Conspiracy behind the Ram Janmabhoomi Movement

A lot of newsprint and airtime has been wasted on the voluminous report presented by Justice (Retd.) MS Liberhan. Frankly, the report was too big and uninteresting for me to go in full. Hence, I will be restricting myself mostly to the angle of conspiracy, seemingly established by the Report.

Conclusions of Liberhan’s research as enunciated in Chapter 14 of the voluminous report can be summarized in the following points:

- Demolition of the Babri Masjid was not an unintended spontaneous event except for ‘self serving hyperbole’

- Logistically, given the total preparedness of the Kar Sevaks, there was a well planned conspiracy to destroy the Masjid

- Financial support came from Sangh Parivar funds including Bank Accounts operated by various named persons

- The then Chief Minister Kalyan Singh and his hand picked bureaucrats were involved in the conspiracy to destroy the Masjid and allowed a ‘parallel government’ and ‘cartel’ to facilitate the campaign which infiltrated the Government

- The State of UP had become a willing ally and co-conspirator in the joint common enterprise…(of)…demolishing the structure

- The conspiracy arose from the single minded efforts of the RSS and VHP ideologues and theologians to manipulate ordinary people into a frenzied mob

- The campaign had nothing to do with a popular mandate from the people who were manipulated to support it

- The police fell in line with the conspiracy

- The Union Government was crippled by the failure of intelligence and the ‘all-is-well reports by its rapporteur Tej Shankar

- Not a single video camera was put in place

- The media and journalists were subjected to systematic harassment

- Leaders like Vajpayee, Advani, Joshi and Govindacharya knew of the designs of the Sangh Parivar and lent their support in various ways.

- Muslim leaders ‘wittingly or unwittingly; did not counter the plans of the RSS and VHP, effectively to make the latter’s task easier

- 68 persons are found ‘culpable’, including Advani, Vajpayee and Joshi, but not Narasimha Rao

While there may be a lot of hair splitting on the inefficacy and uselessness of the report, a few points are beyond contention, i.e., the Sangh Parivar nurtured and promoted the movement for the liberation of the disputed shrine, that for the common man, construction of the magnificent temple was possible only after removal of the existing disputed structure and LK Advani, being the foremost leader of the Ayodhya movement, bears the primary responsibility for the demolition of the disputed structure.

However, these conclusions by themselves are not sufficient to accept that there was a deep rooted conspiracy to demolish the mosque the same day. While the usual suspects may point to the systematic demolition of the structure on that fateful day, we must not mistake trees for the woods and recognize the fact that the of the estimated five lakh people assembled at Ayodhya, at least a few thousands participated in the demolition. The Kar Sevaks were not a bunch of lumpen and unemployed youth alone but comprised a mix of professionals, salaried class, traders, women and even children. For any observer of mob mentality, it is common knowledge that mobs create their own leaders and are capable of achieving quite a lot in a short span of time, particularly if that task does not involve any constructive activity. Refer to the brick by brick demolition of the house of one of the Srinagar sex scandal accused, wherein a mob, after completing their Friday namaaz, simply went over and destroyed everything in less than an hour. Or, more recently, when the city of Kolkata came to a halt following a spontaneous rally of more than a lakh individuals, protesting state atrocities at Nandigram. When even organized political parties find it difficult to rustle up crowds of more than 10,000 strong these days, one would think that the possibility of one hundred thousand people assembling at a short notice can only be a result of a long drawn sustained campaign. But then, masses never fail to amaze. And when we talk of Ayodhya, we are talking of not a disparate mob, assembled together for divergent purposes. We are talking of a group, all individuals of which had a single agenda, i.e., the removal of the structure and construction of a temple at that site. After all, isn’t it plain common sense that if people were leaving their homes and families behind, unsure if they would ever come back and proceed to Ayodhya to work for the construction of a temple, they would have decided to first remove whatever was there standing on ground? Demolition of the structure was only a logical culmination of the urges driving those pilgrims on a destructive / constructive mission.

I dare say that the political leadership of the Sangh Parivar was never interested in constructing the temple and never wanted the destruction to happen at all. This contention is well based on a few observations of the reaction of the top leadership post demolition. The reported first comments of Rajju Bhaiyya, the then Sarsanghchalak of the RSS, when he heard of the demolition were “Ab to Sarkar Gayi”. Journalists who were present at the site on that fateful day have unanimously reported that LK Advani was visibly distraught at the spectacle and that a lot of leaders from the RSS and VHP appealed to the masses to desist from demolishing the disputed structure. While the conspiracy theorists may paint an Oscar worthy acting talent in Mr Advani, such suppositions are too fanciful to merit serious attention. Then, we must not ignore the fact that the assembled Kar Sevaks first went about in the demolition task, totally unconcerned about the idol of Ramlalla which was still inside the structure. Only a non directed mob would have had capacity of committing such a sacrilegious act. It was only moments before the final crumbling of the structure that the idol and its belongings were brought out safe in a steel trunk. A systematic conspiratorial effort certainly would have ensured removal of the deity before the first brick was touched.

Lest it be forgotten in the cacophony of allegations, spare a thought to the belief that Kar Seva had become a mere ritual for the BJP. The first instance, i.e., November 2, 1990 saw scores die in police firing while the one in June 1992 was a simple bhajan affair. While the BJP leadership might have seen the structure as a Golden egg laying goose, the average Hindu on street and in kitchens, was fast losing patience with the leaders of the movement.. December 6 was the day when the leadership of the movement passed on from its leaders to the led and the pilgrims achieved, albeit partially, what they had set out to achieve.

Had the BJP really been interested in constructing the temple, it could have easily erected the small scale version of the grand temple the offer for which had been made by the erstwhile King of Ayodhya (A small but functional model of the temple had been prepared and was capable of getting fabricated at a short time). The armed forces cleared the site of Kar Sevaks only about noon on December 7, 1992; ample time for the fabrication work to have happened. Probably the five century long struggle for resurrection of a Grand Temple devoted to Lord Ram was not destined to close in 1992. But maybe, some day, this centuries-long desire will indeed be fulfilled.

