Book Review: Communal Violence, Forced Migration and the State: Gujarat since 2002

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Book Review, Communal Violence, Displacement, Forced Migration, Gujarat 2002, IDPs, Sanjeevini Badigar Lokhande

Displacement and migration constitute what might be called a traumatic experience for many as they lead to uprooting one from one’s base. But if this happens due to some large scale violence, which has a communal and a caste overtone, it makes the situation worse. It doubly marginalises the victims.  Till recently, it was the violence in Muzzaffarnagar that had become such a distressing story. According to a conservative estimate, more than 41,000 Muslims were rendered homeless, with most of them never being able to return to their village and having to live the life of a destitute. Gujarat (2002) was another example of a communal violence which had led to the displacement of a large number of people, as more than 2 lakhs were displaced within the first two years itself. Those who had to flee their homes had to settle down in houses on rent in Muslim concentrated villages and towns.  As per a status report (2012) published by the Ahmedabad based NGO, Janvikas, 16,087 of them continue to live in 83 relief colonies built by faith based (Muslim/Islamic) organizations and NGOs.

The book under review deals with this subject up to some extent. Taking cue from the much talked about and equally criticised category of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) of the United Nations (introduced in 1998), the author examines violence in Gujarat since 2002. She argues that “displacement (in Gujarat) is not only symptomatic of the state being taken over by a majoritarian vision of the nation in which the minorities may be threatened, but that in our globalised times it entails a shift in the very idea of the state in terms of what can be rightly expected of it and the source of its legitimacy.” The author of the book currently teaches at the Department of Civics and Politics, University of Mumbai, and according to her, this work of hers is a result of almost nine years of research that had begun with a thesis at Jawaharlal Nehru University (JNU).

Book: Communal Violence, Forced Migration and the State: Gujarat since 2002

By Sanjeevini Badigar Lokhande

Cambridge University Press, Delhi, 2015, Hardbound

pp. XI+ 216, Price: Not Mentioned, ISBN-10: 1107065445

Apart from the introduction, the book is divided into five chapters. These reflect the meticulous research undertaken by the author of using ethnographic data, government documents, archival materials, NGOs and media reports, and shows how over the years, people who were displaced during the anti-Muslim Gujarat violence of 2002 have been to reduced to the status of subjects from once being citizens, and how it is now affecting their lives. Presenting a brief history of communal violence induced displacement, the author notes that it is not entirely without precedent in Gujarat. “The displacement of thousands of Muslims due to the violence in 1969, which the camps bore testimony to, also meant a loss of livelihood and even the means of livelihood for thousands as those who had been rendered homeless had lost all their possession that included their tools, instruments and other means of livelihood,” notes Lokhande. (p. 113)

She further notes that, “The examination of the governance of communal violence through state responses in the many instances of communal riots in Gujarat reveal that while the scale of relief offered in different categories of assistance for the victims of communal violence was increased howsoever variably, the categories of assistance remained the same, even in the case of latest relief package offered by the UPA in 2007.”

In the author’s opinion, “the state government scrupulously avoided the term displacement or IDPs, referring to it as migration which suggests that the movement was voluntary and under compulsion.” Hence, these victims are not entitled to the benefits suggested under the United Nation’s guides for Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). “These illustrate,” notes Lokhande “the state’s absence in the complex problem of displacement where a large number of people did not want to return to what was once their home because it had become a place of vulnerability that was exposed during the violence and in some instances, a site where crimes had occurred that after the violence held the probability of legal action and led to continued tension in neighborhoods”. (p.128-12)

In the second last chapter of the book titled Reconstruction And Rights Though Self-Help, the author rightly concludes that, “From (the) account of reconstruction after the violence in 2002 it is not just the long term effects of displacement that are illustrated, but also that the phenomena of displacement is not a ‘one time set of events’ bounded in time and space but continue long after violence as those affected negotiate the uncertainties in their changed realities. In Gujarat these negotiations have included the assertion of their rights through recourse to litigation and self-help for security, housing and social rights as well as through different forms of settlements or compromise to avoid conflict. These shifts gleaned from ground analysis reflect changes in the larger political universe that further need to be unpacked.” (p. 157)

This book is important in its perspective on displacement and communal violence. However, while one appreciates the author’s attempts at taking up a relatively untouched theme, there has been an attempt at trying to touch and cover almost everything, which makes the book slightly monotonous and uninteresting. One also feels that it could have been better and substantial had the author tried limiting it, and rather focusing it on the core subject (of forced migration) as the book starts with promises of examining the issue of forced migration in detail but gets lost in detailing the different aspects of the violence of 2002.

