive post and department with a special responsibility. A policeman is the visible face of the state, so he is always being watched carefully for his attitudes and behaviour. 

I believe that I must appear as a sensitive human being at all times. So what if I am a very orthodox Hindu, who after pooja applies the vibhuti on my forehead? But this sign of my faith should not be visible outside. The arms of the state should not only be secular, but also look secular. To imbibe these values in the police force, the quality of training within the police is vital. Once this sensitive pattern of behaviour is followed, it comes naturally.

My motto as a police officer was simple. Be it Id or Christmas, Diwali or the St Mary’s procession, I would never miss the opportunity to cement my relationship with people from that community. A relationship built at this level percolates down to every level. You are also in the process, demonstrating to your subordinates how a situation should be handled.

A communal situation, in a way is different, even abnormal: people go mad! My neighbour suddenly thinks he should burn my house and neighbourhood, even though through all the earlier years, including times of crises in my life, he has been with me!

Hence it is critical to keep communications open with all sides of the spectrum at such a time. I have been criticised sometimes in meeting with groups like the Hindu Jagran Vedike. But for me it was important to have contact with them if I was to retain the strength to dialogue with them.
In a communal situation especially, the police officer at the helm has to be prepared to lead from the front, to take risks. Only then can he win the confidence of the people warring with each other. Nobody will come forward to offer their necks unless you are prepared to risk yours!

(As told to Communalism Combat)

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2001, Anniversary Issue (8th) Year 8  No. 71, Cover Story 4

‘Why should I be afraid?’

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Madinaben brings, in her small but unique way, a healing touch 
of peace and love to a city that is slowly but systematically being 
more and more fragmented.

AHMEDABAD

Madinaben Ganchhi Pathan

Madinaben Ganchhi Pathan, housewife, 47–years–old, lives in the Sankalitnagar area of Juhapura in Ahmedabad.  Juhapura is today a well–known, Muslim–majority ghetto. About 30–years–ago, this area was in fact a wasteland. Thousands of slum dwellers living on the banks of the river and affected by the floods of the river Sabarmati were moved by the government to live in this area on these patches of land.
Earlier, Madinaben lived in one of the slums on the banks of the river. She might have been about 16 or 17 when she was married off to another slum dweller who earned his living through casual work. Her neighbourhood was a mixed one, housing Hindus and Muslims. Everyone’s attention was focused on the primary objective of trying to make both ends meet. In their poverty, they were able to share each other’s joys and sorrows. 

Pitted against unfair and harsh living conditions that bonded them, the joint celebration of either Diwali or Id were an extension of this bondage. Despite the numerous hardships, life went on, until the floods of 1973 changed the pattern of their lives forever. 

The people who lived in these slums on the banks of the river were forced to leave them. Madinaben was one such evictee… forced to move out of her settlement as a newly married bride with her young husband. But for her, ever since then, there has been no looking back. When the slum dweller evictees first moved to Sankalitnagar in Juhapura it was a mixed neighbourhood. Over the past few decades, however, Madinaben has seen the Sankalitnagar neighbourhood change in complexion, as the Hindu families slowly started moving out, for fear of reprisal by their Muslim neighbours for attacks on Muslims in the other parts of the city. Sankalitnagar is a typical microcosm of the deeply divided and ghettoised society that urban Gujarat today reflects.

In 1984, Madinaben was identified by St. Xavier’s Social Service Society (SXSSS) and trained to be a health worker. Her daily routine in the sprawling slums of Sankalitnagar was to carry out house–to–house visits of the families living there, providing them with health education, promoting good health, showing them how they could prevent the spread of illness and even providing them with medicare when necessary. An essential component of her work has been to listen to people who were traumatised by attacks of violence and who have felt the burden of hate propaganda and prejudice.

In the years of her work, Madinaben has been, in a humble and unassuming way, reaching out to people, to heal the wounds of hate and division. Ever since the demolition of the Babri Masjid on December 6, 1992, she has also been visiting many of the Hindu slum settlements of the city. She does this in a most matter–of–fact way, responding to the needs of the poor in the very same way as in Sankalitnagar. 

Madinaben eagerly waits to make her daily trips to Khariwadi, Rakhial and other places… And, the slum dwellers in these places (most of them are Hindus) wait for her to come, as eagerly. When asked whether she was not afraid (being a Muslim woman) to go everyday to a Hindu dominated area she shoots back a reply, “Why should I be afraid? The problems of the poor are very different; the people do not see me as Muslim but as some one who wants to help them”.

An important part of Madinaben’s responsibility is to counter rumours and hate-mongering that is an integral part of hate politics.  Normally, just before the onset of a communal riot there are dozens of patrikas (handbills/leaflets) which are circulated. Most of them are very venomous and vicious in nature.  They are usually against the other community. They serve the purpose of sowing the seeds of suspicion, preparing the ground for violence.

Since she is literate, Madinaben with ready access to both communities is often asked by the people to read out – and often, explicate — the contents of the handbills to them. She does so creatively and honestly. Often, she is able to destroy the blatant lies printed in them, by taking them apart, one by one. 

It is not easy. A tall order, in fact, because she risks the wrath of either her own or the other friendly community. Loyalties are tested on narrow and brittle ground when communal tensions run high. She runs the risk of fellow Muslims accusing her of divided loyalties and on the other side being dubbed a Muslim and clubbed with a generalised and stereotypical image of her community.

Being a health worker, she also has to deal with the mental health of people.  She is fully sensitive to the fact that during communal riots it is the women and children who are not only the most vulnerable but who also suffer the worst traumas. It is to these groups that Madinaben reaches out. She tries to reason with them, to make them see and understand that it is women, especially, with access to home and hearth, who can create spaces of peace within the communities. 

