The
Aftermath
India’s
Kristallnacht moment came and went by in the last week of February. The architects of the Delhi pogrom, after
observing that enough damage was done not only to Muslim property and
livelihood, but also their spirit and sense of belongingness, they signaled
their marauding, murderous mob to stop.
For days Muslim neighborhoods in north-east Delhi remained at the mercy
of the fascist Hindutva mob, who showed no mercy in killing and destroying
their properties and livelihoods. The
wound they have inflicted to the soul of Muslim ethos of being fellow brethren
will probably never heal. This shames
India and its majority population, Hindus to no end. Like Gujarat, like Nellie, like
Muzaffarnagar, like Bhagalpur, like Bombay, and like many others this is a blot
and scar on democracy and humanity of India as a nation that will never go
away. The nation has always failed its minorities. Delhi assumes highest significance as unlike
Gujarat, this pogrom was done in the capital of India right under the nose of the
central government and its agencies, with the world watching in utter despair
and disbelief. It is a stab in the heart
and soul of India. If one cannot open
eyes after such brutal pogrom unleashed by the ruling BJP’s Hindutva mob
supported by police and state, one has no heart, and has failed as a human
being. If the collective conscience
seeks any justification of what happened, the society has lost its moral
compass and wallows in an ultimate moral degradation, which cannot be glossed
over in any form and falls from humanity to say the least. And, inhuman we have become.
In the
aftermath of this violence, instead of providing a healing touch and sharing
the pain of the people at the receiving end, the state and the administration
has chosen to maintain utter silence on the violence, and with their silence
they refuse to even acknowledge what has happened to a community. This is true of both central government and
state government in Delhi. None of their
leaders showed the courage or empathy to provide some consolation to the
suffering masses who lost everything in a matter of 2 – 3 days. This despite the thumping majority that Delhi
residents provided to both BJP and AAP parties in the Lok Sabha and state
elections of Delhi respectively. With
56% vote share in Delhi, one would expect Arvind Kejriwal and other AAP leaders
to stand with Delhi people given the dire circumstances, even if the police
were not under their control. Their mere
presence might have mitigated the scale of the tragedy, gotten the police into
some action and inspired confidence in people.
Same applies to Modi and Shah who claim to move forward with everybody’s
trust. The trust was betrayed. Their gut-wrenching and heart-rending apathy
symbolizes our collective failure to act as a humane and an empathetic society
– the dead reaction is truly inhuman. The
state that fails to protect its own citizens has no moral right to continue in
power, but the first step to monstrosity is shamelessness.
In addition to
the dead and wounded, thousands of families have been uprooted and have lost
their homes. There are no shelters for
displaced people, there are no relief camps, just some ramshackle arrangement done
for namesake. Both Delhi and the central
government have refused to address the plight of the people on ground. Nor are there any reassurances to
rehabilitate people and restore their lives and dignity. They are left to cruel fate, where rebuilding
of whatever remains of their lives seems an impossibility. The only help they can look forward to are
from communities or social welfare organizations; they cannot have resources to
launch a relief operation of a scale, that is needed; the region looks
war-torn, it has been so badly damaged, only state power can restore it. The human aspect here is intricately
connected to the economic aspect. This
is the most marginalized region of Delhi, where poorest Muslims and Hindus
live. The region is a microcosm of
microscale industries where several Muslim families had set up small loom,
bangles factories, and other types of micro-industry in their homes and in
their commercial area. This was the major
source of their livelihood and lives that has been brazenly destroyed and
snatched away from them with complete impunity.
Thousands of people are returning to their villages and small towns in
neighboring state of UP from where they came from in search of a better
life. They have been relegated and
condemned to their prior mode of existence.
