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AHMEDABAD: The world’s largest democracy, with about 800 million Hindus and 120 million Muslims, has always had the potential to become a religious bonfire.
Now, as India recovers from six week of riots in the western state of Gujarat, in which at least 820 people died, many worry whether those in power are able — or even want — to contain the violence.
Opposition parties, editorial writers and civic activists blame a virulent brand of Hindu nationalism for fuelling India’s worst religious riots in a decade, and fear the fighting could inflame passions elsewhere.
“If this takes place in Gujarat, it could be replicated in several other states,” says Cedric Prakash, who heads the Ahmedabad-based Centre for Human Rights, Justice and Peace.
The secular nation of more than one billion people, 80 per cent Hindu and 12 per cent Muslim, has breathed a little easier in recent weeks as the rioting was restricted to Gujarat, India’s second-most industrialized state.
There, however, tension remains high. Curfews are imposed almost daily in the most explosive areas of Ahmedabad, a city of 4.5 million people and the state’s commercial capital.
Only extraordinary security measures are keeping the lid on the situation which threatens national harmony as details of the recent bloodletting come to light.
POLICE BLAMED: India is no stranger to religious riots. In 1947, when the subcontinent was divided by Britain into mostly Hindu India and Muslim Pakistan, about a million people were killed in violence.
And there are often allegations of police taking sides.
But this time, charges that police and state officials sided with Hindus against Muslims are particularly alarming.
Muslims and civil rights activists claim the Hindu-dominated police force watched or joined in looting Muslim-owned shops.
“Police were seen leading people, breaking down houses, burning things,” says Prakash. “Police have been silent spectators while there has been arson, loot, rape and murder.”
Police deny encouraging the riots. Some people believe that even if they did, they were only following orders.
A top official of the state Home Ministry acknowledged government information might have been provided to the rioters, but only if supplied by state employees acting on their own.
Some, though, believe the evidence indicates otherwise.
Opposition parties allege the BJP orchestrated the riots to appeal to hardline Hindus ahead of a state election that must be held by 2003, charges it has denied.
In February, the BJP suffered defeats in elections for four state assemblies, including India’s biggest state, Uttar Pradesh.
HINDU SUPREMACY: Directing the attacks, opposition parties say, were political forces dedicated to asserting Hindu supremacy in India.
“Ever since (the BJP took office in Gujarat), they’re trying to prove...that this is not merely the laboratory of Hindutva, an ideology which is absolutely fascist in nature, but it is a place where this ideology can take place,” says Prakash.
Hindu-Muslim riots have occurred before in Gujarat. There were religious riots in 1984, 1987, 1988, 1989 and 1992.
But many fear the recent riots have far more potential for stirring long-term unrest by destroying Muslims’ faith in India’s commitment to being a secular state.
Ribeiro says the rioting showed the results of 15 years of work by the VHP.
The thrust has been to instil intolerance to other creeds, and to portray Muslims in particular as a threat to India — as Kashmiri “terrorists” and sympathizers of Pakistan.
“They’ve brainwashed even small children. Even children of four go around with (symbolic Hindu) tridents saying they’ve got to kill Muslims,” said Ribeiro.—Reuters