Within her overall efforts, there have been significant cultural breakthroughs, too. As part of her work, Madinaben has attempted to communicate the message of peace and communal harmony through songs and dances in the communities she works with. When, she successfully manages, as part of her efforts, to get Muslim girls to dance the Hindu garbas and Hindu youths to sing quawalis, associated with Muslims, more than the normal Laxman rekhas between communities stand breached. These small but significant acts become, in fact, important bridges between the two communities.

Madinaben, conveys her convictions in a very emphatic voice…” The people who keep the Hindus and Muslims divided are the politicians. They want us to keep hating each other. What is happening in Ahmedabad should never happen anywhere…Each one of us, has the capacity to love and to help each other solve our problems”.

Madinaben’s voice, though somewhat suppressed in present–day, hate–driven Ahmedabad, is not a solitary one. She brings, in her small but unique way, a healing touch of peace and love to a city that is slowly but systematically being more and more fragmented. 

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2001, Anniversary Issue (8th) Year 8  No. 71, Cover Story 5

A thorn in the sanghi flesh

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Because she didn’t think that former RSS chief  Bhausaheb Deoras was a ‘great philosopher’, she was hounded and maligned for 20 long years

 

LUCKNOW

As an independent academic, a thinking person and a woman, I have been the victim of systematic personal and political vendetta from the hard–line Hindutva lobby led by the RSS, in the city of Lucknow and the state of Uttar Pradesh, for decades. This crude targeting of my character culminated into systematic attacks and threats when I was appointed acting vice–chancellor of the Lucknow University in the late nineties. But the battle goes back many decades to a much, much earlier period. They have been threatening me, slurring my character ever since 1979.

In the year 1979–80, there was an orchestrated movement to personally target me. Sexually derogative and malicious falsehoods were systematically circulated. This is a typical illustration of the underhand tactics that they follow whenever they are challenged and threatened by the convictions of an independent and strong person. 
(As told to Comunalism Combat).

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2001, Anniversary Issue (8th)
Year 8  No. 71, Cover Story 6

I was given derogatory names; my parents and brother were sought out and humiliated; my students who found me a dedicated teacher were also instigated to go against me. There used to be three dailies published from Lucknow at the time. For a whole year, that is, for 365 consecutive days, all three published one vilificatory report on my character after another every single day. I felt boycotted and isolated. There can be no better way to break a person.

The motive? One of my colleagues who has now retired wanted to convert the whole philosophy department into a den that endorsed the RSS version of reality! He wanted us to accept Balasaheb Deoras as a great philosopher. I simply could not let that happen. It was a question of my integrity to my discipline, to my subject. It was a question of what I owed to myself, my principles. I did not let that happen.

Frustrated and angry that his designs were being resisted, he took recourse to the mean and underhand path. He instigated falsehoods and spearheaded a whole movement; I became the target.
It was a trial of strength that went on for a full year. It was tough but at the end of it, when the facts came to light, the same colleague, the mastermind of the slur campaign was himself isolated, for many years to come. I was appointed as acting-VC as per the university rules, and my detractors had to swallow my presence in that chair!

Having undergone this gruelling and searing experience, I learnt so much. The whole experience served one purpose. I lost my innocence —previously I believed that every person is essentially good and can be won over! This learning process was very precious because it has given me strength and also made me thick-skinned. To be strong and thick-skinned are both necessary and crucial, especially when we are fighting highly principled battles!

Why was I such a threat to these forces? For two reasons, I think. Firstly, because I was so firm and strong in my views and simply refused to succumb to them. Secondly, because I was a woman. 
Now, it is interesting to see how gender plays out in these situations in a subtle or not so subtle way. My appointment and promotions had been on merit. Many of my male colleagues would have been happy if I were content being a kathputli (puppet) in their hands. 

You must understand this mentality. I had a very good record. At the beginning, I was seen as a harmless person who would not argue though my views were radical even then; they had simply not yet been tested against very rigid points of principle! 

So, initially there was a distinctly patronising attitude behind the campaign: aurat bechari hai, ro ke bhaag jayegi (after all, she is a woman, she will cry and run away!). Court cases were filed, my father was on his deathbed, the atmosphere was terrible. But something in me made me determined to fight them on all counts. I fought the cases and though I had an offer then to shift to Hyderabad, I felt strongly that I should clear my cards here.

Would you believe what happened, then? Suddenly their nomenclature for me changed! This woman is fighting on every front, they started saying. Suddenly from bechari aurat I became a Phoolan Devi! I publicly said that I preferred the new ‘title’. If there are only two choices before me,  bechari aurat or Phoolan Devi, surely a woman is bound to prefer the latter!

You see how within all this, gender also plays a role. They wanted a nice little girl who would do as they wish so that they could run the department as per their wishes. But this I simply would not allow!
Now you ask where it all began, I am not really sure. Discourses that emphasise the Hindu and Muslim stereotype have abhorred me from the very beginning. I cannot remember or recall any episodic cause or event that can be the source of what are today extremely deep convictions. I do not know where and when it started. I only know that I did not grow up in a very ritualistic atmosphere at home. The general atmosphere was liberal. 

I remember as I grew up becoming more and more sceptical about anything repeated ad nauseum, or routinely. Somehow or the other, from a very young age, oft–repeated things put me off because in some way they reflected a tendency to pigeon–hole and stereotype the rich variety of the human experience. 
It is part of this inherent tendency of mine from the very beginning that has made be abhor the Hindu and Muslim stereotype images that lie at the heart of the Hindutva’s way of thinking from the very beginning.
The other memory of my childhood is one that was vividly brought home to be by my parents who described the violence and hatred unleashed during the Partition–related violence. When my parents spoke of those days, the events were recalled with horror and dread; there was no apportioning of blame; no discourse of hatred surrounding the narrative. 