Regarding the report, it is a shameful travesty of all norms of investigation. What Mr Liberhan has produced after 17 years of ‘investigation’ could have been produced the next day. The entire report is full of assumptions, homilies and prescriptions and reads like an editorial of a pompous journalist. However, in spite of missing out the name of Rajiv Gandhi and Karan Singh among the list of 68, he has refreshed public memory that the Temple Movement was a epoch which cut across the political spectrum. By reminding people that it was Dau Dayal Khanna, who first raised the demand for restoration of the site to the Hindus, that Gulzari Lal Nanda was part of the troika which formulated the strategy of fermenting the temple movement, that Karan Singh’s well attended ‘Viraat Hindu Sammelans’ prepared the ground for receptivity to this movement, that Deoraha Baba was among the prime instigators of public opinion, we re-realise that the sentiments to liberate the shrine were not limited to Hindus of the saffron variety alone but ran across people of all political hues. It was the unfortunate hijacking of the movement by the expedient BJP which ruined it, leaving us with only a makeshift temple instead of a concrete structure to worship in. The Hindutva minded groups should perennially be grateful to Rajiv Gandhi for having allowed darshan at the site, something which a BJP led Government would never have done. By bringing to light the galaxy of leaders behind the movement, Liberhan nails one of his own lies, that the movement did not enjoy popular support. Such supposition is laughable and would make one believe that the ‘investigator’ was deep in a Rip Van Winkle sleep when the large parts of the country pulsated with emotions and cries of ‘Mandir Wahin Banayenge’ reverberated across the Nation. While it is true that people’s emotions were exploited, tell me, which mass movement is rational and devoid of emotions? Even with regards to our century long freedom movement, it was more of the imagery of Bharat Mata in chains and the tales of sacrifices of leaders of that era which fired public imagination. Can any sane person really claim that it was Dadabhai Naoroji’s ‘The Economic Drain and Un-British Rule in India’ fired the mass imagination more than Bankim Chandra’s ‘Vande Ma Taram’? To imagine that any movement can be sustained on basis of logic alone is idealistic. Any movement requires leaders and these leaders have to play on emotions of the people. Ayodhya movement was nowhere different from mass movements across the world.

One aspect which I would certainly agree with is that Babri Masjid symbolized Indian Secularism. In fact, I would go a step ahead and say that, that structure symbolized everything which is wrong with the way India practices secularism. Here we had a structure built on a shrine, which till some time back, was universally acknowledged as the site of a temple dedicated to Lord Ram. This was the site for which a mass movement was carried on, with a demand that the mosque be ‘shifted’ elsewhere. Note that there was no demand of demolition, it was only shifting. Huge piles of evidence in support of the existence of temple were produced by the parties demanding construction of the temple. On the other hand, we had a group which insisted on continuation of the mosque there, oblivious to the sentiments of the agitating Hindus. Rather than the debate being focused on the existence of the temple, all sorts of elements ganged together to question the historicity of Lord Ram himself, as if this was the question at any point of time! Finally, these people wanted the Government to massacre the Kar Sevaks, so that the disputed structure, which for all practical purposes, was a temple, could be saved! We heard many from this group sermonizing the Hindus that a hospital should come up, a urinal should come up, or any damned structure could come up, only it should not be a temple. I do not recollect any of them ever appealing to the Muslims to voluntarily hand over the site to the Hindus in interest of peace and harmony!

Anyone can imagine what consequences such an act would have caused. Not only would have the mosque been saved, it would have destroyed public support for all other liberation movements. Public support cannot be rallied again and again and the tolerant Hindu would never have accorded support to another movement which would have created disharmony in the society. Further, which sites would they have targeted? With Kashi and Mathura, while the evidence of Muslim desecration and destruction are too vivid to be ignored even by the ‘secular’ historians, those shrines have fully functional temples. The business minded Hindu would never have rallied to ‘liberate’ these shrines fully. With regards to smaller shrines like the Saraswati Mandir at Dhar or the Datta Peeth at Baba Budangiri Hills, the former was anyways sorted out by courts and the latter is a dispute which rose primarily on account of unilateral action of Waqf Board. Moreover, it is not a Mosque, only a dargah for the believer, worshipping which itself is kufr for the puritan. Anyways, had the Muslims had shown their ‘generosity’ in Ayodhya, I doubt if anyone would have managed public support for more ‘liberations’ elsewhere. However, since the mosque was a symbol of Indian Secularism, such thoughts themselves were heresy. And so we are at a juncture where we have been left with an unfinished structure an unfinished agenda and a cynical mass which has lost hope of seeing the Grand Temple coming up in their lifetimes.

Welcome Ms Sushma Swaraj

Finally, the supposed generational shift in the BJP has happened with the ascent of Ms Sushma Swaraj as the Leader of the Opposition and Mr Nitin Gadkari as the President of the Bharatiya Janata Party. What is quite interesting that all those critics, who had been crying themselves hoarse over Mr Gadkari’s elevation as the Party President on account of RSS's intervention are pretty much silent about the rise of Ms Swaraj. Probably they would rather believe that the RSS has had no hand to play in this elevation or that Ms Swaraj reached where she has reached inspite of RSS’s opposition to her. Let us have a look, both at the noise and the silence.

First, Mr Gadkari’s elevation. The critics, who have never voted for the BJP and would like nothing better than seeing the party buried for eternity, seem to have wanted someone from ‘Dilli 4’ to become the BJP President. But were any of them really good choices? Mr Venkiah Naidu’s stint is remembered for little else but his tendency for alliteration. He proved such a failure that he had to step down, ostensibly on account of his wife’s illness! And what about the support base he possesses? He has lost practically all  popular elections he ever fought. Coastal Andhra, the region to which he belongs is nowhere close to being a BJP stronghold. Then, why him? Regarding Mr Ananth Kumar, he is supposed to be a good administrator and does have a mass base, but more importantly, he has always been a factional leader in Karnataka. Is he the panacea that a faction ridden BJP needs now? Certainly not! Regarding the darling of the Delhi media, the talented Mr Jaitley, well, life is long and he will have his chances. But how could the BJP elevate a person who is prone to off-the-records briefings to belittle his colleagues? That leaves Ms Sushma Swaraj. 

