FILLING IN AN INFORMATION GAP
The Hindutva terror groups linked with a series of bomb blasts in Muslim shrines and other places Rajasthan and Maharashtra terror have also killed Christian activists and targeted evangelistic work in the tribal belt of India.
Police investigators have traced the murder of Malwa Christian leader Pyar Singh Ninama to hit men of the terror gangs responsible for bombing the world famous Ajmer Sharif shrine.
According to news reports this morning in the New Delhi edition of Mail Today and Rediff, the Malwa region in western Madhya Pradesh is a focal point and recruiting ground of this terror group which also has as its members retired and serving officers of the Indian Army, who may have sourced the explosives used by the group.
This is the first time official information has come about the network which so far was presumed to be working against Muslims alone.
The following is the text of the Rediff illuminating report: published July 12, 2010:
Most names figuring in the investigations of the 2007 bomb blasts in Ajmer, at Hyderabad's Mecca Masjid, and in Malegaon hail from Madhya Pradesh's Malwa region. Rediff.com's Krishnakumar Padmanabhan traces the common thread that could have brought these men together.
What started as minor skirmishes between two groups vying for power seven years ago in a small Madhya Pradesh cantonment town was the beginning of the phenomenon that is now spoken about as Hindu terrorism.
Recently, the Central Bureau of Investigation and the Rajasthan Anti-Terror Squad made a string of arrests from in and around Indore and established that the 2007 bomb blasts in Ajmer and Hyderabad's Mecca Masjid were the handiwork of the same group of people.
At least three of the accused in the bomb blast case were charged with the murder of a tribal leader from the Congress party in 2003.
As like-minded men began coming together and plotting heinous attacks, the Madhya Pradesh establishment turned a blind eye. Investigators now say the perpetrators found haven in the Malwa region of Madhya Pradesh, as they wreaked havoc in other parts of the country.
In 2003, towards the end of Digvijay Singh's tenure as chief minister in Madhya Pradesh, the Congress party had strengthened its hold in its traditional areas — the party base, the minorities, and the Adivasis.
In Malwa's tribal belt, Pyar Singh Ninama, a local tribal strongman, was the party's face among the Adivasi population. Around that time, accusations began to trickle that Christian missionaries were stepping up efforts to get more Adivasis into their fold. Around that time a member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, Sunil Joshi, was 'sent' as the Mhow pracharak from Gujarat, where it was said the heat was on him following the 2002 riots.
In Mhow -- an acronym for Military Headquarters of War -- the Sangh Parivar was virtually a family. The most active among them were Lokesh Sharma, his cousin Jitender Sharma -- from the RSS and Bajrang Dal respectively -- and Devendra Pandya, who were working to spread Hinduism in adjoining tribal areas.
On the other hand, Ninama, a converted Christian, was seen as nudging his fellow tribals towards Christianity. The two groups were soon at loggerheads and in one of the ensuing clashes, Pandey's choti (tuft) was allegedly cut off. In apparent revenge, three people including Ninama and his son, were brutally killed.
Cases were filed against Lokesh Sharma, Sunil Joshi, Ramesh Sharma, a businessman from neighbouring Pithampur, and 10 others. While most of them are still in jail and the case is before the court, Lokesh Sharma and Joshi were never caught. Here is where the seeds of what is now seen as Hindu terror were sown.
Investigations by the Central Bureau of Investigation, the Anti-Terror Squads of Rajasthan and Maharashtra have revealed that the lynchpin was Sunil Joshi, who was murdered in December 2007. Lokesh Sharma is accused of planting the bomb in Ajmer.
Locals say soon after the Ninama murder case, Joshi's stock rose among hotheaded youngsters.
In the assembly election that followed a couple of months after Ninama's murder, the Congress party was voted out, and the Bharatiya Janata Party [ ] came to power.
Around this time, some local residents claim Joshi and Lokesh Sharma began to be seen in public quite often.
"Digvijay Singh had often spoken about how the violent activities of the Hindu groups was fast turning to 'terrorism'. He said he had evidence that they were gaining bomb-making capabilities. But then he was voted out at a crucial juncture," says Manohar Limbodia, a veteran journalist.
With what was seen as a friendly BJP government, Joshi began to operate quite openly, mobilising support.
"Joshiji was someone who would say one death from our side should be avenged with five from the other side. The youngsters liked him and his approach a lot," a Bajrang Dal activist in Mhow recalls, speaking on condition that he would not be identified for this report.
As it was becoming evident that Joshi was going down an aggressive path, the RSS publicly distanced itself from him.