These accounts left an indelible influence on me; for me that kind of situation or anything close to it is Enemy Number One: anything that comes close to anything like that frightens me and must be avoided at any cost. This is my amateurish analysis of my unconscious mind!

Basically, I believe that the human being is already so vulnerable and it is this vulnerability that endows us with the capacity for both love and revenge. I do not know why but anything that accentuates the possible cleavages, the capacity for revenge, frightens me the most. It is this fear that makes me committed to rationality, non–violence a humanistic approach.

I also find it stupid to harbour these divisions because they defy logic. In today’s situation, in today’s India, I believe that it is everyone’s duty to do all that we can to fight and combat the forces of division. Agar kisi ko apne zinda rahne ka saboot dena hai to aise kaam mein lagna hi padega (To be engaged in this endeavour is the only proof that you existence). We must participate in processes that challenge these cleavages and separations.

Now, religion has a unique capacity. The sharp edge of religion has a dual potential, of dividing as well as uniting. In the modern age, it’s divisive potential is sharper. Therefore, I believe it should be confined to the personal sphere. At an individual level, religion or spirituality touches us at a unique and beautiful plane. Without the refuge of traditional religion, I can feel one with the cosmos while watching the sunset or observing close human relationships. This is the strength of religion. Provided that it remains in the realm of the personal. 

I believe that socialised religion and the superstructures within religions place ethical and social constraints on the human mind. It is also this double–edged quality of religion that makes people commit heinous crimes without even feeling sorry about the actions. Hence I sincerely believe that secularism at the state level is both vital and urgent.

I also believe that the threat from forces that wish to stereotype communities and exploit the politics of identity, those who would like to hegemonise minds are as active among Muslims and other minorities as they are among Hindus. Look at what is happening in Kashmir today; it is abominable the kind of diktats on women that are being issued! Our struggles against all the forces of fanaticism and fundamentalism must be firm and strong as these forces are insensitive to human life. We must be unsparing and address all sides, the obscurantists within all communities must be challenged! 
(As told to Comunalism Combat).

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2001, Anniversary Issue (8th) Year 8  No. 71, Cover Story 6
 

‘Love for all of humanity is a gift from my parents’

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A one-man peace brigade, ready to risk his life and limb when others are attacked, for Harkantbhai peace is an end in itself 

 

AHMEDABAD

Harkant  Natwarlal Patel

Born into a middle class Hindu family, Harkant Patel’s deeds are a thorn in the flesh of aggressive communal attitudes that govern Gujarat today. Born and brought up in Dariapur area of Ahmedabad, he has vivid memories of a colourful childhood, celebrating the co-existence of different communities. 

Dariapur, today a sensitive hotspot on Ahmedabad’s map has a substantial presence of both Hindus and Muslims. The vibrant colour of this locality is an intimate and happy part of Harkantbhai’s childhood and youth. What seared his memory forever is the burning alive of eight persons decades ago in act of retaliatory communal violence when he was in his teens.

In recent years, with the sharp growth in communal sentiments on both sides, Dariapur has also witnessed the outbreak of mindless hate-driven, violence. Each time, something inside Harkant compels him to step out, to intervene, to try and save a life. “Manavta ni bhet baap na aashirwaad che” (“Love for all of humanity is a gift from my parents”), he says humbly. 

‘This is all I have,” he adds. “Today, there is lawlessness and anarchy everywhere, topped with corruption and immoral public behaviour. These are the values that middle class society is today aspiring towards. I cannot be part of this. Careers are the choice of many people but I prefer being a servant of society. To serve humanity with all I have keeps me away from other temptations.”

For the past 18 years Harkantbhai has lived in the sensitive area of Dariapur, fondly recognised by many as a social worker. Many unfortunate incidents have taken place here, many innocent people have lost their lives. Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Marathis every community lives and inhabits this area. He makes it a point to attend the festivities of each of the communities.

But it is when the senseless attacks and killings begin that Harkantbhai’s true worth comes to the fore. He receives missives from none less than the city’s commissioner of police, DCPs and ACPs, because they know that here is a man with access to all the social segments, be it Dalits, Muslims, Christians or caste Hindus.

August 24-25, 2001: Violence suddenly breaks out in Dariapur. Senior police officers, including the IG, MK Tandon and commissioner, section I, Shivanand Jha, summon him. There is high tension after Muslim youths are attacked by some Dalits belonging to the Waghari community. They have held A third Muslim youth captive. It is Harkantbhai who arrives on the trouble spot, goes straight to the Dalit quarters, speaks to them and manages to save the life of the youth held captive!

Does he not experience fear, when he attempts direct street action like this, when unreason seemingly guides all other actions? “Fear is like this, you can either get the better of the emotion or let it govern your lives,” he replies. “Manavta be khatir, aa tatva mahatva na che (“For the sake of humanity, some principles are important”).

His actions are so well known that even now in Ghatodia where he had to shift when his own building at Dariapur collapsed in the January earthquake, Muslim women repose total faith in him. “Aamhe amara chokra tamhrae bharose school ma mokaliye che” (“We send our children to your schools because of the faith we have in you”). 

They have felicitated me so many times, they show their appreciation in so many ways. “If I were to stand for an election from Dariapur, fifty per cent among the Muslims would vote for me. This is because of their experience of me year after year,” Harkantbhai proudly adds.

