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In the Hindutva Laboratory: Pogroms and Politics in Gujarat, 2002

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  19 August 2008

HOWARD SPODEK
HOWARD SPODEK*
Affiliation:
Department of History, Temple University, Philadelphia, PA, USA
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Abstract

Communal violence wracked the state of Gujarat and the city of Ahmedabad once again in 2002, leaving some 2,000 people dead. Because the ruling BJP party had proclaimed Gujarat the ‘Laboratory of Hindutva’, analysts throughout India saw the violence as BJP policy and debated its possible spillover effects elsewhere. This paper finds that in a period already marked by stressful economic and cultural change and attended by political uncertainty, some BJP leaders gambled that an attack on Gujarat's Muslims, and on the rule of law in general, would attract followers and voters. Their gamble proved correct at least in the short run. This paper examines the cultural, social, geographical and educational restructuring that is occurring, through legal and illegal struggles, and the impact of the violence upon these processes. It examines the declining status of Muslims as a result of continuous propaganda against them. It analyzes the degree to which the state was damaged as a result of the decision for violence and asks about the degree to which leaders do, or do not, wish to ‘put it behind them’, and suggests that Ahmedabad's problems are widely shared in both the developing and developed worlds.

Type
Research Article
Information
Modern Asian Studies , Volume 44 , Issue 2 , March 2010 , pp. 349 - 399
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2008

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References

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7 Praful Bidwai, “But Who Lit The Fire?” Frontline, 11 February 2005, XXII(3). http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2203/stories/20050211001909200.htm

8 Ibid.

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36 Engineer, p. 20.

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38 Ibid., p. 743.

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41 This common understanding of the ‘engineering’ of violence finds expression, more academically, in the extensive writing of political scientist Paul Brass. Brass explains further that after the violence is engineered, attempts are made by the engineers to disguise their work: ‘Their violent manifestations appear spontaneous, undirected, unplanned – and even the most carefully planned and well-organized assaults on the other community are designed to appear so. Since such riotous violence is illegitimate and the elements of preplanning in it are disguised, the struggle that takes place afterwards to explain it – that is, to control its interpretation – is crucial’. Paul Brass. The Production of Hindu-Muslim Violence in Contemporary India (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 2003), p. 14. For a similar analysis, see Steven I. Wilkinson. Votes and Violence: Electoral Competition and Ethnic Riots in India (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004).

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44 Ibid., pp. 17–18.

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53 Ibid.

54 India Today International, 15 October 2001.

55 Ibid.

56 India Today International, 29 April 2002.

57 Frankel, p. 752.

58 Cited in Frankel, p. 751.

59 Ibid., p. 754 from Times of India, 15 April 2002.

60 Ibid., from Times of India, 16 April 2002.

61 Financial Times, 12 April 2002, http://search.ft.com/nonFtArticle?id=020412009999

62 Order of the Election Commission of India No. 464/GJ-LA/2002, 16 August 2002, reprinted in Sondhi, M.L. and Mukarji, Apratim, eds. The Black Book of Gujarat (New Delhi: Manak Publications, 2002), pp. 448–449, full report, pp. 420–453Google Scholar.

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65 India Today International, 30 December 2002, p. 10.

66 Varadarajan, p. 23, cited from Asian Age, 7 June 2002.

67 Frankel, p. 760.

68 Ibid., p. 762.

69 Two years later, in the national elections of 2004, Mrs. Gandhi reversed direction and confronted Hindutva head-on with her own call for ‘all-inclusive, composite, pluralistic nationalism’. Frankel, p. 777.

70 India Today International, 30 December 2002, p. 33.

71 India Today International, 30 December 2002.

72 Ibid., p. 38.

73 The Congress may have done well in Saurashtra because of anger over Modi's displacement of Keshubhai Patel as chief minister. Saurashtra, and especially the Patel communities there, are Keshubhai's base. Modi is identified as an OBC (Other Backward Caste) from north Gujarat.