"Though the RSS distanced itself from the likes of Joshi, we could see that he had the support from within the organisation and also local BJP leaders. Joshi and his group could not have operated without strong support," a businessman, familiar with the Sangh Parivar in Dewas, where Joshi was murdered, says, again speaking on condition that he would not be identified for this report.
Soon after the Ninama murder case, the police defused a bomb at the venue of a Muslim congregation in Ghansipura, Bhopal, which they now allege was planted by the same group behind the terror attacks.
It was an improvised device with explosive material stuffed in metal pipes, connected to a mobile phone. The bomb was set to explode when the mobile rang, but the police defused it in time.
Had that bomb exploded it would have been the first attack of Hindu terror in the country.
How did those who came together in Mhow establish contact with foot soldiers like Ramji Kalasangra (who allegedly made the bombs used in the Ajmer and Mecca Masjid attacks) and Sandeep Dange (who is alleged to have 'facilitated' the others in executing the blasts) on the one hand and alleged masterminds like Colonel Prasad Purohit and sadhvi Pragya Thakur on the other hand?
"The RSS has many organisations," says Deepak Joshi, son of former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Kailash Joshi and the BJP legislator from Hatpipliya, Dewas. "There are also different kinds of people. First, there are the RSS members. Then there are people who might be involved in the RSS's activities without being members. Then, there are people from sister organisations like the ABVP (Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad), Bajrang Dal, etc. Finally, there are people who believe in the ideology but are not associated in any way with any organisation. There are about five or six RSS events in a year where all the four kinds of people come together. Since they are all from the region and had extremist leanings, that is how these people must have met."
Explaining how various people could have gotten to know each other, he says he had met Pragya Thakur about 10 times. "She has sat in the exact place where you are sitting. The connection between her and me is that we are both from the ABVP. She was very aggressive from those days, and I did not make any efforts to know her better," he adds.
But he shies away from dubbing the phenomenon as Hindu terrorism.
"It is not organised to begin with," he says, "And it does not have the sanction or approval of an organisation like the RSS."
He accepts that the likes of Sunil Joshi did have support at the local level.
"When the police said Sunil Joshi was in hiding, I had met him at an event. He told me he was being framed," says the BJP MLA. "In small places, it is not difficult to meet and get to know people. In Madhya Pradesh, a lot of BJP politicians owe their career to the RSS. And some of them may have shared beliefs with people like Sunil Joshi. In the end, such politicians end up using these people for their personal gains."
How did the Malwa region become the hotbed for Hindu terror?
The Malwa region is predominantly tribal. Indore, which is the biggest city in the region, does not have much of an Adivasi presence. But Dhar is 75 percent Adivasi, Jhabua is nearly 100 percent Adivasi. Balwani, Khargon and Khandwa are 50 percent Adivasi.
The Hindus form the second biggest community. They comprise Malis from Rajasthan, Jats, Thakurs, Baniyas and Brahmins.
"More than the composition, the reason the region has been the hotbed of radical Hinduism is because of the leaders," says Limbodia. "Nagpur may be the seat of power for the RSS, but Malwa is the front. RSS stalwarts like Khushabhau Thakre, Pyarelal Khandelwal and Suresh Soni hailed from the Malwa region and shaped the RSS philosophy. That way, this region is the cradle of the RSS."
"It is not just Hindu terror," says Kamil Seher, a hotel owner in Pithampur, an industrial area. "The Pithampur-Dhar region was the base for SIMI [ ]. They used to train there. Before that, the Dawood Ibrahim gang used to be active here. Now the Maoists are also entering this region. Why, some time ago, even an LTTE (Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam) soldier was arrested from a Pithampur factory, where he was working as a gunman for the owner."
"If you are working in a factory, and you bring in someone from your village to stay with you, how would we know if he is a criminal or not?" asks Seher.
He alleges that though the likes of SIMI leader Safdar Nagori were arrested, those who were pumping money and were the brains of the outlawed organisation got away.
"If with an organisation like SIMI, money power and clout could work, how will anyone be able to get close to the top of the Hindu terror hierarchy, if it exists?" he asks.
While the official RSS line is that those arrested are not part of the organisation, it is reported to be helping the accused's families and has arranged for lawyers to fight their cases.
"The RSS arranged for lawyers in Ajmer and Hyderabad to take up my brother's case," confirms Jitender Sharma, Lokesh Sharma's cousin. "I am thankful to the organisation. But at the same time I understand why they want to distance themselves in public. There is a Congress government at the Centre, and all the three states where the terror charges have been filed are also ruled by the Congress, which wants to link the RSS with terrorism. For the Congress, the RSS is the biggest enemy, not the BJP. They want to finish off the RSS."