“The Dariapur vistaar is such that we have to live like this”, he believes. But the unusual thing about Harkantbhai’s interventions is that they are not restricted to the neighbourhood where he grew up. Ring up any one in the Shahpur locality when there is any hint of trouble and they say: if Harkantbhai comes, the problem will be solved. A one-man peace brigade, ready to risk his life and limb when others are attacked, for Harkantbhai “peace is an end in itself”. 

Why? Because he cannot bear to see the nirdosh/innocent victims who suffer after the motivated politicians begin the bloodletting. “I have never once in all these years encountered a politician (who instigates the violence) himself get hurt,” he challenges. “The persons hit are completely innocent, drawn in by the anger and rhetoric. This angers me deeply.”

March 13, 1996: The Indian cricket team loses the semi-finals against Sri Lanka. That night at about 10 pm, excited Hindus near the Kalupur Swaminarayan Temple find an old Muslim rickshaw driver, who was transporting a Hindu passenger and for no reason start beating him up. Without a thought for his own safety, Harkantbhai rushes to rescue him. In the process, he too is attacked. The attackers pierce his back with a sharp instrument and though badly bleeding, he manages to save the rickshaw driver’s life. 

His reward came later through a personal letter, penned by the DSP of Zone 4 when he came to know of this incident, commending his courage. If the old gentlemen had died instead of being saved, the city of Ahmedabad would have burnt for several days.

1996: The city is tense after communal riots have broken out. In the commotion near Dariapur Tower as the curfew is lifted, a Muslim passer-by is stopped, beaten and knifed by a Hindu mob on the rampage. The victim is rendered unconscious… the cowardly crowd simply runs away. It is near the Rupali Cinema in Ahmedabad, that this Muslim who had been attacked grievously, lies unconscious on the ground. 

Harkantbhai who happens to be passing by, does what his conscience tells him to do. He stops his car, asks his entire family to come out of the vehicle, puts the injured person in the car and drives him to the VS Hospital, thereby saving him from bleeding to death. 

1993-94: This is the first time that Harkantbhai intervenes. During the Rathyatra in the Dariapur Tamboo Chowki area, there is commotion. A crowd of Hindus try to break open and set fire to a shop belonging to a Muslim. Harkantbhai who is present at the spot physically prevents them from committing arson. The shop is saved, but a big stone thrown by the crowd hits him on his head. He falls unconscious and has to have 20-22 stitches for his head injury. But this will not deter him in future.

When he stops to help an injured man or woman, the colour of the skin or faith are things farthest from his mind. He responds swiftly, instinctively. And that instinct always tells him he must help, and quickly. He must stop the violence. And help save a precious life. 

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2001, Anniversary Issue (8th) Year 8  No. 71, Cover Story 7

From ‘kar seva’ to ‘manav dharm’

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The RSS, VHP, Christian priests, Janata Dal, RJD, SP, Samata Party, Dalit Sena. 
He has been through it all, seen through it all. Bhanwar Megwanshi (26) is still often subjected to indignity for being a Dalit. Today, he finds solace in the ‘manav dharma’ 
a Sufi saint introduced him to and the monthly magazine he runs 
‘to combat communalism and casteism’

BHILWARA

Bhanwar Megwanshi

Twenty–six years old Bhanwar Megwanshi is the editor of a monthly Hindi magazine, Diamond India, published from Bhilwara in Central Rajasthan. A Meghwal, one of the scheduled castes, he was born of humble parents in village Sidiyas near Bhilwara. Though his parents were not literate, they educated Bhanwar and his elder brother in the local village school and sent him to a boys’ hostel run by the social welfare department to complete his 12th standard, after which he did his BA privately. 

He comes from a family that believed in Baba Ram Dev, the medieval saint worshipped by both Hindus and Muslims. The latter call him Rama Pir. He grew up worshipping the pagliya, feet of Baba Ram Dev. And Bhanwar has grown up a long way to this day when he is busy combating communal forces and fighting caste oppression in his home district. But it has been an arduous and amazing journey for him, a battle 13–years–long, beginning since he was only a boy of 13. A chequered way to dignity and fulfilment through a fight for justice in society.

As early as standard 6th, the reality of being born an “untouchable” was driven home to him. Bhanwar had gone to meet one of his school friends — a Jat by caste. Till then his friend’s mother had never objected to his sitting anywhere in their house. But that day she asked him to sit on the floor and not the bed on which he was sitting, as the family had guests who knew that he belonged to one of the ‘lowliest castes’. The family tried apologising to him, but Bhanwar was broken. It hit him for the first time that he was a low caste and an “untouchable”, and had a fate radically different from his “upper” caste friends. 

The Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh came to the village with its shakha in 1988 when Bhanwar was in the 8th standard. Bhanwar went to the secondary school in the neighbouring village. His Geography teacher in that school started the shakha with help from the peon. As the RSS shakha provided the only opportunity for games and physical exercises, Bhanwar joined it along with several other boys. In the shakha, he was introduced to Panchjanya (the central organ of the RSS) and Patheya Kan (the Rajasthan RSS mouth piece). 

In the first year itself, he was promoted to the mukhya shikshak of the shakha. When only 15, in the year 1990, he was selected for the Officers’ Training Camp by the RSS. He completed the first camp of 20 days. In the same year, he was promoted as the RSS Zila Karyalaya Pramukh or office in-charge of Bhilwara district, quite a prestigious post. 

He wanted to rise further in the organisation and become a pracharak.  He told the seniors of his ambition. He was told that he could not become a pracharak, “…Kyunki tum ek vicharak ho, tum apne dhang se hamare vichar rakhoge na ki hamare hisab se…” He was further told that since he belonged to a lower caste he would not be acceptable. 

