Vajpayee terms carnage a blot on Indian face: Call to restore peace; toll mounting
By Jawed Naqvi
NEW DELHI, March 2: Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee looking for help in the opposition ranks after his own rightwing Hindu hardliners appeared determined to let him down, on Saturday described the religious pogroms under way in the western state of Gujarat as a blot on the face of India.
Official sources said the death toll from three days of anti-Muslim riots across Gujarat had climbed to 300, as Hindu mobs wreaked vengeance for Wednesday’s attack by suspected Muslim extremists on a train carrying rightwing Hindu activists that left 58 dead.
“Whatever the provocation, people should maintain peace and exercise restraint,” Vajpayee said in a televised address to the nation. “The burning alive of people, including women and children, from Godhra to Ahmedabad and other places is a blot on the country’s face.”
He said the religious madness in Gujarat had damaged India’s reputation in the world. “I am confident all secular-minded people will observe peace and help the government in maintaining communal harmony.”
His appeal to “secular-minded people” fell on deaf ears as far as the fanatical Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP, World Hindu Council) was concerned. The VHP on Saturday set stiff conditions to stop its campaign to begin construction of a temple in Ayodhya from March 15, including permission, forbidden by a court order, to offer prayers near the site of the Babri mosque that its supporters razed in 1992.
The VHP also demanded the handing over of the protected land by getting the courts to rush the case through. Congress party leader Sonia Gandhi told the government flatly not to yield to the demands.
Violence continued in Gujarat on Saturday, though the capital city Ahmedabad seemed relatively calm after the presence of the army was strengthened. The death toll in the riots is now feared to be 350, police said.
Reports said in Bhavnagar, two people were killed on Saturday when police opened fire to disperse a 600-strong mob that burnt two buildings in Kumdvadi area.
“Two people have been killed in firing as police tried to disperse the crowd that was indulging in arson,” Rahul Sharma, superintendent of police in Bhavnagar, said.
Late Friday, 30 people were burned alive in the troubled Panchmahal district.
Earlier on Saturday morning, police confirmed the death of 27 persons in Sardarpura village in Mehsana district in an incident which took place on Friday night.
Police officials said two more persons had been killed in Ladol town near Sardarpura on Saturday. In Ahmedabad, an element of normalcy returned following three days of intense Hindu-Muslim clashes.
In Ahmedabad film actress and Member of Parliament Shabana Azmi was stopped by the Bharatiya Janata Party administration from visiting local hospitals. Ms Azmi received desperate phone-calls from a number of localities in Ahmedabad from frightened citizens, mostly Muslims.
“This is exactly what happened in Mumbai in 1993,” she recalled. “The state administration had become a silent witness, even an obstruction to relief work,” she said.
Opposition leader and former prime minister V.P. Singh said the affected parts of Gujarat should be declared disturbed areas to be handed over directly to the army. Some other leaders demanded the dismissal of the state government, ruled by a hardline faction of Vajpayee’s BJP. As an indication of whathas changed since the days of Nehru-Gandhi administrations when the Rashtriya Swayamsewak Sangh (RSS) was seen as the main architect of anti-Muslim violence, the government of Mr Vajpayee was under pressure on Saturday to seek the RSS help to mediate with the VHP.
Ironically, all three — the RSS, the VHP and the BJP — sit in parliament under one umbrella, as the BJP.
Three people were killed in one incident on the outskirts of the city which served as a reminder that Ahmedabad is still a city on the edge.
Curfew was lifted in some areas. A tenuous calm returned to the battered city and people came out to buy vegetables and provisions. Even in the worst-affected areas like Naroda, the salvage operation was in full progress as bulldozers began clearing the debris.
Seven people were burnt alive at Dabhoit road in Baroda, where the army had staged a flag march on Saturday. Incidents of arson, setting shops on fire, stone-pelting, throwing of acid bulbs and firing were reported from several areas including Raopura, Karelibaug, Wadi and Makarpura in the city.
Fifteen people were injured when police fired at a number of places to disperse mobs. Among those admitted to hospital, three more succumbed to their injuries. Also, a body was found in MEMU-Baroda-Godhra inter-city train.
In Surat, the police fired 17 rounds in the air to disperse a rampaging mob that pelted stones, set some shops and vehicles on fire in the curfew-free Randial and Pandasar areas and curfew-bound Katergam area.
Two persons were stabbed to death in Athwa and Chawk Bazaar areas and five others sustained injuries, following which indefinite curfew was imposed in these areas.
Defence Minister George Fernandes said the attack on the Sabarmati Express was pre-planned and the involvement of ISI cannot be ruled out.
NEW DELHI, March 2: Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee looking for help in the opposition ranks after his own rightwing Hindu hardliners appeared determined to let him down, on Saturday described the religious pogroms under way in the western state of Gujarat as a blot on the face of India.