For someone who has been following the issue for some time, it might appear to be a bit repetitive and offer nothing new except for the intense detailing of the different aspects of 2002. However the book will be an interesting read for those who are new to the subject and are looking for a guide on it.

First published in The Book Review Journal, August 2016.

 

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Of Owaisi and Togadias: A Case of Hate Speech in India

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Gujarat 2002, Hate Speech, Muzaffarnagar Riots, Praveen Togadia, Togadia_Owaisi Akbaruddin Owaisi

Praveen Bhai Togadia, the International working President of Vishwa Hindu Prashid (VHP) did it again. On Saturday (19^th July 2014),he reportedly said, “Aap Gujarat bhul gaye honge, par aapko Muzaffarnagar yaad hoga.” He said it in Indore (Madhya Pradesh) while addressing a press conference about the World Hindu Congress Summit scheduled to be held in New Delhi in November this year.  “If you set Hanuman’s tail on fire, Lanka will burn. The Godhra incident led to the Gujarat riots, and the alleged rape of a Hindu girl led to the Muzaffarnagar riots,” he added.

Now the question is, will he be arrested like Akbaruddin Owaisi was last year for his alleged hate speech, or enjoy impunity as he and all the leaders of Hindutva brigade do? Given its renewed relevance, reproducing here an old article of mine, which first appeared in Kafila.org on 9th January 2013.   

Akbaruddin Owaisi, an MLA of Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly, who belongs to a Hyderabad-based political party All India Majlis-e-Ittihad al-Muslimin, better known as MIM, and its floor leader in the Assembly made an inflammatory speech against Hindus on 24 December 2012 at a public meeting in Adilabad District. The speech attracted widespread condemnation by Muslim activists, rightly so, apart from left, liberal individuals and organizations. Dr. Zafarul Islam Khan, President, All India Muslim Majlis e Mushawarat (AIMMM), an umbrella body of prominent Indian Muslim organizations termed it ‘a hate and rash speech’ arguing, ‘words that should never have been uttered by a responsible person, let alone a political leader, were used’.

Shabnam Hashmi, a prominent social activist and who has been relentlessly working on the issue of minority rights registered an FIR in Delhi against Owaisi stating, ‘the whole speech is highly objectionable, inflammatory and against the values of our constitution, democracy and secular values’. Similarly, FIRs were also registered in the State invoking section 295 A (for deliberate and malicious acts intended to outrage religious feelings) and 153 A (promoting enmity between different groups) of Indian Penal Code (IPC). Owaisi was arrested finally arrested on Tuesday (8th January) and sent to 14-day judicial custody.

However, there was a small section of Muslims, mostly individuals, who held this as an illustration of the ‘double standards of civil society and state machinery’. The crux of their argument was, that while governments take speedy actions and act in a haste in the cases where Muslims are involved even in petty crimes, criminals belonging to the majority community roam free despite being involved in all sorts of serious crimes such as communal carnage, mass murders, looting and rapes, let alone the cases of hate speech. While on the surface, these allegations might appear as a desperate attempt to defend communalists belonging to the Muslim community – and indeed some of them may be—the fact is that these claims are not that far removed from reality.

Sample this. Praveen Togadia, Vishwa Hindu Parishad’s (VHP) international working President, during his recent visit to Hyderabad in December last year, made an equally inflammatory and communal speech while addressing a press conference in the city. The VHP president at the press conference on the issue of controversial Bhagya Lakshmi Mandir- Charminar threatened Muslims by saying that ‘VHP will convert Hyderabad into Ayodhya if Hindus are not allowed to perform Puja’. The simple fact is that Hindus have never been stopped from performing Puja. He further thundered the VHP would teach Muslims of Hyderabad a lesson that they would never forget. Following this, a few cases have been registered against him but the government is yet to act. It is well known of course that this is not the first time when he has made such a speech. In fact, several such cases are pending against Togadia, not only in Hyderabad but in different parts of the country; and the police and the governments have never acted against him.