His having a mind of his own and his lower caste status disqualified him for the post of a RSS pracharak. Nevertheless he was selected to become a worker in the Vishwa Hindu Parishad office which had only then started in the heart of the Muslim area of Bhilwara as compensation. 

Thus he became a vistarak, a post as important as that of a pracharak – vistarak of the ideology by moving to an allied organisation like the VHP. As a vistarak, he could also have moved to other allied organisations like the Bhartiya Mazdoor Sangh, Sanskar Bharti, the Bhartiya Janata Party or the Akhil Bhartiya Vidyarthi Parishad. 

In December 1990, Bhanwar was selected for the first “kar sewa” at Ayodhya. The 400-strong contingent from Rajasthan was stopped at Tundla near Agra where they were arrested. They stayed in a temporary jail in Agra for ten days. On his return to Bhilwara he went back to his village as the VHP and the RSS were taking out the asthi kalash yatra of the so-called kar sewak martyrs who had lost their lives by the Saryu in Ayodhya. This event was the turning point of his life. 

The asthi kalash carried by the VHP sadhu-sants and leaders was given a glorious welcome by the villagers under Bhanwar’s leadership. He got his family to prepare the meal for the yatris, consisting of kheer and puris. When they were asked to eat the food, a senior RSS leader took Bhanwar aside and told him that they did not have problems eating in his house but the sadhus would. So they suggested that the food be packed to be eaten in the next village. The food prepared for twenty-five people was packed and given. The next day Bhanwar discovered that the food his mother had prepared with such pain had been thrown by the yatris on the roadside. They had instead eaten in the house of one Brahmin. 

This was a shocking, second encounter with untouchability. Bhanwar felt angry and cheated. He took the decision to leave the RSS. He decided that he would not work with those who would not eat or sit with him. It was a painful moment of introspection for him. His every day experiences of being an untouchable hit him with a force. He realised that his RSS and VHP colleagues had never let him get into the Charbhuja temple close by. Being “untouchables” he and his folks were made to take water from a separate hand pump. As a Dalit he could not ride a cycle past the Thakur’s Rawala, or the village manor. The rule for the Dalit was that he had to get off the cycle. His anger against Hindu dharma made him want to leave it. 

Finally one day, he left his village and went to a nearby town in the district to a Roman Catholic Priest and told him that he wanted too become a Christian. His past brushes with Christians made him believe that theirs was a religion that practised equality. He felt that he would find his answers there. 

He was honest with the Roman Catholic priest. He told him that his desire to join Christianity was not out of any love for the religion but an act of vengeance against Hinduism that had treated him with indignity. The priest advised him not to be hasty, asked him to go back to his village and read the Bible. Only after he felt convinced, would he be baptised. 

Bhanwar tried to explain to the priest that his fight was against caste and untouchability. It was in that context that he wanted to convert. The priest did not respond to this. Bhanwar took the Bible away and went to the priests of other Christian denominations. He felt that none of them could understand his anger against Hinduism and the indignity he had gone through. And none of them were willing to fight against caste. They all talked of things spiritual: that “Christ is the Saviour “ and that he should “surrender to Christ”. 

One of the priests even sent word to his family that their son was going astray and planning conversion and that they should stop him. Bhanwar’s father told him firmly that they would be ex-communicated from the caste if he took a wrong step. He felt a betrayal by the Christian Church. When the Babri Masjid was demolished in 1992 and many of his erstwhile companions had gone to do ‘kar sewa’, Bhanwar was trying to seek his answers in Christianity. 

His struggle to attain a new identity and do away with his original lower caste Hindu identity, which he hated, made him so lonely and engrossed with himself that he was even indifferent (he can not believe it now) to the demolition of Babri Masjid and its bloody aftermath.

His desire to fight caste and the RSS was so great that he felt that he would get a platform for this by joining party politics. In 1993, at age 18, he joined the Janata Dal. He was promptly made the Bhilwara district president of the Chattra Janata Dal. In no time he got disillusioned, as the party had no programme. He came in contact with Ram Vilas Paswan and was made the district Dalit Sena president. He found the Dalit Sena full of sloganeering and no programme dealing with the Dalit reality on the ground. He was also disillusioned by the local Dalit Sena leaders who talked of scientific temper but spent a great deal of time with astrologers. 

When Ram Vilas Paswan was railway minister in 1996, Bhanwar was dutifully paid for his services and made an advisor on the Divisional Railway Users Consumer Committee of Western Railways (Ratlam Division). At the young age of 21, Bhanwar was in a powerful position. But corruption in high places put him off. He found that many of Paswan’s close supporters were keen that he become a broker for the minister. Not willing to the do this dirty work, he resigned from the committee in early 1998. 

He once again felt cheated and realised that the famous words of Ram Vilas Paswan: “Mein us ghar mein diya jalane chala hoon jis ghar mein sadiyon se andhera hai” were only propaganda. Paswan was just like any other Raja, a Dalit Raja. He maintained a separate court for the ordinary workers, like the Diwan-e- Aam of the Rajas, and a Diwan-e-Khaas for the office bearers. Bhanwar called him not Ram Vilas, but Bhog Vilas. He left the Dalit Sena. 

Still keen on getting answers some where on party political platforms, Bhanwar joined the newly floated Rashtriya Janata Dal. Although the district president of the RJD, he felt that at the state and district level it was a Yadav party, of the Yadavs, by the Yadavs for the Yadavs, the rest of them were just showpieces. He moved on from RJD and took membership of the Samata Party in 1999. When the Rajasthan Samata party merged with the Samajwadi Party, he decided to leave party politics altogether. 
He realised that none of the political parties were serious as far as the Dalit question was concerned. He had had truck with all the socialist groups. Why did he keep away from the BSP? He recalls that he met Kanshi Ram of the Bahujan Samaj Party in 1999. He did not like Kanshi Ram calling all Dalits chamaars. Bhanwar felt that chamaar was pejorative in Rajasthan. He felt that the BSP was also not addressing the core issues of indignity and untouchability. It was moving with the compulsions of electoral politics. 