74 The third was 30 December 2002, captioned ‘Moditva and Beyond’.

75 Frankel, p. 764.

76 Political scientist Ashutosh Varshney reports that for the period 1950 to 1995 ‘The West Indian state of Gujarat, in fact, has the highest per capita rate of deaths in communal incidents, at around 117 per million of urban population’. Varshney, Ashutosh. Ethnic Conflict and Civic Life: Hindus and Muslims in India (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002), p. 97Google Scholar. The next highest is Bihar, far behind at 80, with Maharashtra third at 45. Within Gujarat, the cities of Ahmedabad and Vadodara account for 75% of the deaths. Ibid., p. 103.

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81 Reddy Commission Report, p. 228.

82 Spodek, “From Gandhi to Violence.”

83 Spodek, Howard, “Crises and Response: Ahmedabad 2000,” Economic and Political Weekly XXXVI, No. 19 (12 May 2001), 1627–1638Google Scholar.

84 Spodek, “Crises and Response.” Also, Howard Spodek. Ahmedabad: Shock City of Twentieth Century India (Forthcoming)

85 “The World Gujarati Conference, 2006,” a festival of Gujaratis held in New Jersey, in September 2006, attracted 30,000 participants. Others were turned away for lack of space. Gujarat Times (in Gujarati) (New York City), 15 September 2006.

86 Achyut Yagnik, a Gujarati political activist, journalist, and a highly respected political analyst explained Hindu militancy in Gujarat as an attempt to build a new sense of nationalism based on religion in a state perplexed by the speed and pervasiveness of social and economic changes. Yagnik saw the call for Hindutva – nationalist politics based on Hindu militance – as a search for stability and order. Yagnik regarded Hindutva as a mistaken and dangerous path, but to the political leadership of Gujarat it appeared successful, or at least electorally popular, at least in the short run. Nandy, Ashis, Trivedi, Shikha, Mayaram, Shail, and Yagnik, Achyut, eds. Creating a Nationality: The Ramjanmabhumi Movement and the Fear of the Self (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1997), pp. 100–123Google Scholar.

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88 Interviews with Ghanshyam Shah, Pravin Togadia, and others.

89 Personal interview with Pravin Togadia, 3 August 2006.

90 Nagindas Sanghavi, “In Free India: Only Politicians, No Statesmen; Only Netas, No Leaders,” http://www.liberalsindia.com/freedomfirst/ff456-06.html

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93 http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/msid-141847,prtpage-1.cms

94 Cited in Frankel, p. 760.

95 Togadia interview, 3 August 2006.

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97 Spodek, Howard, “From Gandhi to Violence: the 1985 Ahmedabad Riots in Historical Perspective,” Modern Asian Studies XXIII, No. 4 (October 1989), 765–795CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

98 Jaffrelot, p. 299.

99 Ibid., p. 302.

100 Ibid., p. 299.

101 Frankel, p. 743.

102 Times of India, 22 August 2003.

103 The usual term used for tribals in India today is ‘Adivasi’, original inhabitants, suggesting that they had inhabited the Indian subcontinent before the arrival of the Aryan peoples. The Sangh Parivar claims that the Aryans had always inhabited India and therefore refers to the tribals as ‘vanvasi’, or forest dwellers.

104 Shah, Ghanshyam, Under-Privileged and Communal Carnage: A Case of Gujarat (Amsterdam: Centre for Asian Studies Amsterdam; Amsterdam School for Social Science Research, 2004), p. 21Google Scholar.

105 ‘In the 1986 communal riots in Ahmedabad, which broke out during the Rath Yatra of Lord Jagannath, the impression was widespread that the Dalits and Muslims were killing each other’. Nandy et al., pp. 103–104.

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110 Engineer, “BJP's Riot-Free India,” in Engineer, p. 82.