And Togadia is not a solitary soldier: there is a veritable contingent of Togadias whose prime work is hate mongering and inciting violence, especially in situations where there are higher chances of communal disturbance and violence. It has become almost a routine for these forces to fuel violence in name of protecting their religion, religious tenets and identity or interests of their fellow religionists and people. Ashok Singhal, Adityanath Yogi, Uma Bharti, Sadhvi Ritambhara and Raj/Udhav Thackeray to name a few. What is strange, though often understood, that they draw their supports from political parties of all hues. While certified communal political parties like BJP and Shiv Sena lent them open support, self- appointed secular parties like Congress and Samajwadi Party would never bother to book them according to the law of the land despite ample evidence being available. Hence, these cases of selective action only prove that our governments utilize double standards for crimes of similar nature, for criminals belonging to minority and majority communities. Varun Gandhi is the sole exception, and there are indications already that the UP government may go slow on him, after he submitted an application for quashing of the case against him.

It was interesting also to see how the Owaisi saga played out in the electronic media. Watching these programmes, one would think that Owaisi was the originator of hate speech in India, and not simply one among the many who blight public discourse through their venom. TV anchors after anchor summoned ‘Muslim’ politicians from a range of political parties daring them to condemn Owaisi. Would the Congress Party spokesperson be ever asked to condemn Togadia – or Rithambara or Uma –as a Hindu or as someone opposed to their politics or ideology?  Why then this rush to seek declarations from Muslim politicians as Muslims? Coming just months after all TV channels were paying obeisance to Bal Thackeray, whose political career was built on hate and its articulation, the self-righteousness of the various channel heads is only amusing.

So now that Owaisi is thankfully arrested, the larger question is: what about Singhals, Yogis, Bhartis and Thackerays? Will they ever be arrested and sent to jail like Owaisi for their umpteen numbers of crimes? This must be answered; at least to show that we as a constitutionally declared secular country – considered to be the world’s largest democracy – do not practice two different sets of rules for majority and minority. Remember, mere lip service like in the past would not work this time as it would only further the argument of the State practicing double standards.

Is anyone listening?

Also read: Why ‘Police Can’t Arrest Togadia’

Being Muslim and Working for Peace

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Biblio Magazine, Book Review, Gujarat 2002, Muslim Activist, Muslim Women, Raphael Susewind

A Review of Being Muslim and Working for Peace: Ambivalence and Ambiguity in Gujarat

The place of Gujarat 2002 in the history of communal violence in India in general and anti-Muslim violence in particular, will be ‘special’ in many ways. While the scale of violence was massive and the role of the State and its various agencies partisan, the response by civil society groups and media was extraordinary. Much has been written about this in the last ten years, both in academic as well as in journalistic circles. However, there was one more thing which was distinctive, in fact, quite remarkably so, from the earlier incidents of violence. This was the response of the victim community, Muslim in this case, both in individual as well organisational capacities. This time, the community worked, what can be called “beyond the celebration of victimhood”. The community, learning from previous incidents of communal violence, especially Mumbai (1992-93) worked hard not only to ensure the immediate concern of relief but is still working steadfast for the proper implementation of rehabilitation policies and above all to guarantee that the perpetrators of the violence should not go unpunished. How this happened and what encouraged them to do so, is an area that has not been explored in any length.  

Being Muslim and Working for Peace is an important initiative in this regard. It is a detailed study of a set of such Muslim activists who have been involved in this process. In doing so, Raphael Susewind employs the typology: “being Muslim and working for peace”. According to Susewind, it is “a micro-level exploration of 21 personal struggles with the ambivalence of the sacred in the quest of justice, reconciliation and peace” (p 9). He says: I wanted to understand the various ways in which spiritual beliefs, religious practices and dynamics of belonging influence Muslims who work for peace—and to see how their activism in turn shapes these dimensions of their religious identities. … I wanted to turn away from violence—not to deny or negate its terrible consequences, but as a strategic intervention to counter a biased discourse on Islam, Muslims and religion in politics more broadly.  (p 7) The study, in a sense is a sequel to Dipankar Gupata’s work, Justice before Reconciliation: Negotiating a ‘New Normal’ in Post-riot Mumbai and Ahmedabad (Routledge, 2011), where the role of the Faith-Based Organisations (FBOs) in providing resources for relief, repair, and rehabilitation — and in some cases campaign for justice was examined for the first time. Like Gupta’s work, this study also breaks many stereotypes about Muslims.