Disillusioned with life, Bhanwar returned to his village and joined as a teacher of the newly started Rajeev Gandhi Pathshalas. He wanted to have no truck with any ideology. He felt that neither religion nor party politics could bring about essential change. So disenchanted was he by the world that he chose not to even read newspapers or hear the radio. 

In August 2000, he met a Sufi saint called Selani Sarkar in Ahmedabad. Bhanwar felt comfortable with him and his followers, as they did not believe in divisions of caste or religion. Bhanwar found that people of all castes and religions seemed to have the same place in the Sufi saint’s order. He experienced a sense of freedom, of being just a human being, free of caste, religion and other identities. Something that he had not experienced till then at all. 

He found that people of different religions had even adopted each other’s practices. It was here that he realised what Manav Dharma was. The Sufi saint inspired him to begin writing and start a magazine. Bhanwar involved his teachers of the area to start a publication of their own under the company nomenclature of Diamond Newspapers Private Limited. 

In the last year he has made this magazine, Diamond India, a platform for voices of the oppressed and for communal harmony. He feels that his resolve to practice and live Manav Dharma is actualising through this endeavour. The first issue of the magazine talked of Hindu–Muslim rishtedari. These youngsters took the bold stand of Hindu–Muslim inter-marriages in a scenario where such marriages cause communal tension. 

Through their magazine they said that if a Hindu has no Muslim or Christian friend and vice versa, he/she has lived an incomplete life. They talked of how friendship between people of different religions must not stop at the tea stalls, but should move to the homestead. 

In the last seven months, Bhilwara district has seen many instances of breaking/ damaging of mosques and mazaars, including the latest ones in Asind and Jahazpur. In this backdrop, Bhanwar’s magazine has fearlessly taken a stand against the sangh parivar and allied communal forces. The Diamond India team is combating communalism and caste through the printed word. 

Even though Bhanwar has been able to take life in his stride and tried living Manav Dharma, he is still often subjected to indignity for being a Dalit. He is saddened by it but feels that through his work he can make the minorities and Dalits see their strength in their togetherness. 

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2001, Anniversary Issue (8th) Year 8  No. 71, Cover Story 8

 

‘As an Israeli I can do what a Palestinian will be shot for doing’

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ISRAEL

Our group was set up five years ago, when BN Netanyahu was Prime Minister. The whole issue of the Israelis demolishing Palestinian homes was what speared us into existence. Since 1967, in the Occupied Territories — that is Arab Jerusalem, Gaza and the West Bank — seven thousand homes have been demolished. 

After 1993, when the Oslo accord was signed and the peace process began the number of demolitions started going down. However, since 1996, when Netanyahu was PM and under him the hard-liners against democracy got more concrete presence in the government and administration, the demolitions were begun again.

For the Israeli State the key issue that symbolised the rejection of peace at the time was the resumption of home demolitions. That is how house demolitions became a focal and symbolic point of the peace process. 

We are representatives of 15 different Israeli peace and human rights groups. All of us felt five years ago when we set ourselves up that we had not been active enough. What was needed was not a new organisation but a Direct Action Coalition that worked on the ground to actively resist the occupation of these territories by Israel. 

We started with the resistance to house demolitions. We have been arrested many times. Being arrested is nothing for an Israeli. You are privileged to be arrested if you are part of the Israeli few who ever do that. An Israeli who gets arrested is privileged. As an Israeli, I do not pay any price for it; I can do what a Palestinian will be shot for doing. 

If I sit in protest, in front of a bulldozer, if I am seen as a protestor, I will be perceived as a mad old guy. The security forces will simply drag me away. I am not a challenge to the system. The consistent acts of joint Israeli and Palestinian resistance, for example, to the bulldozers that mow down people’s homes is a direct challenge to Israeli authority. 

From the Israeli government’s point of view, Palestinian protestors and resistance to the Israeli occupation simply get eliminated. Palestinians protesting simply get shot. It is not funny or strange, it is serious. We felt we had to break this and introduce a whole new and different dynamic at the ground in the Occupied Territories. We felt we had to use our privilege as Israeli Jews — the fact that we, being Israeli and Jews, will simply not get shot — to do acts of resistance that Palestinians cannot do. 

However, in all our actions we have been together with Palestinian organisations, especially the Palestinian Society for the Protection of Human Rights the Environment and Law. This is because we feel that what Israel and Israelis claim as our territory, is the same land the Palestinians call theirs. We must respect them, we are guests here, we must work through them. We need to work as partners in the resistance; Israelis have to be the junior partners. This is important; we are serious about changing the power equations. 

I say this because this realisation has not yet seeped in to the attitudes of the Israeli Left. They still behave like conquerors. We need to teach ourselves how not to behave like occupiers. For example, lets take the house demolitions and the peace movement. Without active Palestinian participation in the resistance to demolish homes, we are replicating the occupation even if we are the good guys. What we need to do is to work with Palestinians because that is what gives our work depth, understanding and, finally, credibility.

Working on a single point, a politically powerful symbol like home demolitions gives our movement greater responsibility because we are compelled to move beyond the discourse of mere protest and concretely offer something. Typically, within the peace movements, protest remains a protest, it does not proceed to become anything beyond that. 

On the question of home demolitions when we resist, there are real expectations. Many questions arise. Where has my home gone? Are we going to resist the unjust demolition? How will we get the building permit? How will we rebuild? Who will pay for the lawyer? Will we succeed in making it an international issue? 