Jitender's version of what happened is different.
"I was with the Bajrang Dal and Lokesh was with the RSS. Under Digvijay Singh, Hinduism was under attack. So we tried to get a case filed against him. But it is not easy to get the police to file a first information report against the state's chief minister. So we indulged in chakka jams (blockades), and jail bharo protests on a small scale. The state police had marked us from that time. There were a lot of small cases (filed) against us. But we are not people who will get into hardcore criminal activities. At the most we would have stoned a few shops during bandhs," he says.
Though he does not criticise the RSS, Jitender does not have the same feelings about the BJP and its local leaders.
"Kailash Vijayvargiya, who is the BJP MLA for Mhow, has done nothing. He used Lokesh during elections and after that has turned a blind eye," he alleges.
Jitender is now fighting a lone battle to save his cousin.
"First he was implicated in the Ninama murder case. He lost five years of his life hiding from the police. Only last year he got married and his son was born this year. But he hasn't been able to see his son. We are poor people and now his family is struggling to make ends meet and also spend on the legal proceedings."
Though others do not buy the witch hunt theory, they agreed that the Congress party being in power at the Centre and the three states involved is the prime reason the case is moving at this pace.
"These people first surfaced in 2003," says journalist Manohar Limbodia. "After a few failed attempts, they executed their first attack in 2007. Wasn't four years enough for the state police to act? In fact, had any party but the BJP been in power in Madhya Pradesh, you might not be talking about a phenomenon called Hindu terror today."
"Even before the Ajmer blasts, they all met in a temple in Bhopal. What did the police do? After the blasts too, the Vasundhara Raje government (in Rajasthan) did not do anything," says Naveen Mali, a businessman and community leader in Mhow. "Only after (Congress Chief Minister) Ashok Gehlot [ ] took over did things start moving. True, it smacks of politics, but then something happened and something had to be done."
The Dewas-Indore belt was home for those accused in the terror cases.
"They thought they would be safe as long as they could strike in other states and hide here. They thought they were untouchable. They never expected the police from other states to come looking for them," says Limbodia.
Though Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad chief Hemant Karkare blew the lid off the Hindu terror phenomenon when he cracked the Malegaon blast case, it is the Rajasthan ATS, with its sweeps into border towns and midnight arrests, that has struck terror in the hearts of those hiding in the region.
"The Rajasthan ATS comes and picks up people for questioning and drops them back whenever it wants to. The local police is clueless. They come to know only when the Rajasthan ATS informs them as a formality about who they are taking away with them. Sometimes they don't even do that," says Seher about the arrests that the neighbouring state's police have made in Pithampur.
"The Shivraj Singh Chauhan government (in Madhya Pradesh) is not very strong," says Jitender Sharma. "In Gujarat, (Chief Minister) Narendra Modi ] doesn't allow the ATS to touch anyone. But here, the ATS from other states walk in freely and pick up whoever they want to whenever they want."
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Saturday, July 10, 2010
WWW integral to Democracy, and vice versa
10 July 2010
John Dayal
Poland is a young people, and a younger nation in terms of centuries. Slav tribes came together not more than a millennium ago. They became Christian as recently as in 966 AD – remember, St Thomas made his first converts in Kerala and Madras circa 54 AD, the first century after Christ – and made its first international show with the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569. And at various times, it defeated the Teutonic German knights, but was brutally conquered by Hitler, freed by Marshal Stalin, but held ideologically captive by the Soviet Union, freed once again by a combination mass movement led long distance from Rome by home boy Pope John Paul II and by ship builder Lech Walesa of Gdansk. That was about thirty years ago, just. It is home to Auschwitz where a million Jews were incinerated, but is also where Chopin was born, and Copernicus and Madame Curie. Let us say, Poland knows a bit about democracy, and the lack of it, and the difference between the two. Not surprisingly, when in the middle of its Presidential Elections this month, it held the Tenth anniversary meeting High Level Meeting of the Community of Democracies, the event was alternately dominated by events showcasing Polish culture and ethos on the one hand, and US arrogance on the other, specially as displayed by the very vocal Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and one of her predecessors Madeline Alright. Between the two, they put up the US as the global underwriter of democracy, and financier of pro democracy movements in third world countries, Clinton announcing a support fund with an initial Dollar donation of Five Million.