111 Kancha Ilaiah, “The Rise of Modi,” The Hindu (online), 26 December 2002.

112 Ribeiro, Julio, “Lost Middle Ground: A Community Loses Hope in Gujarat” from Times of India, 23 April 2002, reprinted in Engineer, pp. 157–158Google Scholar.

113 Frankel, p. 753. The Prime Minister's Office released a transcript which read ‘Wherever such Muslims live . . . .’ Members of the audience reported that the word “such” did not appear in the speech, a videotape confirmed this, and later, under questioning in Parliament, the prime minister admitted this. The Hindu, 17 May 2002, cited in Varadarajan, p. 26

114 Seshadri Chari, guest column in India Today International, 30 December 2002.

115 See for example Modi's introductory letter of commendation to Manohar Lal Batham. Aatankvaad: Padakar ane Sangharsh [Terrorism: Challenge and Response] (Ahmedabad: Gurjar Grantha Ratna Karyalay, 2005). Also see Sheth, Pravin. Aatankvad: Padkar, Pratikar, ane Parivartan [Terrorism: Challenge, Resistance, and Revolution] (Jersey City, NJ: Gujarat Foundation, 2003)Google Scholar. In revised form, this book has been published with co-author Parekh, Bhikhu, in English, as Global Terrorism: Melting Borders, Hardened Walls (Jaipur: Rawat Publications, 2005)Google Scholar.

116 Spodek, Howard, “Crises and Response: Ahmedabad 2000,” Economic and Political Weekly XXXVI, No.19 (12 May 2001), 1627–1638Google Scholar. Journalist Dionne Bunsha notes that bootlegging was also politicized. She cites a local police officer: ‘After the BJP government came, Hindu bootleggers have become more powerful than the Muslim ones’, he said. Frontline, Dionne Bunsha, “Riding the Hate Wave.”

117 Times of India, 8 August 2006.

118 Cf. the pronouncement of Hareshbhai Bhatt, vice-president of the Bajrang Dal in Bunsha, p. 31.

119 Times of India, “Amdavadis Turn to Walls, Iron Gates to Replace Trust,” 30 May 2002.

120 Personal experience. See also Rubina Jasani, ‘“Sarkar nadi ke us-par rehne wale logon ke liye hay” (The State exists for the people living on the other side of the river) - Violence and Minority Citizenship in Ahmedabad’ (unpublished paper for Gujarat Studies Association, Great Britain) and Rubina Jasani, ‘Violence, Re-construction and Islamic Reform: Stories from the Muslim ‘Ghetto’.” Modern Asian Studies (2008) XLII(2-3), pp. 431–456, delivered at South Asian Anthropologists’ Group Meeting, Goldsmith's College, London), The Future for South Asia: Revolution? Disaster? 3–4 July 2006. Robinson, Rowena notes that similar terminology is widely used in other areas of India as well. Robinson. Tremors of Violence: Muslim Survivors of Ethnic Strife in Western India (New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2005)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

121 Valjibhai Patel, interview with Yogi Sikand, 15 November 2005. http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=9126.

122 Robinson. Tremors, pp. 54–55, and personal interviews.

123 Varadarajan, p. 23 cited from Asian Age, 7 June 2002.

124 Hanif Lakdawala head of Sanchetna, an NGO-based in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, working primarily with Muslims and Dalits, interviewed by Yogi Sikand, 15 November 2005. http://www.zmag.org/content/showarticle.cfm?ItemID=9123

125 Bidwai, Praful, “Combatting Muslim Exclusion,” Frontline, 1 December 2006, p. 106Google Scholar, summarizing key findings of the report. http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2323/stories/20061201003910600.htm

126 Lal, Vinay. The History of History: Politics and Scholarship in Modern India (New York: Oxford University Press, 2003)Google Scholar presents a useful account of this rewriting of history. Many prominent historians have addressed the issue in numerous books and in articles for both scholarly and more general audiences. See, for example, writings by Bipan Chandra, K.N. Panikkar, Sumit Sarkar, and Romila Thappar.