While eminently qualified to be the President of BJP, she has received a bigger reward. Historically, the BJP’s Leader of the Opposition is the Prime Minister candidate. Till 1984, the leader of the BJP Parliamentary party used to be Mr Atal Behari Vajpayee and till 1984 elections, it was he, who would be projected as the BJP Prime Ministerial candidate. Surprising, yes…but then the slogan, 'Ab ki bari, Atal Behari', was not coined in 1996 or 1998 but is as old as…probably Vajpayee himself. In 1991, LK Advani was the leader of the BJP Parliamentary party and by virtue of him riding the Ram wave, it was assumed that he would become the Prime Minister in case the BJP came to power. Post elections, he rose to occupy the chair of Leader of the Opposition and was seen as BJP’s shadow Prime Minister till 1995, when he graciously declared Mr Vajpayee to be the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate. At this time, Mr Advani resigned from the post of the Leader of the Opposition and Mr Vajpayee adorned that seat. Likewise, post the 1996 13 day Government, Mr Vajpayee continued to be the Prime Ministerial candidate and became the Leader of the Opposition. 2004 onwards, when Mr Vajpayee retired from active politics, Mr Advani became the Leader of the Opposition and de facto and later de jure Prime Ministerial candidate of the BJP. Hence, we can safely assume that as things stand, Ms Swaraj is the Prime Ministerial candidate of the BJP. This, is certainly something which is higher than being the BJP's President!

At the same time Mr Gadkari, certainly cannot  be said to be the best choice for the post. After all, he was also seen as a factional leader in Maharashtra and has not exactly worked wonders for the BJP in that state.  The fiasco of Chimur where he fought the Sena rather than the Congress and ended up with egg on his face is yet to recede from public memory. Probably someone like a Manohar Parrikar would have been a better bet as compared to him. That said, we must not forget that Mr Rajnath Singh had become the President with a lot of promise. He was seen as a decisive man, an RSS favorite, one who did his best to salvage the BJP in Uttar Pradesh. He started off with making all the right sort of noise... on getting the prodigals back, on going back to basics, so on and so forth. Sadly, he was let down by his teammates, who never let go of a chance to underline that he did not belong to Delhi or that he was intellectually challenged. I very vividly recollect a renowned BJP watcher, with sufficient access  to the inner circle of 'Dilli 4' telling me that Mr Singh was unfit to be a primary school teacher! I could only nod my head wondering which school teachers in India had become the Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Cabinet Ministers or the Head of a National Political Party.  IThe BJP's President can only be as good as his esteemed colleagues would allow him to be. Probably the test of the leader will be more on how he manages them, rather than the party!

Now, to conclude that the RSS will be happy to have a person, who it does not believe in (or oppose), as the BJP’s Prime Ministerial Candidate, is to do disservice to both the BJP and the RSS. Even Mr Vajpayee’s declaration as the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate in 1995, was a result of RSS deliberations. Further, while it cannot be denied that there are tones of disharmony in the relationship between the RSS and the BJP, the latter has had its roots of the former and still gains umbilical sustenance from it. While it may warm the cockles of secularists wishing for a parting of ways between the two entities, such thinking is entirely wishful, particularly when you realize that there is little to distinguish between each other, at the core level. One may do good to remember the lament of Mahatma Gandhi, pre and post partition, when he said that while everyone professes to respect him, no one listens to him. While this was certainly far from reality, what this and the accounts of that period do reinforce that there was indeed some tension between Gandhi and his followers, the latter finding Gandhi too idealistic for their comfort! It however, by no stretch of imagination means that there was a stage for parting of ways! Same will be true for the BJP and the RSS, at least in the coming years.

What some critics would like to forget now is the Ms Swaraj was seen as an RSS favorite till some time back. And why not? This lady started her political career in the Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad, is attractive in her own way, is an excellent orator, a walking epitome of Indian culture, is an efficient administrator and is as yet, untouched by taint of corruption. Few, who have seen Ms Swaraj perform in debates would have any doubt that she is among the most articulate speakers in Indian political firmament today. For those, who would want to dismiss this as of little consequence, should remember that Mr Vajpayee made his mark first as an orator only. I have had a chance to hear Ms Swaraj in a public rally. This was when she came to my hometown along with Mr LK Advani, on the Su Raj Yatra. No disrespect to Mr Advani, but Ms Swaraj spoke first and was mesmerizing. When Mr Advani started, the crowd started moving away and mid way through his speech, half the crowd was already gone.

In addition to being an orator, Ms Swaraj is a feisty lady, always up for challenge. After all, how many would have decided to confront Ms Sonia Gandhi on a Congress bastion, in an alien state? Or how many would have given up the comforts and certainty of the Central Council of Ministers to accept Chief Ministership of Delhi, all while knowing that a defeat is certain and would mean being away from position of power for long. Finally, she was a part of the Ayodhya campaign and unlike others, she has never beaten round the bush with regards to BJP’s association with the movement.

It is not to say that Ms Swaraj has not had her share of failures. Just after 2004 elections, when Veer Savarkar’s plaque was removed from the Martyr’s memorial at Andamans, Ms Swaraj led a delegation of NDA MPs on a Satyagraha against that move. Unfortunately, that did not make a mark. Likewise, she became the campaign champion of Mr Bhairon Singh Shekhawat, during the run up to President of India polls. While she had a lot of positive statements and hopes to offer, in the final reckoning, Mr Shekhawat scored less than promised votes!

That said, there can hardly be a candidate better than Ms Swaraj to lead the BJP. If nothing else, the simple fact that quite a large section of the media pejoratively describes her image of a middle class Indian women, stands ample testimony to the fact that they are scared, scared that the down to earth and common-sensical appeal of Ms Swaraj could be too hard to ignore for a significant section of the Indian population. While many of these critics would like that the entire country go ga-ga over Priyanka Gandhi’s natty dress sense, there exists more shades of India than one. Welcome Ms Swaraj. I have always believed you to be a future Prime Minister of this country and am sure that you will adorn that office one fine day.

