Politics of violence
Shubhshil Desraj

Scarred: Experiments With Violence In Gujarat
by Dionne Bunsha. Penguin Books.
Pages 307. Rs 295.

On February 27, 2002, the Godhra incident took place. The next day, during a bandh called by the VHP, riots broke out and mobs supported by the VHP and the Bajrang Dal attacked members of the minority community in 20 out of 26 districts of Gujarat. The riots continued for three months and 1,000 people were killed.

Narendra Modi’s own ministerial colleague told a tribunal of retired judges that Modi’s only motive for encouraging "`85 religious polarisation was to win the elections. Godhra provided the opportunity. There were plans to use other triggers ... but Godhra made it unnecessary". Modi’s strategy of hate and violence was a great success. The BJP decisively won the state elections in December, 2002, with 126 of 181 seats in the General Assembly improving its previous score of 117 seats in 1998.

The book is an exceedingly lucid and comprehensive study that gives a painful, tragic account of the Gujarat riots. Very carefully, the author, Dionne Bunsha, examines the broad range of issues on the political, social and personal levels, giving their origin, growth and their present magnitude in the state. For example, the first communal riot erupted in 1714 when some hooligans threw gulal on a Muslim walking down the street. Thereafter, some more incidents took place. The British hammered a wider wedge between the Muslims and the Hindus following their policy of divide and rule. Subsequently, communal riots have erupted with more frequency, greater violence, coloured by the harsh temperament of the times.

The 2002 riots witnessed heightened communal tension, inter-religious disorder and violence, which raged with naked hatred. Major responsibility for brutality and savagery is attributed to the Bajrang Dal, which indulged in atrocities with complete disregard for the law—they were assured the law was on their side.

In a terrifying, systematic manner, the author explains how convictions undergo a violent change from established traditions and customs when communal fires are fanned by rumours and propaganda. The Muslims faced injustice—their pain, terror, frustrations and their tormenting humiliations heaped on them by a brutal society and despotic judicial system, come out in the book. The administrative machinery must bear the shame of having been not only a passive onlooker, but also a ready instrument to the atrocities committed in the state.

In her post-script, Dionne Bunsha sounds a note of hope. The public outcry against the travesty of justice in Gujarat has made the Supreme Court order the re-opening of many

cases. Hopefully, the guilty will be punished and the victims rehabilitated satisfactorily.

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