So, put simply, we, together with the Palestinians, chose such an issue, an issue that compels us to be more effective. And that is how we became a force that resists a forum that resists actual acts of terror carried out by the Israeli authorities. 

In the five years of our existence, we have succeeded in making home demolitions an international issue. These demolitions have been going on for 30 years without being challenged. But after our resistance at the ground level and our working closely with foreign missions and international journalists, today Israel cannot demolish a house on the West Banks or in Gaza without paying a political price for it. There is always a world outcry.

Two things happened because of the approach we followed. One, we got to know the Palestinians deeply, more than any Israeli peace groups ever before. Two, we were compelled to learn the lay of the land. Most Israeli peace groups and Israelis in general have no conception of the Occupied Territories. 
There is a rather sad joke in Israel that explains what I mean: “The West Bank and Gaza are father away then even Thailand”. The West Bank and Gaza for all Israelis and many Jews are just blank spaces in the mind. Where the West Bank and Gaza are located is not exactly known, the places exist as some sort of abstractions.

The news that five people are shot by the Israeli army in Romala is the same for Israelis as hearing that five people died in a flood in Bihar! The West Bank and Gaza are just not real places with real people living there for Israel. 

Now, when we go to Gaza or West Bank to resist home demolitions, what is it we are doing? The resistance to the demolitions is asking serious questions. Why are we demolishing the homes in the first place? What is the logic of the Israeli government policy that persists in destroying homes in this fashion?  What are the political goals behind systematically pursuing this policy? Finally, what does occupation mean?

Our real aim is to get the reality of the occupation out to the wider public. You know, in the same area hundreds and thousands of acres of land are earmarked by the Israeli government for highways; only recently a three billion dollars project was announced. At the same time this is going on, the ‘closure’ of workshops and industries in the West Bank and Gaza has rendered thousands of workers jobless. The government has no problem giving viability settlements to the workers who loose jobs there. But the mental and physical barriers erected against Palestinians, by the government, by the army, visible in the barricades and check posts in the Occupied Territories symbolise a callous duplicity. 

In these circumstances, the issue of resistance to the Israeli bulldozers becomes a real one. The rebuilding of a home is an actual act of resistance. When Jeff with his photographs and slide show and Salim, whose home has been destroyed three times — the last time on April 4, 2001— travel all over the USA, Canada, and Europe, speaking about the occupation, the attitudes that deny the awful reality of home demolitions and our resistance, changes and a whole campaign develops around it.
When we work with the Palestinians Land Defence Committee, when we rebuild homes involving hundreds of Israelis in the task — who have entered the West Bank for the first time in their lives — we are seriously impacting attitudes and causing deep shifts to occur. These people (Israelis) have never come here before. They will be seen for the first time what life for the Palestinians in Occupied Territories is like. 

Do you know it is illegal to rebuild homes that have been demolished on all days of the week? We are allowed only Fridays and Saturdays, a two-day window because of Sabbath. We work only on these two days. We have to come back again next week for two more days to carry on the work.
We feel by engaging in this kind of resistance we are intervening in a concrete human way. But when the demolitions happen, as they are happening again and again – with a renewed viciousness — you feel apart of you is being torn out all over again.

There are three levels at which our committee works. The first is resistance and solidarity with the Palestinians on the ground. Second, we work with the participating Palestinian families on other aspects and issues raised by the occupation. 

The third level, which is very critical, is at the level of international lobbying. We do not believe peace is going to happen from inside Israel. The Israeli public doesn’t care, it is very defiant, it blames the Palestinians unthinkingly. Therefore our international work is very important.

Though our actual committee has eight core group members, we are actively backed by over one thousand Israelis. Besides, we are passively supported by more than half of the Israeli population; not because they believe in peace but because they would simply like to rid themselves of the headache and get back to living ‘normally’.

At the moment we have a terrible government in which the Left and the Right govern together. 
The story of the Israeli occupation is a sorry lesson for all humanity. You asked a question about Israel’s behaviour despite the persecution suffered by it’s own people. Despite the persecution suffered by the Jews, look at what they are capable of dishing out? 

When one people gets power over another, power corrupts. Power makes you lose your humanity; you can now do whatever you want to do. Any ethnic group of people who are not in power have to be sensitive to power dynamics. You are compelled to read the map, to survive you have to be sensitive. Once you are in power there are no compulsions.

When you get into power like the Jews did — for the first time in hundreds of years — they acted just like any other set of people who get power. 

“Jews are like anybody else, only more so,” said Mark Twain.  Jews are one of the epitomes of a great race, a persecuted race. Once they got into power they conformed to the existing norms of power dynamics. It’s less to do with Jews, its about how all people tend to behave when they acquire power. The question we should be asking is not, “What’s wrong with the Jews, or whoever else”, but, “how can we create conditions of existence, where one set of people are not in power — or do not hold the reigns of control — over any other”. It is like caste oppression in your country!

Coming to the issue of raising of the issue at the WCAR, there is a tension here. On the one hand, we would have liked the conference and the world to deal with — exclusively — the Israeli-Palestinians issue and condemn the Israeli occupation as a form of discrimination and apartheid. The WCAR definitely offered us a potential forum to make this articulation.

But as long as the conflict is in tribal terms — Jews vs. the Arabs – people are forced to take sides. You must realise what Israel does in a cynical, systematic way. It plays on the Holocaust, it plays on the suffering of the Jews, it plays on the guilt of Europe. It does all this to diffuse criticism of its own conduct in the Occupation. 

The way around this is for us, international civil society groups, to adopt a direct human rights language. This is what the WCAR should do, to uphold the ‘discrimination against none’ principle articulated in so many international declarations.