MNS's Anti National Stance

Unlike an overwhelming majority of Non Maharashtrians, I have been ambivalent with regards to my feelings for Raj Thackrey’s Maharashtra Navnirman Sena. If the Sena was appealing to a large number of educated, cosmopolitan youth, then there must be a reason to it, I used to think and that we should make an attempt to understand rather than dismiss his comments as demagoguery. After all, isn’t democracy all about respecting people’s opinion? I have stayed in Mumbai for close to three years and have no doubts in proclaiming it to be a wonderful city. At the same time, I did feel that quite a lot of people had little respect for the city and its locals. Quite a lot of times, I was corrected by my colleagues / acquaintances that it is not Mumbai but Bombay and that for them, it will remain Bombay forever. Many a times, I was told that the localites are ‘working class’ and at other occasions, have been a witness to people calling others ‘Ghati’. This is not to say that these were all pervading sentiments. In fact, most people in Mumbai are too worried about themselves to bother about anything more. However, a superiority complex vis-à-vis the localites does exist in a small minority. And this minority becomes the source of grievance for the local youth, which are then articulated and exploited by the Raj Thackreys of the world. That iconic movie, ‘Mee Shivaji Raje Bhosle Boltoy’, very aptly captures the issues facing the Marathis in Mumbai, where quite a lot of them find themselves increasingly marginalized by the affluent class, mostly belonging to outside the state. The sad part is that their anger and helplessness gets targeted at the most vulnerable underclass of the city.

The chattering classes must pause and introspect if what they feel about the Marathis is justified or even remotely acceptable. Fighting for one’s constitutional rights is one thing, basic humanity dictates that you will not be contemptuous of your neighbors or look down upon them. It is perhaps the same need to feel superior which makes numerous individuals shirk their language and culture and adopt that of what they perceive to be artifacts of a more superior culture.

While these realizations made me sensitive to the angst of the Marathi Manoos, I never had any doubt that what Raj was doing was plain hooliganism. Raj Thackrey has had a chequered past, his strong links with builders before he became a builder himself came forth to the world’s notice with the Ramesh Kini murder case. He was the person who arranged for beating up of North Indian youth at Railway stations when they had come to appear for Railway examinations, while still in the Shiv Sena and is the person who alongwith Manohar Joshi, purchased Kohinoor Mills, at an unprecedented price (at that time). Raj has been strongly supported by the Democratic Front Government in Maharashtra in his growth. It is not easy to form a party and sustain it without an organization and funds. Ask Uma Bharati, who lost out on everything in spite of huge charisma and mass appeal. Here, not only did Raj prosper, the state kept him out of jail and provided him adequate coverage to appear as a potent voice of the disgruntled Marathi.

Now, with the assault on Abu Azmi, that hooliganism has reached even newer heights. No logic is strong enough to justify this assault. However, it is sad that of all people, it is Abu Azmi who has appeared as a patriot. For the uninitiated, Abu Azmi is widely suspected of having close links with the D Gang with the then Mumbai Police Commissioner R H Mendonca, even having submitted affidavits in court in that regard. Azmi has been associated with at least half the communal riots in Maharashtra in some way or the other and has emerged as a rallying point of anti National of various hues over the years. Even in this instance, it was he who needlessly brought forth the issue by demanding assembly papers in Hindi, when it is normal practice across India to have papers in the State Language and English.

However, leaving the person apart, MNS’s assault on an MLA for the ‘sin’ of taking oath in Hindi, is an Anti National Act. Forget about the fact about Hindi being the official language of India, had any MLA wanted to take his oath in even Assamese or Nepali, it is a right guaranteed by the constitution. Language is a sensitive issue across the world. Qubec almost seceded from Canada for its French speaking majority felt discriminated by the rest of Canada. Closer home, Bangladesh got formed on account of Urdu dominance and we ourselves have seen violent pro and anti language agitations in the country.

In spite of being a Hindi speaking person myself, I cannot imagine me being happy in a situation where I or others are forced to speak Hindi only. If anyone is so interested in furthering the cause of something, why not take positive steps for its furtherance. The Swadeshi movement promoted Swadeshi not by physically attacking foreign made goods but by educating the public on the need to use Swadeshi. Likewise, why don’t the votaries of Marathi or any language for that matter take positive steps to popularize it? Force, that too by an illegitimate authority will only create a backlash, which whichever way it goes, will only serve to weaken National unity.

A parting question to Raj. What if some other person had taken the oath in Sanskrit, the mother language of Marathi? Would the MNS have assaulted that person too?

Reporting of yesterday's Seminar

There has been some reporting of the Multi Party Event on Kashmir held yesterday. It seems that I lost on quite a lot of the discussions after leaving for Mehbooba Mufti, the separatist patron mother, reiterated what she has been proclaiming all along, i.e., that autonomy is the only the solution to Kashmir, that the pro Pakistani, Syed Ali Geelani’s blessings are a must for any lasting solution, that security forces must be withdrawn etc etc. What she has left unsaid is that Azadi from India remains the crux of all demands and nothing short of secession will sate the Kashmiri Muslims thirst for cribbing, constant stone throwing and perpetual demonstrations.

Of greater import are the comments made by Yasin Malik, where he has accused ‘Indian’ facilitators of having become stakeholders in the peace process. He wants these well wishers from the Indian ‘civil society’ which has anyways ‘failed’ the Kashmiris, to only act as a facilitator between the Government of India and the separatists. What would be the ultimate goal of such negotiations are nobody’s guess. Am sure that the Indian ‘civil’ society must now be quite ashamed of their duplicity and will redouble, nay triple their efforts to complete Kashmir’s secession from India. At least Yasin is honest and and has no qualms in fearlessly proclaiming that the terrorism in Kashmir is a freedom struggle which will continue till the logical conclusion is achieved. I guess it doesn’t take much to understand what the logical conclusion to any freedom struggle is.

Now I come to the part on which I wrote yesterday; the insensitivity of the Indian ‘civil’ society to the sufferings of the Kashmiri Pandits vis-à-vis their fawning admiration for the separatists. A report states that "While Malik was speaking, some members of Kashmiri Pandit groups - Panun Kashmir and Roots in Kashmir (RIK) created ‘ruckus’ (emphasis added) by shouting anti-JKLF slogans.

Another news report portrays the event in more glowing terms:
"A group of Kashmiri Pandits ‘heckled’ (emphasis added) the chairman of the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front, Muhammad Yasin Malik, and blamed him for their exodus from the Valley. However, Malik resisted their attempt to cow him down and justified taking up the gun to highlight the Kashmir issue. (emphasis added) As soon as Malik started his address a small group of Pandits 'heckled' (emphasis added) him. However, JKLF chairman reacted strongly saying, “these obscurantist forces are responsible for the political unrest in the Valley.” (emphasis added) Organizers immediately intervened and avoided the situation from taking an ugly turn.