But as part of the observances was an interesting sub-conference on the use of the Internet and emerging communication technologies to assist NGOs and Civil society groups in their struggle for democracy. Also discussed was the role of parliamentarians, and women’s groups and civil society participation in economic development. The concluding documents of the group discussions said “developing mechanisms to ensure that the voice of NGOs, Think tanks and other actors is heard is essential to foster the democratic ideal.”
The issues would have interested India, but alas, of the three civilians and one diplomat at the conference from home, only one attended this session. Egyptians and Latin Americans spoke of the use they had made of the Internet in globalising their struggles. Others spoke of Internet censorship, by China and Pakistan, for instance. And a representative of an international Search engine-turned portal tried to forecast the future where the Internet in an advanced version would be an important tool for “equality, fraternity and the pursuit of happiness,” or words to that affect.
For NGOs in India, there was much to reflect upon. We boast the second largest number of Internet users in the world, but poverty, still prehistoric infrastructure maintenance, low penetration where it matters among the rural, the forested tribal communities and the religious minorities -- the huge victim group in other words – it remains a moot question if Indians can pin their democratic hopes on the World Wide Web, yet. The blame cannot be put on Airtel , Idea, Reliance, BSNL, Aircel, Tata Indicom, Vodafone, MTNL, and Loop Mobile, though they too care tuppence for the 600 million consumers, almost half of the total national population connected by wire or wireless. Another demon is the cost. India still rates as one of the most expensive in communication and Net access.
The ghost culprit is the Government of India. It is, I admit, no monster compared to China’s regime, but let us not forget that Kashmiris cannot often still carry hand mobiles every so often, villagers lose touch for want of electricity, and above all, things are not clear about shadow organizations such as the Computer Emergency Response Team ("CERT-IN") are meant to ensure Internet security. Officially, the Ministry of Home Affairs, all courts, the military and civil intelligence bureaus can use it, as they say in officialese, to enhance the security of India's Communications and Information Infrastructure through proactive action and effective collaboration.
Nothing legal yet about website censorship, but news reports on a weekly basis speak of interest groups fingering some site or the other, foreign or national. Records show, and I should be I suppose indebted to CIA portals for this information, not just pornographic but also anti-establishment political websites have been blocked. In 2001, the Bombay High Court appointed a committee to oversee issues relating to online pornography and Cybercrime. A court panel called for licensing of cyber cafés, putative identity cards for cyber cafe visitors, and long books for internet service providers. Good for internal security and since the Indian State and its police defines what is national good, bad news for a free society. Not that in India we need India to scare us. Self Censorship in India ensures that most of us, the Media included, quietly toe the government line where it matters, afraid we may be branded Maoist supporters, if not Maoists of Jaish operatives. Our hard disks remain squeaky clean, our ‘Net signatures absolutely innocent of real democratic shouts. Time for some debate on Internet freedom, and its importance for Civil Society – without drawing on the 5 Million Dollar American fund.
[An editorial in FNB news for the soul]
John Dayal
Poland is a young people, and a younger nation in terms of centuries. Slav tribes came together not more than a millennium ago. They became Christian as recently as in 966 AD – remember, St Thomas made his first converts in Kerala and Madras circa 54 AD, the first century after Christ – and made its first international show with the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1569. And at various times, it defeated the Teutonic German knights, but was brutally conquered by Hitler, freed by Marshal Stalin, but held ideologically captive by the Soviet Union, freed once again by a combination mass movement led long distance from Rome by home boy Pope John Paul II and by ship builder Lech Walesa of Gdansk. That was about thirty years ago, just. It is home to Auschwitz where a million Jews were incinerated, but is also where Chopin was born, and Copernicus and Madame Curie. Let us say, Poland knows a bit about democracy, and the lack of it, and the difference between the two. Not surprisingly, when in the middle of its Presidential Elections this month, it held the Tenth anniversary meeting High Level Meeting of the Community of Democracies, the event was alternately dominated by events showcasing Polish culture and ethos on the one hand, and US arrogance on the other, specially as displayed by the very vocal Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and one of her predecessors Madeline Alright. Between the two, they put up the US as the global underwriter of democracy, and financier of pro democracy movements in third world countries, Clinton announcing a support fund with an initial Dollar donation of Five Million.
But as part of the observances was an interesting sub-conference on the use of the Internet and emerging communication technologies to assist NGOs and Civil society groups in their struggle for democracy. Also discussed was the role of parliamentarians, and women’s groups and civil society participation in economic development. The concluding documents of the group discussions said “developing mechanisms to ensure that the voice of NGOs, Think tanks and other actors is heard is essential to foster the democratic ideal.”
