Tuesday, March 25, 2014

BJP and the politics of polarization:

BJP and the politics of polarization: 

On my recent visit to Muzaffarnagar in Uttar Pradesh, at the refugee camp of 
the September 2013 riot victims, the name of Amit Shah often came up 
during discussions. Mr. Shah is the newly appointed campaign manager for 
Narendra Modi in Western U.P. For those who are keeping a close tab on the 
human rights situation in India, Amit Shah‟s name rings an alarm bell. 

The appointment of Amit Shah appears to have a lot of political 
underpinnings. “How did this man who is charged with murder in Gujarat 
end up being the campaign manger in U.P”, wondered Sajjad, an aid worker 
to the riot victims in disbelief! Uttar Pradesh has become a pivotal ground 
for BJP‟s election strategy and Mr. Shah, who has a winning track record in 
Gujarat has the full confidence of Modi and the BJP. In order for Modi to 
become the Prime Minister, UP‟s share of BJP seats has to be substantially 
increased from ten seats at present. 

Amit Shah has been charged with murder, extortion, kidnapping and five 
other sections under IPC for the killing of Sohrabuddin and his wife Kausar 
Bi in 2005. Mr. Shah was Minister of State for Home in the Gujarat 
government under Chief Minister Narendra Modi, but had to resign in 2010 
after he was arrested on charges of having ordered a series of "encounter" 
killings by the State Police. 
 Currently on judicial bail, the Supreme Court 
has directed that he may not enter his home state of Gujarat where he may 
influence the investigations of the encounter killings. 

In Muzaffarnagar, they would all lament that it is the first time in the history 
of the region that Jats and Muslims have killed each other. They are 
culturally the same people and the Muley Jats are converts from the Hindu 
Jat community. For instance, both communities observe the custom of pagri 
rasam ritual which consecrates a new head of a family, lineage or clan. The 
worship of Goga Pir, a local saint is common among both communities, 
remembering of ancestors. In a recent incident when an Imam issued a 
Fatwa against the use of cell phones by Muslim women, the entire 
community got together and filed an FIR, thereby forcing the withdrawal of 
such a dictate. The community is primarily known as owner cultivators who 
also tend cattle and raise chicken farms. 
 The Jat-Muslim combination was first formed by Charan Singh, and was 
efficiently used to field Jat and Muslim candidates for a great win that 
catapulted him to become the Prime Minister of the country in 1979. The 
BSP in 2009 followed the same strategy and got encouraging results. For the 
BJP and Samajawadi party, the Jat-Muslim combination has become an 
obstacle for 2014 election strategy and had to be broken, thereby breaking 
the hold of BSP and Rashtriya Lok Dal of Ajit Singh. 

It was recounted that two Jat youths named Sachin and Gaurav Singh had 
first killed Mohammed Shahnawaz, a Muslim youth of the village of Kawal 
after a traffic incident. Later a Muslim mob lynched to death the killers. It 
looks like it was a perfect situation handed down on a silver platter to these 
political operatives to put together a racial based game plan to exploit and 
score for their party. 

The rest of the events are there for the record. For the BJP, it presented an 
opportunity to consolidate the Hindu vote overriding caste divisions in U.P. 
They went on an overdrive even directly involving Members of the 
Legislative Assemblies to aggravate the situation by inciting the rioters. 
FIRs are filed against 19 MLAs though only 3 were arrested and all of them 
were shortly released. 

For the Samajawadi party, adopting a slow response to the worsening 
situation in Muzaffarnagar was allegedly a calculated move as well. They 
were determined to break the supremacy of BSP in the region in order to add 
additional seats for SP President Mulayam Singh Yadav, who is also eyeing 
the post of Prime Minister in the upcoming election. 

Seema Mustafa, Director of Center for Policy Analysis does not mince 
words when naming the perpetrators behind the violence. ‟The BJP, RSS 
and VHP, supported by the Bharatiya Kisan Union (BKU), were behind the 
violence. Moreover, the Samajwadi Party government did not do anything to 
prevent or control the violence, nor did it rehabilitate the displaced‟. 

The BJP seems to have accomplished its goal by fracturing the Jat-Muslim 
combination and their support for the Lok Dal and BSP. The Samajawadi 
Party might be biggest loser in this whole affair as they have alienated 
Muslims who voted with them (40%) in the past. Jats who live not only in 
U.P. but also in Haryana and Rajasthan are indeed tilting towards BJP as the 
strategy of divisive politics is beginning to pay big dividends.  
To add insult to injury, those BJP MLAs who incited the community into 
violence are now rewarded with tickets to run for Parliament. That includes 
Mr. Sangeet Som who created a fake video which is blamed for much of the 
anger and frustrations by the Hindu mob that participated in the melee. 
Sadhvi Prachi, a BJP leader was also arrested for violation of prohibitory 
orders and inciting communal violence by speeches in meetings at Nagala 
Madore area of Muzaffarnagar is heralded as a great champion for the 
promoting the Hindutva agenda. 

If one looks back at the history, Babri Masjid demolition and subsequent 
riots were results of careful and intensive strategizing by the Hindutva 
leadership. The demolition of the ancient Mosque in 1992 is the one incident 
in India‟s social and political history that marks the climax of the politics of 
religious identity, and is the source from which caste identity politics 
originated and became powerful . There were 24 riots that happened last 
year alone and the the public might even have missed those reports. 

Soon after assuming responsibility for UP campaign, Amit Shah reportedly 
visited the Babri Masjid site and said the temple should be built there. 
Although he said it was not an election campaign issue, many observers 
made the connection as soon as the riots broke out, with minority affairs 
minister Rahman Khan telling India Today magazine that Shah had been 
sent expressly to stir up communal tension. „Any polarization along the 
religious lines would naturally help BJP‟ another observer pointed out. 

Riots seem to be engineered for political purposes and the BJP is mastering 
the art of creating communal tension for the sole purpose of political 
leverage or electoral gains. By driving citizens from their homes to refugee 
camps, these parties are in gross violation of their oath to safeguard the life 
and property of all citizens guaranteed by the constitution. 

Unless the leaders of India, especially from the secular parties show some 
courage to stand up to fundamentalism that may emanate from any quarters 
whether it is Hindu, Muslim, Sikh or Christian and stop exploiting religion 
and caste for vote bank politics, India‟s democracy is headed for serious 
trouble. 
 By: 
 3/24/2014 George Abraham, Chairman 
 Indian National Overseas Congress (I), USA  



 Babri-Masjid - 1992 



 Gujarat -2002 Kandhamal, Orissa -2008 Muzaffarnagar, U.P-2013 

No comments:

Post a Comment