Another news report mentions:
During the course of the proceedings, the organiser of the forum has (sic) to call police when a group of pundits tried to interrupt Yasin Malik to deliver his speech.

Please note. Protests of people who have lost everything get reported as ruckus and heckling and a leader of the killers is portrayed as a strong person who refused to be ‘cowed’ down. Notice the alacrity of the organizers who had no qualms in calling the police even. And who were these protestors? A bunch of students who were armed with cameras!! Thank God for the organizers else those cameras could have caused a blood bath!

The story of Kashmiri Pandits get beautifully captured in those comments of Yasin where he calls them the obscurantist forces responsible for the political unrest in the Valley! This mentality of the Kashmiri majority has been all pervading since the times of Sheikh Abdullah and saw its ghastly culmination in the ethnic cleansing of 1990. Since the media and ‘civil’ societies love secularism and any display of the same, each of the polished Kashmiri ‘victim’ takes pain to proclaim that the Pandits are our own and we welcome them back. However, a façade is a façade and it takes a mere surface scratch to show up the true colors of all these separatists of different hues.

My Impressions on the Multi Party Meet on Kashmir

When I had started this blog, I had thought of keeping my writings distinct from my personal experiences. However, a seminar which I happened to attend today had made me cross that line and write about something of which I was a part of as an audience if not a vocal participant.

I thank Shri Tarun Vijay for inviting me to the Multi Party Seminar on Jammu & Kashmir, held at Nehru Museum today. Unfortunately, I reached the seminar quite late and could hardly spend time with him, the same being the primary purpose of my visit. That said, the galaxy of eminent personalities at the seminar made me stay back and be a part of the proceedings.

Owing to prior commitments, I had to move out at 5 PM, without hearing out Yasin Malik and Mehbooba Mufti, two people who I very much wanted to listen to. I am sure that the thoughts of these two separatist leaders, one a born again terrorist responsible for the ethnic cleansing of Kashmir and the other, a prominent leader of a front organization of the separatists who has fought elections waving a green handkerchief, would have been quite interesting. But then, what I did hear from the others, from Ram Jethmalani, Madhu Kishwar, Muzaffar Hussain Baig, representing the PDP and an ex Deputy Chief Minister of Jammu & Kashmir, Mohd Shafi Uri, MP from National Conference, Sonam Wangchuk Narboo of Ladakh Union Territory Front, Abul Ghani Bhat from the Hurriyat Conference, Nancy Kaul from Panun Kashmir/Daughters of Vitista, Sanjay Tikoo from Kashmiri Pandit Sangharsh Samiti, Ramesh Manwati from Panun Kashmir, Prof Ellora Puri from the Jammu University and belonging to Panthers Party, Balbir Punj, MP, representing the BJP, eminent journalist BG Verghese and a host of Kashmiri Pandit youth, was sufficient to feel distressed and dismayed at the current state of affairs and the future path which we are being pushed towards.

We had Prof Bhat spouting Persian poetry, reminding us that Kashmir was the paradise longed for by the Mughal decadent Jehangir when he died and more ominously, telling the august gathering that the Kashmiri is a snake with a forked tongue. That the Kashmiri is a species which can test, which can bite and which can kill; and that the Kashmiri is a very intelligent and flexible creature, one who balances ragda with participation in polls, the one who has a twisted way of walk, one who adjusts but still persists in what he wants. What do you think the reaction of the public to this speech and assertion of sticking to the core demand would have been? Condemnation or at least rebuttal? No Sir, nothing of that sort. Speaker after speaker (not that many actually) hailed the flexibility of the Hurriyat and painted it as a victory of the ‘normalization’ process, all because Prof Bhat had so kindly desisted from the use of that dreaded word ‘Azadi’

I could not but fail to contrast this with the treatment meted out to Nancy Kaul of Panun Kashmir who was made to shut up by Madhu and Ram. To be fair to Madhu, Nancy was reading out from her prepared script which did not really construe the right reaction to Mr Baig’s statements. However, what stood out for me was its contrast with the treatment meted out to Prof Bhat, who again had only rhetoric and veiled threats to offer. Not only was Nancy forcefully shut up, she was chided by Mr Jethmalani for ‘spoiling the atmosphere’. It would have been laughable had it not been so sad. Here we have a bunch of separatists who have been condemning the country and its people from every available fora being feted and pampered to mitigate their supposed grievances. One the other hand, we have another batch of Nationalists who have been a target of ethnic cleansing in the most brutal a manner, being asked to shut up and not ‘spoil the atmosphere’. This was not the only instance. Another representative from Panun Kashmir, Ramesh Manwati was interrupted twice by Madhu and one other time by another hyper gentleman for hankering back to the past when it was time to move ahead. When Ramesh pointed out that he had been only listening without interrupting even once the entire day and would close in five minutes, Madhu gave way and apologized, with sealed lips and a loud ‘I’m sorry’, inviting smirks and titters from the more liberal and forward looking of the audience.

I could not help but feel dismayed at this discrimination. The real victims have become a National shame, like a penniless cousin in family who everyone prefers to ignore while the bending over backwards to pamper the rich but wicked aunt. So, other than Mr Jethmalani’s chidings, we had Madhu very condescendingly telling the Kashmiri Pandit representatives that everyone feels for them and that no solution of Kashmir is possible without them but that they have to move ahead and not dwell on past. Then we had Prof Ellora Puri giggling when Balraj Punj was narrating the gruesome murder by torture of Rajneesh Sharma in Srinagar. On a more personal interaction level, a lady journalist who has been based out of Kashmir for last 9 years very emphatically telling me that the demands for Panun Kashmir cannot be fulfilled. After all, aren’t they so impractical? Of course impractical! In this country, talking of autonomy short of independence is practical, talking of virtually ceding the territory of the Nation is practical, even talking of secession is practical but talking of building an enclave for the displaced in their own historical lands is an impractical supposition of the highest order, matched only by another impossibility, that is the abrogation of Section 370 of the Indian Constitution.