127 Engineer, p. 297. See also Davis, Richard H., “The Cultural Background of Hindutva,” in Ayres, Alyssa and Oldenburg, Philip, eds. India Briefing: Takeoff at Last? (Armonk, NY: M.E. Sharpe, 2005), pp. 107–139Google Scholar.

128 Engineer, p. 203.

129 Cited in Times of India, 30 September 2004. http://timesofIndia.indiatimes.com/articlesshow/msid-868469,\prtpage-1.cms

130 Times of India, 15 June 2006.

131 The Greater Common Good (Ahmedabad: Mahatma Gandhi Labour Institute, n.d.).

132 Interviews with the authors.

133 (Bombay: India Book Distributors, 1999). This essay was subsequently re-published as an essay in a larger volume, Arundhati Roy. The Cost of Living (New York: Modern Library, 1999).

134 See IPI Global Journalist Online http://www.globaljournalist.org/archive/Magazine/Rhyme-19994q.html. Also personal observation of the disappearance of the book from the bookstore and conversation with the bookstore owner.

135 Dionne Bunsha, “Heights of Intolerance.” Frontline, 16 June 2006. http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2311/stories/200606163110800.htm

136 Ibid.

137 Times of India, 26 January 2007.

138 Dionne Bunsha, “Organised Intolerance,” Frontline, 26 March 2004. http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2106/stories/20040326004301700.htm

139 Times of India, 17 June 2006.

140 Dionne Bunsha, “A seriel Kidnapper and his ‘mission’” Frontline, 29 December 2006. http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2325/stories/20061229001810100.htm

141 In response to the Vice Chancellor's actions, the highly respected civil-rights activist Achyut Yagnik said, ‘In most universities Vice Chancellors are with the RSS. They are political appointees and try to be more loyal than the king. There is intellectual poverty here’. Frontline, 1 June 2007. http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2410/stories/20070601004903000.htm

142 Anupama Katakam, “Communalism: Attack on Art,” Frontline, 1 June 2007. http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2410/stories/20070601003902600.htm

143 Robinson, p. 140.

144 Times of India, 23 June 2006.

145 See, for example, Indian Express, 14, 15, 16 September and 8 October 2005; Times of India, 22 September and 8, 9, 10, 13, 21 October 2005 all Ahmedabad editions. Nationally, the Hindu, 8, 17 October; Hindustan Times, 8 October; Asian Age, 8 October. The two page Frontline article, 18 November 2005, Dionne Bunsha, “A Spat in Gujarat,” http://www.flonnet.com/fl2223/stories/20051118002604800.htm presented with facing pictures of Bhatt and Modi, summarizes the issues very well. SEWA's website carries updated reports of newspaper accounts of the dispute and reports of its auditors, for example, “SEWA's Ongoing Struggle: Independent Audit: ‘Clean Chit to SEWA,’” www.sewa.org. Similarly, the Government of Gujarat website carried its version under reports on rural development, but more recently, the website's listing for Jeevika states simply, “The project has been closed.” http://www.ruraldev.gujarat.gov.in/jeevika.html

146 The Hindu (online), 17 October 2005.

147 Quoted in Joanne Omang, “Women's Union in India Buttles state charges,” in Women's e News, Jun 22, 2006. http://www.womensenews.org/article.cfm/dyn/aid/2610/context/archive

148 Government of Gujarat. Note on Jeevika Project. This note was posted on GoG website, removed after the Jeevika project was closed.

149 Interviews with several leaders of SEWA.

150 Times of India, 16 June 2006.

151 The Hindu (online), 27 October 2002. http://www.hinduonnet.com/thehindu/mag/2002/10/27/stories/2002102700240400.htm

152 Translation is by Jayant Joshi, the playwright's father. As yet, neither the play nor the translation has been published.