As international civil society groups we need to remind the world that Israel has signed almost all international covenants against discrimination and apartheid. If the rules of the WCAR and international community apply to everyone then it is on the grounds of non-discrimination and anti-apartheid that the illegal occupation of West Bank and Gaza must be opposed. If Israel wants to be a part of the international community it must accept international standards. 

It is ironic that even after 30 years, the reference to ‘occupation’ does not evoke unequivocal international civil society outrage. This is because the Occupation has not been seen and perceived by the international community as a blatant violation of human rights. This has got to do with the power play within the human rights discourse.

If at the end of the WCAR the official document does not condemn the Israeli occupation of Palestinians what is the point of it all? Our frustration is with the European Union countries as much as the US who are resisting articulation of this. The Western media, too, for all its claim to freedom and democracy continues to use the Israeli government as its main source of information. It is also simply not independent or critical enough. 

It is important for the world media to articulate honestly the gross rights violations against Palestinians living under illegal Israeli occupation. It is only then that a balanced world opinion on the issue of strife in the Middle East can be created.

This is why we Israeli and Palestinians groups decided to make our representation on the issue of occupation together at the WCAR and the prepcoms that preceded the conference at Durban. We are trying to break the idea that there are two sides that means an either or situation. We need to show that our interest and concerns are not mutually exclusive, that we both equally desire peace, a just peace. 

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2001, Anniversary Issue (8th) Year 8  No. 71, Cover Story 9

‘To the people of world’

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On August 8, 2001, while RAWA was distributing food among refugees in New Akora Khattak camp, Mohammad Akram, the representative of Afghan refugees in the camp asked RAWA to film his remarks and send them to the people of world. He made this request to RAWA because nobody listens to their horrible stories, takes care of the ill-fated refugees who are struggling with hunger, illness, lack of shelter etc, and who will share his story with the world. Here is a translation of parts of his emotional remarks. The original is in Pushto, recorded on videotape.

My name is Mohammad Akram and I live in New Akora Camp. About 6,500 families live in this camp and among them 3,500 families have been registered by the WFP (World Food Program). As part of the previous project of WFP, supplies were being given to a number of families while a great number of families were left without any care. It was the responsibility of WFP to provide continuous supplies of food to all of these families, but they act in the opposite way, that is they provide some families with supplies for a short time and then supplies are stopped, leaving the responsibility in the hands of the government of Pakistan. As a result Pakistan has to force the refugees out because it is not in a position to feed them.

There is a propaganda in Afghanistan that the WFP provides refugees with food supplies, but this help is very limited, for example a tin of vegetable oil and a sack of flour to a family, and even this aid comes only once.

Our situation has become worse in the past two and a half months since the WFP has stopped giving us supplies. The UN has committed heinous actions under the name of human rights. They are liars and have abstained from telling us the truth. We are warning them that soon very bad disasters are going to occur in this camp. Houses will be burnt, people will burn themselves and will show to the world that while in many other countries millions of dollars are spent on research and welfare of animals, no one cares about the humans living here in this camp.

In Russia, it is an important matter that pigs are near extinction, and in other countries, monkeys are being taken care of, while these people living in such a terrible situation and there is no one to even think about their future. We were in the UNHCR office and they also ignored us, directly telling us that they can’t do anything for us.

There are people who have received supplies for about a year or six months and then the supplies have been stopped. The situation of this camp is getting worse day by day. We have four schools here in this camp. One of them for girls and three for boys. We are closing the schools now because the students studying in this school have to sell sugar cane, or water, or do anything to earn some food and this is how they are also deprived of their basic right of education.

The people who have come here to this camp from Afghanistan, have not left their country because of lack of food or poverty. They were made to leave their homeland because of heavy fighting and severe dangers to their lives. We say clearly that we are not in a position to go back to Afghanistan, because we feel it is very dangerous for us. We heard that the UN took the responsibility of the security of some families who were to return to Afghanistan, and we all saw what happened to them. We don’t accept anyone’s offer to take the responsibility for our security, we are going to stay right here, we are not returning to Afghanistan.

Now our hope is that our voice reaches to the people of the world. Especially to those Afghans who are living in the West. We want them to save some money even from their toiletry expenses, very small amounts, one dollar perhaps, and send it to us. This way not only this camp, but also many other camps will receive help from this amount. They are living in very good conditions. At the same time thousands of orphans, widows, handicapped and poor Afghan refugees are having a very hard life in this camp and others like it in Pakistan, and people are witnessing this.

Our message to our countrymen is that their help at the smallest scale can really make a difference. Also we want you to raise our voice to the people of the world so that they know the real situation of Afghans.

It is worth mentioning that there are a number of NGOs in Pakistan that are running their personal business on these camps. They come here, make videos, photographs and interviews and run surveys but never return with any help and if they do receive any funds, they would never give it to the needy people.

At the same time there are some NGOs that are really working for the benefit and welfare of refugees. We request them not to let the corrupt NGOs work against the people and for their own personal benefit. We also blame the BBC Radio for not broadcasting our interviews. The people of the world will not come to know about our situation unless our voice is raised through such interviews but the BBC radio did not fulfil it’s promise of broadcasting our interviews.

We thank you for your concern and help and would like you to tell more journalists about the situation in this camp so that they can come to us and see and cover the situation personally. This way we hope the world will come to know about the real situation of refugees in Pakistan.

(RAWA is a political/social organization of Afghan women struggling for peace, freedom, democracy and women’s rights in fundamentalism-blighted Afghanistan.)

Archived from Communalism Combat, September 2001, Anniversary Issue (8th) Year 8  No. 71

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