One learning for me was that we must learn how to play the victim. If I may say so, none of the three representatives of Kashmiri Pandits on board were the suave, sophisticated and articulate type. Contrast them with Prof Bhat and others. It was while the lunch was in progress that Yasin Malik arrived. His arrival for preceded by a public announcement by Madhu that he would be arriving any minute. Malik was the cynosure of all eyes when he came, looking smart and elegant, and more importantly, the type you would want to be photographed with. Now comes the learning part…I went up to Yasin and told him that I do not support anything what he stands for except for his abjuring of violence. Yasin thanked me and while I was shaking his hands drew me close and held me in a hug. Was I astounded? Yes…I was. Firstly, I have never been hugged by anyone who had just met me and secondly, I hadn’t exactly told him that I was his fan. But then, this is probably what makes these ‘victims’ so effective in peddling their victimhood. We, as a Nation, have been suckers for praise, for rhetoric and for feel good and we take everything personally. So, it becomes….there is no way that such a refined and cultured person can be a blood letting terrorist….we must make an effort to walk the extra mile for these people who are the blood of our blood…..the hospitality of the Pakistanis is a delight…if you are an Indian, the taxi driver won’t charge you…the people love each, its only the politicians that….and so on and so forth.. Sadly, the actual victims are probably so overwhelmed by their destiny and sense of loss that they forget the need to play to the gallery in this age of made for order victims. Probably the Kashmiris can train some of their youth to play to the gallery and be the perfect victim. Those present from that community might take heart from the speech of Prof Ellora Puri from the Panthers Party, which was extremely low on substance, repetitive and frankly, pointless but at the same time, very well received. After all, this had come from a pretty lady, with a perfect command over the English language and quite a lot of publications to her credit. So how could the words of this lady be interrupted with comments like..’Please offer a concrete proposal’.

While on Kashmiri Pandit representatives, Sanjay Tikoo from the KPSS made quite a pertinent demand for a truth and justice commission to be formed by the Indian Parliament to look into the issue of how 57,000 youth managed to cross the heavily guarded LoC? In a small but quite significant demand, he called for a stop to the demonization of Jagmohan as the cause of Pandit migration from Kashmir and pointed out that in between 1998 and 2008, the 19,000 strong Pandit population has dwindled down to 3,000. I wish he had spoken of Wandhama and Chittisignpora among others but then, he still lives in Kashmir under the shadow of gun. When Madhu supported the demand for a Truth and Justice Commission but asked Mr Baig on why can’t the Jammu and Kashmir Assembly form such a Commission on his own, Mr Baig conveniently sought refuge in the fig leaf of Atrocities committed by the Indian Security Forces, over which (unfortunately, it seems) the J&K assembly has no jurisdiction and hence cannot address. In one stroke, a demand for seeking of truth behind the rise of terrorism and ethnic cleansing of a vulnerable minority was deflected to the ‘atrocities’ committed by the Indian Security Forces. Any counterpoints made? Of course not!

The double face of Kashmiri separatism is beautifully highlighted by the submission of Mr Baig. His disposition was masterly, emotive and impactful and to be fair to him, if he really meant what he said, then it certainly is a progress from what PDP has stood for. The moot point to note was that the arguments and suggestions offered by Mr Baig were substantively different from the autonomy proposals presented by the PDP in 2000 and circulated in the seminar. But our worthies seem to believe that written words are meaningless and what is said by honourable people is more worthy than Gold. After all, hadn’t Bhutto committed to recognizing rhe LoC as the de jure border? Poor guy could not do anything for he was deposed. After all, we are not Chinese and we should not let ourselves burdened by history. In fact, let us trash all our collective memories and start afresh, without being burdened by irksome wisdom passed on by history. But then, I’m digressing. Let us come back to Mr Baig, I met him during the lunch time and commended him for his comments, his displayed feelings for the Pandits and his commitment towards the resolution the Kashmir issue. Then I asked him if his views represented the views of the party or were his own individual opinion? Very diplomatically, Mr Baig responded that dialogue is a continuous process and people who are of contrarian opinion will be bought around !

That the Indian intellectual class is still in denial mode was bought about quite starkly by the venerable BG Verghese who made a startling claim that the problem of Kashmir is not that of Religion. Huh!!!! We must have been in slumber all along, imagining nightmares that of religion being the root of the issue in hand. We used to think that the Kashmir terror cycle is a Jehad by the Muslims, that it is left over issue of Partition, which happened on religious lines, that Kashmiris want to secede because we are seen as a Hindu Nation (??) and Pakistanis is seen as the logical ummah, that the Kashmiri Pandits were brutalized for they were Hindus, their temples were deflied and descreted because those were kufr and that they protested against Amarnath Yatra because it is a Hindu religious celebration. No Sir…we were all grossly mistaken. After all, if a Magsaysay award winner, that too of such a long standing in public life and a one who has written on Kashmir, says that Religion is not an issue with Kashmir, then it must be true. We must tell the Pandits to stop pretending that they became victims for they were Hindus. They certainly must have conspired with the Devilish Jagmohan and hatched the diabolical plan to run away from their homes and give a bad name to the poor innocent Kashmiri Muslim. The poor innocent Kashmiri Muslim, who used to share his plate with the Pandit was never liked by the Pandit, you know and what better way of getting back to him than to give him a bad name by running away? Cries of 'Agar Kashmir me rehna hai, Allah hu Akbar kehna hai' never rent the air, Mosques never did blare 'Nallay taqdeer Allah-hu-Akbar' nor did newspaper advertise slogans of 'Asya ghazi Kashmir batnain san te batav roose'. Rechristening of Sankaracharya hill to Suleiman Teng or of Anantnag to Islamabad never happened nor did the killing of Tikka Lal Taploo or the rape of Sarla Bhatt ever happen. It must then be malicious propaganda that the Jammu Hindus, the Ladakhi Buddhists and Kashmiri Pandits, want complete integration with India. Am sure that newer revelations by Mr Verghese will throw light on how all these communities secretly hate India and desire to be a part of Nizam-E-Mustafa which certain sections of the Indian intelligentsia are helping the separatists to achieve.

And helping others is something which we Indians have in blood. Even a cursory reader of Indian history will know that each and every invader of our country was ‘helped’, be it Alexander by Ambhi, Muhammad Ghori by Jaichand or Babur by Silhadi. This tradition of helping is still very much alive and kicking and hence, we have an orchestrated campaign by the ‘civil society’ demanding resumption of talks with Pakistan (note that the PDP, NC and Hurriyat are one with this demand) and more dangerously, advocating open borders and horrendously, pitching for ‘Joint Management’ of the state of Jammu and Kashmir by both India and Pakistan. So, we have Mr Jethmalani disclosing that the Jethmalani proposals on Joint Management were actually a slightly revised version of the original proposals sent by Parvez Musharraf to him through a personal channel. Mr Jethmalani then made slight changes in that, got it approved from Musharraf (so logical, you see) and then published it as his own proposal. Mr Jethmalani was quite categorical in stating that he, along with others will organize a campaign to ‘pressurize’ the Government to accept the proposals.

