NEW DELHI, Aug 4: The head of India’s National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has likened the recent communal carnage in Gujarat to misery inflicted by war and urged Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to help ease the suffering of its predominantly Muslim victims, the Press Trust of India reported on Sunday.

PTI quoted NHRC chairman Justice J.S. Verma as telling students at a law school in Bangalore that those who have survived the mob fury could not return to their homes for a variety of worrying reasons and that they had lost their kith and kin in large numbers.

Non-government organizations say at least 2,000 people are feared to have been killed after well-organized Hindu mobs attacked Muslim homes and shops in an apparent act of revenge for the mysterious burning of a train in which some rightwing Hindu activists are believed to have been killed.

The state government says the Godhra train attack was planned by Muslims, but Mamata Banerjee, a disgruntled leader of India’s ruling coalition has accused the government of a cover-up with a view to blame the Muslims for the train carnage on Feb 27.

“How is it different from war?”, Verma, a former chief justice of the Supreme Court, asked. He said the people of Gujarat had undergone the same sufferings and miseries that one experiences during war. “The effect remains the same.”

“How can this happen in this country. I never hoped to witness this in my life”, he said, inaugurating a national roundtable conference on communalism and human rights organized by the NHRC and the National Law School.

Indicating that the situation had not returned to normal as yet, he said, “Gujarat continues to haunt us even now. I only hope the agony does not go on much longer”.

He said he was happy to read that the Prime Minister had expressed anguish over religious intolerance, without referring to Gujarat. “Once again, there is a need to translate rhetoric into action”, he said.

Justice Verma said a silent majority of people in India believed in secularism and asked them to ‘wake up’. “We are becoming more self-centred. We don’t bother about anything until we are directly involved. If a house is on fire, how much time does it take to spread to yours?” he asked.

The carnage could not be the handiwork of religious people, since no religion preaches violence and hatred. It was inflicted upon by criminals and vandals, he said.

Verma’s remarks came a day after the ruling Bharatiya Janta Party endorsed the Gujarat state government’s handling of the violence which opposition groups and independent observers say was patently state-sponsored.

Mr Vajpayee has led an unsuccessful move to remove Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi. The prime minister looked on silently on Saturday as senior BJP speakers lavishly praised Modi’s work.