Though more than four months have passed since communal riots hit Muzaffarnagar yet it is hitting headlines for one reason or another. This time it is in news for the state government’s arbitrary order to get all the relief camps evicted at any rate. Subsequently, televisions and newspapers were abuzz with the images of bulldozed camps. Now there is no camp left in the area and the homeless people are forced to live under bare sky in this biting cold where the mercury usually comes down to 3-6 degree Celsius at night. The people of evicted camps are camping at Neem Kheri Bus Stand and nearby areas. This is what the government is calling rehabilitation. The move has earned the Government of Uttar Pradesh a nationwide fury and anger.
Ask Mumtaz Alam who edits an online news portal, Indiatomorrow.net, as to what made the state government take such a decision and pat comes the reply, “There are two basic reasons. First, the issue was getting more politicised especially after recent visits of Lalu Parsad, Rahul Gandhi, Mohd Adeeb and other political leaders. And second, there were several deaths reported during winter which speaks volumes about the failure of UP government to protect the riot victims.”
The government has justified its actions, saying that the riot victims were occupying and encroaching upon the government lands illegally. Then why the camps on Eidgah land were evicted or rather ‘excavated’ poses a question. Obviously, the government’s move has earned heavy furore from every section, but everyone will forget about it in days to come. The UP government does not want to give political parties a standing issue before elections and that is why it took such an irresponsible decision.
Farah Naqvi, member National Advisory Council, writes in her article (The Hindu, January 2), “They (the administration) dug large pits where the tent had stood, making sure it could never be re-pitched.” She termed the act of government as “nothing less than an act of unconscionable State terror.”
Those returned from Muzaffarnagar say that the situation over there is worse than how it looks like and another similar or more intensified riot might erupt anytime. When this scribe approached Afroz Alam Sahil, an RTI activist and Editor (Investigation) of the news portal Beyond Headlines, he showed an image on his mobile which was in fact a poster pasted at several places in the affected areas. The poster carried a quotation “Hum Do Hamare Bees” (We Two; Our Twenty) and was released by some extremist groups.
The communal uprisings in Muzaffarnagar were no doubt a politically motivated move and those who are behind this game will never miss any chance to en-cash it. The forces that had divided the Indian citizens on communal lines in Gujarat in 2002 are hell bent to create the same scene in other places so as to get their petty political gains served. They are leaving no stone unturned to get the country polarised on communal lines before the upcoming parliamentary elections in 2014 and these are some tools for the same. It is to be noted that the BJP’s success in Gujarat relies 90 per cent on polarisation and only 10 per cent on other development work. If you analyse the Gujarat carnage, you will find a sudden growth in vote per cent of the BJP soon after the riots (for details refer to research article of Raheel Dhattiwala published in the American journal, Politics and Society). And they are working on the same methodology here. Do remember that the majority has always an upper hand whenever there is polarisation.
What happened in Muzaffarnagar is one of the worst examples of communal disharmony in post- independence era of the country. And what is more than worst is the way the Government of Uttar Pradesh treated the riot victims. This was the first time in Indian history that a government, instead of providing shelter for the riot victims, has pushed them out of relief camps in the name of rehabilitating them. “You cannot push the victims out of relief camps in the name of rehabilitating them. People are in fear. The government should have taken steps to form “Gram Shanti Samiti” and other such groups for the safe return of the victims,” says Shafi Madani who is in-charge of Relief and Rehabilitation work of Jamaat-e-Islami Hind in the riot-hit areas of Muzaffarnagar.
He added that only 11 villages were literally affected during the uprising but the heat was felt in as many as 132 villages. The people from other 121 villages had fled out of possible fear.
Mr Madani visited 8 out of total 11 affected villages in addition to other villages where the people fled from. He says that the matter in those villages is not as grave as is presented by media. He said, further elaborating his claim, that he along with some others visited Kheri Patti village which was one of the worst affected and was taken aback to know that there were still two Muslim families residing in the village safe and sound. He met there one Manoj Daya Ram who claimed that he had prayed (Vinti Kiya) to Muslims not to leave the village and provided shelter for them for two consecutive nights and one day in his own house. But then, the police came and took them to the relief camp and they did not lend an ear to “my Vinti”. Mr. Madani claimed that similar is the case with many other villages as well.
But Muslims are in fear, grave fear. They do not want to return to their villages at any rate. They prefer to get a home in Muslim ghettos. Consequently, communal forces are succeeding in their plans to displace and segregate Muslims in a corner. At this juncture Muslims need to collect some will power and return to their ancestral villages without fear and foil the plans of fascist forces.
Mr. Madani whose Islami Relief Committee had given a silver lining during Gujarat carnage, gives an example of Pandarwada village in Gujarat and says that there were 29 persons killed in the village which was home to only 110 families. The IRC helped the victims lodge FIR against 40 people and also helped them return to the village. Now, the situation in the village is that those who are named in the FIR found themselves in a position to protect the victims as any attack on the victims would be added to their account. The Muzaffarnagar riots can hardly be equated with Gujarat carnage. What is needed here is to show strong will power and to return home. Building ghettos and segregating in between four walls after each communal riot is not a remedy at all.
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