Rather than striking a balance, Susewind deliberately attempts to present arguments before the development practitioners and fellow scholars, which may challenge their core understanding and goes much beyond popular notions prevalent in the civil society as well as academia. Towards the end of his introductory chapter, Susewind notes, “I fear that well-meaning civil society activists unintentionally are in the process of tapping into the same fallacy by imagining a ‘Muslim community’, distinct from their own circles, ‘isolationist and secretive’, ‘out there’ and in the dire need of leadership. Surely, theirs is a vision of reaching out and supporting this imagined community rather than defeating it, yet they still miss the fact that Muslim activists are not just ‘out there’, but actually exist amidst themselves. They reinforce boundaries, even if they do so in order to bridge them later on.” (p 26)

Divided in to seven chapters, Chapter 3 to 6 are the core of the book, where Susewind presents the empirical data from his extensive fieldwork. He presents to us four different, and interesting, categories of Muslim activists, often quite contrary to each other, namely ‘Faith based Actors’, ‘Secular Technocrats’, ‘Emancipating Women’ and ‘Doubting Professionals’. This book is also a departure from Gupta’s work, because unlike Gupta it examines the role of individuals and explains ‘why individuals matter’ at length in the second chapter. Susewind argues, in order to “highlight the diverse conditions and consequences of the identity formation without denying that actors themselves experience their being and belonging as essentialist force,” micro-level study is very important, hence individual matter.

He further argues, “Only on the micro-level can one therefore truly appreciate the diversity that automatically flows from individual freedom”(p 30). In the next chapter, where he deals with issues like, natures of peace activism, orthodoxy, faith-based activism, religious fundamentalism and its relationship with faith-based actors using both theoretical concepts about it and field view, he opines that, “the line between committed faith based actors and fundamentalist is admittedly a thin one, but it exists”.

This is a very important distinction, which is often forgotten or ignored in an attempt to counter or expose the competitive communalism and fundamentalism of the minority group. Susewind’s engagement with Muslims is therefore incredibly nuanced — going beyond the stereotypical representation of violent terrorists that saturate our public discourse, but more importantly, even overcoming the stereotypical portrayal of Muslims in academic tracts and NGO reports as backward, deeply religious and lacking agency.

Activists categorised under ‘Emancipating women’ are perhaps the most interesting and unique set of actors in this study. They essentially began their journey of peace activism as victims of the violence of 2002, but now comprise the most vibrant lot of peace activists. Unlike Faith based Actors and Secular Technocrats, the stories of emancipating women are very much personal narratives. Also, theirs is an ongoing story of regaining agency, and a story of continuous experimentation and change.  “This dynamic transformation from victim to activist,” Susewind argues, “is the main rationale for me to call these women ‘emancipating” (p 81). He further notes, “The metamorphosis from victim to activist not only compelled emancipating women to work for peace, however—it also deeply challenged their religious identities, both in terms of belief and practices and in terms of belonging to other Muslims. The complex dialectic of religious identities and political agency experienced by emancipating women is remarkably similar stories…They were torn apart—and yet remained determined on their path of personal emancipation and political transformation.” (p 86)

This work is not only a welcome and important addition to the available literature on communal violence and conflict in general and Gujarat in particular but it also serves a fresh perspective to look at issues related to conflict, violence, religion, peace and to some extent, gender. Though based on a small sample size, the study ably demonstrates the various ways in which spiritual beliefs, religious practices and dynamics of belonging influence Muslims who work for peace and how their activism in turn shapes these dimensions of their religious identities. It also give us hope, as one can see that despite all the repression and unfavourable circumstances people on the ground continue fighting for justice and peace. And it is heartening to note that ordinary Muslim women are taking the lead on the ground level. Susewind rightly concludes: “If there is one key lesson to be learned from the activists presented in this book, it is that we should strive to hold open the spaces of liberty for individual agency and processes of sometimes surprising change.”

The book also points out various issues of research, which need to be carried out in the near future, in order to substantiate these arguments in a better way and on a wider scale. One hopes to see more such studies in the coming years, especially comparative studies. Being Muslim and Working for Peace is a must-read for all those working on the issues of conflict, peace, development, justice and religion, no matter as activist, professional, researcher, academician or policy maker.

Reprinted from Biblio: A Review of Books Magazine, March-April 2014