153 http://www.hindu.com/2005/10/16/stories/2005101605480800.htm

154 Times of India, 1 July 2006.

155 Ibid.

156 Dionne Bunsha, “Probe or Persecution.” in Frontline, 23 May 2003, XX(10). http://www/frontlineonnet.com/fl2010/stories/20030523003403900.htm

157 Praveen Swami, “A circle of Hute,” Frontline, 11–24 October 2003, XX(21). http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2021/stories/20031024002705500.htm

158 Ibid.

159 The Hindu (online), 10 January 2006.

160 Times of India, 15 July 2006.

161 Times of India, 2 August 2006.

162 The Hindu (online), 29 January 2007.

163 Annual Report of the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom, p. 37. http://www.uscirf.gov/countries/publications/currentreport/2002report.pdf

164 Ibid.

165 Noorani, A.G., “Modi and His Visa,” Frontline, 09–22 April 2005, XXII(8), pp. 47–50Google Scholar. http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2208/stories/20050422000704700.htm

166 Hasan Suroor, “A Diplometic No,” Frontline, 09–22 April 2005, XXII(8) p. 51. http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2208/stories/20050422000705100.htm

167 Dionne Bunsha, “Taking on Modi,” Frontline, 15–28 July 2006, XXIII(14). http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2314/stories/20060728002803400.htm

168 Editorial, “Narendra Modi as Super Scapegoat,” The Hindu, 31 May 2004 http://www.thehindu.com/2004/05/31/stories/2004053101591000.htm

169 http://timesofIndia.indiatimes.com/articlesshow/674008.cms

170 Times of India, 15 September 2003, cited in Robinson, p. 226.

171 The Hindu (online), 16 October 2005, http://www.hindu.com/2005/10/16/stories/2005101605480800.htm

172 Times of India, 21 July 2006.

173 Times of India, 21 July 2006. Also http://property.magicbricks.com/news_tracker/ahmedabad.html

174 Interview with the Chief Minister, 17 August 2006. Questions about 2002 were designated as out-of-bounds. For a similar interview and similar responses, compare Jo Johnson, “Radical Thinking,” Financial Times, 30 March 2007. http://www.ft.com/cms/s/24b366ca-dcc9-11db-a21d-000b5df10621.html

175 http://www.financialexpress.com/fe_full_story.php?content_id=151684

176 http://www.thehindubusinessline.com/2006/12/23/stories/2006122302891900.htm. The business community of Ahmedabad was one of Modi's staunchest advocates. In February 2003, when national leaders of the Confederation of Indian Industries publicly criticized Modi and Gujarat, a group of leading Gujarati industrialists objected so strongly that CII Director General Tarun Das flew to Gandhinagar on 6 March and apologized on behalf of his organization. Times of India, 7 March 2003.

177 Times of India, 1 August 2006 and 14 August 2006.

178 Personal interview, 21 August 2006. On the fifth anniversary of the Godhra conflagration, Patel told the Reuters news service, “Gujarat today is about good governance, pro-active bureaucracy, solid infrastructure.” http://in.today.reuters.com/news/newsArticle.aspx?type=topNews&storyID=2007–2-27T105047Z_01_NOOTR_RTRJONC_0_India-289315-1.xml

179 Interview with Pankaj Patel, 21 August 2006.

180 Shakeel Akhtar, “Old Scars Yet to Heal in Gujarat,” BBC News online, 26 February 2007 http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/6396223.stm

181 E-mail communications from Bimal Patel (10 March 2007) and Hanif Lakdawala (9 April, 11 April, 2007).

182 E-mail communication, 9 April 2007.

183 Akhtar.

184 Report on Social, Economic and Educational Status of the Muslim Community of India, Rajinder Sachar, chair, New Delhi, November 2006.

185 Dionne Bunsha, “Modi's Mandate” Frontline, 05–18 January 2008, XXV(01). http://www.frontlineonnet.com/fl2501/stories/20080118509812400.htm

186 Jaffrelot, Christophe, “Gujarat: The Meaning of Modi's Victory,” Economic and Political Weekly, XLIII (15), 12–18 April 2008, 12–17Google Scholar.