I am still unable to digest all this.

Mr Jethmalani is among the foremost legal brains this country has produced post independence. He may be old and a bit infirm but his mind and tongue seems as sharp as it could be. So, when he says that autonomy merely means shifting of some topics from the Union List to the State List, is makes me doubt my rudimentary understanding of our constitution and federalism. When he says that Section 370 cannot be repealed, except by war, I cannot understand which war is he talking about? The Kashmiris have already been waging a war against the Indian Nation since the last 25 years. Which other war and against whom? When he so vehemently supports Joint Management, I become numb. The thought of Joint Management for me means accepting that Kashmir never belonged to us, that not only Kashmir, Jammu, Ladakh, Pir Panjal, Aksai Chin, Baltistan, Mirpur and Kargil never belonged to us, that the Muslims in India are indeed vestiges of Pakistan whose interests can only be safeguarded by Pakistan and most importantly, that we had actually brutalized and colonized a Nation for the last 62 years. It would mean that in spite of us being under various degrees of foreign occupation for centuries, we are bullies which oppressed a race for more than half a century. I will of course, be then forced to look at our Martyrs as colonial mercenaries and berate India for making such a wasteful expenditure over a piece of land which never gave us revenue but gave us hatred, refugees and dead bodies. Has it ever come to the proponent’s thoughts that Joint Management is a chimera and a mere façade for de facto secession of the entire state of Jammu and Kashmir. Has joint management ever worked, anywhere? And before that, what is the need for Joint Management. What is mine remains should remain with me and what is thine, you take care of. I am very sure that if any of these proponent’s neighbors start claiming their property, these worthies would not decide to own that plot of land together. They would fight tooth and nail to preserve what is theirs. So, why such contempt for a land and people who historically, legally and morally belong to us? Or is it that that these worthies are now tired and want peace at any cost? However great that price might be?

Had I attended this seminar even two years back, I would not have been worried much but I am worried today. My cause of concern the vaccum in the opposition space in India today. If this Government goes ahead with the joint management proposal, the feeble voice of the Kashmiri Pandits would be completely drowned and no party would take up the cause of National and territorial integration of the country. With the BJP being in the state which it is, it is inconceivable that they will do anything other than sending their Generals to Television Studios to offer token protest and then go back to their intrigue camps. The General Public has become too disinterested now and country wide protests by a leaderless mass are not even a distant possibility. As regards the media, the lesser said about these Corporatized profit making front entities, the better. Who will then take up the mantle of stopping these steps towards the eventual dismemberment of our Nation? Who will ensure that the Kashmiri Pandit race is not extinguished from the face of this Earth? Who will lead the struggle to ensure that there remains One Nation with One Flag and One Head of State?


Note: Kashmir here denotes only the Kashmir Valley.

PS:
This seminar was attended by a few Kashmiri Pandit youth who were kids when they were expelled from their homelands. Away from their land of birth, they have grown up and are now seeking justice by organizing in various forms. A learned community reduced to the status of refugees in their own land, eyes and words of these youth denote a mix of pain, anger, desire for justice and longing for their own hearth. Unfortunately, they don’t seem to be on the radar of any of those who claim to speak for the oppressed and the weak. Are they destined to be sometimes greeted with condescending words but most of the times contemptuously ignored? Will there be any end to the tribulations of this community which constantly reminds us that we have failed as a Nation in protecting them?

Life Beyond EVMs

• Doubts over efficacy of Electronic Voting Machines being used in Indian Elections since 1999, are being raised for some time now. There are quite a few petitions which have been filed across various courts in the country challenging the validity of EVMs in the process and have prayed the courts for direction that the old system of paper ballots be reintroduced. I have read one such petition, filed by among others, one Mr Anil Chawla, post the November 2008 state assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh, where he, alongwith a few others make a case quite strong enough to be looked into.
  
  I remember the days before EVMs were introduced. In case of Lok Sabha elections, it would be noon by the time the first trends would start coming in, that too from smaller constituencies like Goa and the entire counting process would get at least two days to get over. One of the reasons for the delay was on account of the mixing of ballot papers from across booths, such that it became difficult to identify the direction of voting at a particular polling booth. With EVMs, things changed of course. Now, instead of agonizing waits, we can see the political spectrum of the country changing colors in a few hours flat.
  
  That said, it is distressing to see that the Congress and a few of the usual suspects in the media have been so dismissive of the concerns expressed by the opposition parties on the safety features of the EVMs. While I cannot comment on the efficacy of the EVMs at all, I’ll certainly want to comment on a few of the points which are raised by the Congress and the media brigade to dismiss the apprehensions of the opposition
  
  That EVMs are faulty is a complaint of the losers – So? Which sane person would expect winners to complaint that they won through unethical means? Has any winner abdicated his seat on this count ever? Or has any party accused of booth capturing accepted that they had indeed intimidated the voters? It is a natural flow of justice that the aggrieved seeks recourse while the beneficiary / accused tries to question the creditability and motive of the appellant? So what is different in this case? Do we really expect Congress to move courts asking for revert to paper ballot or do we expect the CPM to own up booth capturing, something which it has been accused of for ages?
  
  EVMs have bought prestige to the Nation – Bah!! Double Bah!! Will Indians grow up and accept that there is more to life then empty praise. It is a self fulfilling delusion that something ‘brings’ prestige to the Nation and that the Nation’s ‘prestige’ is so fragile that questioning anything will ruin it forever. When countries much more advanced then us technologically had no qualms in discarding a system which they felt they couldn’t trust, what is so special about us? Why do we need to build holy cows all around when we don’t care for the actual cow?
  