It also gives a clear economic advantage to the Hindu community which
can now thrive better or take over what is remaining from mass
displacement. The trade and commerce now
shifts towards Hindu community, earlier dominated by Muslims. The economic boycott of Muslims by Hindu community
in north-eastern part of Delhi is already in action, which leaves no chance of Muslim
traders to survive. The violence has thus
managed to displace Muslims both socially and economically. The heart-rending images of people moving out
with their remaining belongings and families remind of similar refugee crises in
Syria or of Rohingya Muslims, trying to escape unending violence. The soul is lost here.
The minority
commission in Delhi reports that thousands of Hindutva goons were brought in
from outside Delhi to orchestrate this carnage.
The Speaker of the Lower House suspended 7 Congress MPs demanding
discussion on Delhi riots. The whole
world and their governments have taken a note of this violence and have roundly
and unanimously condemned it in their own parliaments or congress. UK vouched to end trade relations if such
massive human rights violations continued unabated. India is increasingly getting isolated among Muslim
countries; Iran and Turkey have condemned Indian government’s inaction and
support to violence in no uncertain terms.
Iran, a long-term friend of India has been brutally critical of the Delhi
massacre. Despite strong international censure
from governments all over the world, the Indian administration seems to be
completely passive to any criticism. The
apathetic indifference to any call of morality from any government institution is
astounding.
The compromise
of government institutions is not limited to police but has reached judiciary. The embarrassment of the government at high court
of Delhi caused by Harsh Mander’s petition that resulted in court order for
police to execute their duties at the peak of the pogrom by judge Muralidhar, resulted
not only in transfer of judge Muralidhar within a few hours, but the supreme
court charged Harsh Mander for incendiary speech and ordered a probe into
it. This is justice inverted. Harsh Mander, who resigned the administrative
service after Gujarat riots in 2002 has been an epitome of selfless social
work, and has worked tirelessly to preserve and restore secular fabric of India. His speech encouraged people to answer hate
with love and called for unity of secular India. In this surreal world, Kapil Mishra whose
incendiary speech is on record has been provided with Y+ security! No action against other actors from ruling
BJP like Anurag Thakur, Parvesh Verma or Home Minister Amit Shah whose hate
speeches lit the fire in which Delhi burned.
In a highly communal fashion, hundreds of FIRs have been registered
largely against Muslim men who have been put in jail in no time. Even legislator Tahir Hussain from AAP was
not spared whom police has admitted to saving a day before the mob entered his
house. Secularism is being made to exist
only in the pages of constitution, on ground it is Hindu Rashtra, the grand
project of RSS is now taking shape in a very visible way. AAP quickly suspended Tahir Hussain without
any investigation, thus declaring him guilty without any proof or trial. The rightward lurch of AAP towards Hindutva
politics to secure Hindu votes is nauseating.
Despite the world
media focus and consistent reporting from all quarters condemning the pogrom, the
Indian media instead has focused on changing the narrative to “clash” between
two communities, rather than reporting the planned conspiracy with which Muslim
neighborhood was attacked and razed to ground.
The so-called mainstream media, which has long ago abdicated its duty to
report truth and inform people of facts, has been cacophonous in justifying
what happened. For media, only Muslims
are guilty. Hindus also died in this
violence, but it is still unclear who killed them; the frenzied Hindutva mob
probably killed anybody who came in their way.
Even if some killings came from Muslims, they were not the first
perpetrators and is unreasonable to expect that a community under brutal attack
will not have a reaction or self-defense. This in fact is a tried and tested tactic of
BJP/RSS; attack Muslims mercilessly and when they react discredit them as jihadists
and extremists. This is straight out of
their playbook of riots, which they have applied in every riot in independent
India. It was largely Muslim property
and mosques destroyed, Hindu temples remain unscathed; majority of people died
are Muslims and not Hindus, most families displaced are Muslims and not Hindus,
the population still under threat is Muslims and not Hindus; it is unjust to
call it a clash; the attack was a cold, calculated conspiracy to pave way for
eventual genocide. The heartless
rationalization of violence by media and upper caste Hindus is sickening to the
core, and prepares the ground for shredding the secular social fabric of India.