  EVMs declare the results faster – So? Answer a simple question. What is the purpose behind conduct of elections? To gauge the people’s mandate or to declare the mandate faster? If it is the second, then I rest my case but owing to the beliefs which have been inculcated all along, i.e., that democracy means rule by the people and for the people I have all along believed that the elections are a tool to gauge people’s will. If people’s will is being subverted, are they elections in the true sense? Why is then there a history of masses agitating against ‘rigged’ election results across the world, on a country wide scale in Bangladesh or Iran or on a smaller scale in West Bengal and Bihar? Let the result declaration process take a week. Only let it be what people have willed and not otherwise.
  
  EVMs have helped prevent rigging – Huh! This is indeed hilarious. It is like saying that Bofors Guns helped Indian soldiers evict Kargil intruders so the scam associated with Bofors should not be investigated. Besides that, rigging has come down more on account of greater security and better booth management by the EC. EC must certainly be commended for better and cleaner elections but to credit the EVMs for that is indeed too much.
  
  EVMs cannot be tampered with – Well, cannot comment on this in particular but would seek refuge in my knowledge that there is nothing such as perfect security. Even the most secure defense systems are routinely hacked across the world and here we are talking of a small, simple machine which is used in thousands. To turn a blind eye to the possibility that some, if not all, machines can be tampered with, either at the time of production, voting or counting is foolhardy. Moreover, this does not explain that how Maneka Gandhi and P Chidambaram won their respective seats on recount when they had initially been declared losers? If the system is electronically foolproof, it would not have allowed accretion of a single vote to either of these candidates. Further, there have been quite a few instances of particular candidates winning 100% of votes polled at an EVM. In an election, which was not driven by a strong sentiment or a wave, such happenings are certainly not normal and defy the rules of probability.
  
  
  This is not to say that the General Elections 2009 were rigged. This is only to point out that when a large part of the political space in the country has developed doubts regarding a tool of election, it is proper that the cause of concern be investigated and doubts set at rest. The opposition has as much a stake in the running of the country as the ruling party and the simple fact of their defeat cannot dismiss their concerns as unfounded. We are a democracy and people’s will needs to be respected. Let us not get into a state where the credibility of our system becomes so suspect that the losers start taking to streets disputing the results. Let us remain a successful democracy and not a wannabe Iran.

Delhi High Court Judgment on Sec 377 - Those opposing the opposers

Ever since the issue of decriminalization of homosexuality has gained more prominence in public imagination and more importantly, ever since the Delhi High Court judgment has been delivered, there is a sort of avalanche of posts in various foras denouncing opponents of the judgment.

While it is understandable that any person feeling threatened by someone would resort to such denouncements, what escapes notice is the cause behind the striking absence of objectivity in the readers' denouncement of critics.

Almost all supporters of judgment have heaped scorn and vitriol on saffron backsides, knickerwallahs, hindutvavadis etc. Have these people venting their spleen on the abovementioned even paused to think if their frothing is justified?

Since the judgment has been delivered, the most vehement reactions have been from the clergy of Abrahmic religions, precisely those religions which have their holy books denouncing homosexuality and precisely those which ignite and fan a strong anti homosexual sentiment across the western and Middle Eastern world. Coming to Indic religions, the Sikh clergy has officially condemned homosexuality while refusing to tar it as criminal behavior. Regarding others, I have not come across any Buddhist monk coming out against the judgment though there has been one Jain muni who has been speaking out against it from available foras. That leaves Hindu clergy to deal with. The strongest opposition has come from Baba Ramdev, who is neither a part of the clergy, i.e. math or monastery nor is he a Godman in the sense of the Sathya Sai Babas or even Asaram Bapus of the world. In fact, no Hindu religious leader of any standing has come out against the judgment even remotely as strong as the reaction of the Abrahmic clergy. Nor have there been petitions by Hindu religious leaders to the PM or any minister asking that the Parliament overturn the judgment or appeal it in any fora. It might have escaped notice of these critics, either by design or default, but even the much maligned RSS, VHP or Bajrang Dal have had nothing much to say about the judgment

Coming to the political parties, it was the Samajwadi Party, the RJD and the LJP (the last in Rajya Sabha) which have been most vehement in their protest against the judgment. The BJP has remained silent and even the Shiv Sena hasn't reacted the way as it did against Fire. (By the way, people forget that the ostensible reason for Sena's protest against Fire was the usage of the names Radha and Sita for the protagonist and not the film itself)

Some may point out that BP Singhal, one of the parties to the Naz petition and an outspoken critic of homosexuality is a BJP member. But then, he never joined the case on behalf of the party. If we apply that logic, then Ghulam Nabi Azad, who is a much more senior member of the Congress party, having occupied ministerial and senior party position, is against the judgment. The ex Home Minister, Shivraj Patil was a strong opponent of the call to decriminalize homosexuality. Does all that mean that the Congress is opposing the judgment?

People ignore the fact that previously, NHRC, then headed by JS Verma, one of the most respected judges in the history of the country had refused to support the movement. He was not a Hindu right sympathizer by any extent. Ashok will concur that the strongest opposition to a seminar on gay rights, many years ago, had come from Vimla Farooqui, the then Head of National Commission of Women, and a card carrying member of the communist party

Even now, the NWC has given a guarded reaction to the judgment without supporting even the concept and has only said that it will need to study its impact on the family life in the country. Likewise, there is no squeak of support from either the NHRC or the Minorities commission. None of these are headed by anyone who is remotely associated with the Hindu Right.

It stretches credulity to the extremes to believe that the Hindu right must be condemned for opposing homosexuality. Even if we give more than required weightage to the Hindu organizations opposing the judgment, we would still find their reaction muted as compared to the opposition coming from the Abrahmic clergy, something more noticeable when you realize that their population is only between one-sixth and one-fifth share of the entire population of the country

Why can’t people criticize where it is due and just? Why do they forget that criticism just because of one’s ideological blinkers or because one is scared to protest against those who protest the loudest, is an act of cheating on oneself. If one is so convinced of his / her correctness, why this display of spinelessness in taking all the opposers headlong?

Let us not forget that the Indian society has never denounced homosexuality. Though not accepted it was never persecuted and only ignored. For most Indians, while decriminalizing it may be welcome, they may not be equally comfortable in legalizing it. We are in a country where public displays of affection among heterosexuals can invite obscenity laws and sexual liberation hasn't yet prevailed.

The struggle for equal rights in any arena is a long journey and always has potent foes. It can do well without imagining foes and ignoring perils where they actually exist.