The issues would have interested India, but alas, of the three civilians and one diplomat at the conference from home, only one attended this session. Egyptians and Latin Americans spoke of the use they had made of the Internet in globalising their struggles. Others spoke of Internet censorship, by China and Pakistan, for instance. And a representative of an international Search engine-turned portal tried to forecast the future where the Internet in an advanced version would be an important tool for “equality, fraternity and the pursuit of happiness,” or words to that affect.
For NGOs in India, there was much to reflect upon. We boast the second largest number of Internet users in the world, but poverty, still prehistoric infrastructure maintenance, low penetration where it matters among the rural, the forested tribal communities and the religious minorities -- the huge victim group in other words – it remains a moot question if Indians can pin their democratic hopes on the World Wide Web, yet. The blame cannot be put on Airtel , Idea, Reliance, BSNL, Aircel, Tata Indicom, Vodafone, MTNL, and Loop Mobile, though they too care tuppence for the 600 million consumers, almost half of the total national population connected by wire or wireless. Another demon is the cost. India still rates as one of the most expensive in communication and Net access.
The ghost culprit is the Government of India. It is, I admit, no monster compared to China’s regime, but let us not forget that Kashmiris cannot often still carry hand mobiles every so often, villagers lose touch for want of electricity, and above all, things are not clear about shadow organizations such as the Computer Emergency Response Team ("CERT-IN") are meant to ensure Internet security. Officially, the Ministry of Home Affairs, all courts, the military and civil intelligence bureaus can use it, as they say in officialese, to enhance the security of India's Communications and Information Infrastructure through proactive action and effective collaboration.
Nothing legal yet about website censorship, but news reports on a weekly basis speak of interest groups fingering some site or the other, foreign or national. Records show, and I should be I suppose indebted to CIA portals for this information, not just pornographic but also anti-establishment political websites have been blocked. In 2001, the Bombay High Court appointed a committee to oversee issues relating to online pornography and Cybercrime. A court panel called for licensing of cyber cafés, putative identity cards for cyber cafe visitors, and long books for internet service providers. Good for internal security and since the Indian State and its police defines what is national good, bad news for a free society. Not that in India we need India to scare us. Self Censorship in India ensures that most of us, the Media included, quietly toe the government line where it matters, afraid we may be branded Maoist supporters, if not Maoists of Jaish operatives. Our hard disks remain squeaky clean, our ‘Net signatures absolutely innocent of real democratic shouts. Time for some debate on Internet freedom, and its importance for Civil Society – without drawing on the 5 Million Dollar American fund.
[An editorial in FNB news for the soul]
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Poland Diary 3
8 July 2010
Poland drowns murmurs of anti Semitism in festivals of Jewish Culture, and a Museum to Schindler’s List
From John Dayal
Krakow, Poland
The fat lady sang her heart out, and then collapsed on stage. But Kurdish-Jewish singer Ilana Eliya, singing with Jabalayo Ensamble, was made of sterner stuff. After ministrations from a concerned audience in the historic Temple Synagogue, now alas just a tourist attraction and packed to the rafters, she had a sip of water, got on her feet, and completed her song of love and patriotism. She got a standing ovation with what seemed most of Krakow’s remaining Jewish population and the rest strapping young Poles with their girl friends.
There was much that was familiar in her song and music to anyone from west or south Asia. Her voice shifted the octaves between Pakistani singer Reshma and our own Shobha Mudgal singing Sufi song, and the music, part Turkish and with the Kashmiri looking Saaz, seemed nostalgically familiar to the solitary Indian in the audience – this correspondent.
Elia, a child prodigy was on her first visit to Poland, her explanatory speeches interspersing her ballads reminding audiences of what her people had to bear when Iraqi dictators bombed them with poison gas. She had the audience hanging by her lips, for many of the tourists had earlier in the day been to there see the poison gas chambers at Auschwitz in the town nearby, where a million Jews, and thousands of Poles, were industrially murdered by Hitler in World War II.
Ilya’s was one of a series of performances during a weeklong Festival of Jewish Culture, now in its 20th year, which Poland has used artfully to apply some salve to a guilty conscience. The annual festival, together with a massive conservation of the three concentration camps, gas chambers and cremation factories at Auschwitz, and a brand new museum in what was the factory of former Nazi businessman, Oskar Schindler – remember the film Schindler’s List which played in India some years ago -- are but thee of the many social-psychological instruments that the government uses to caution its youth against anti Semitism. An underground current of anti-Semitism, and the occasional crop of neo Nazi and skin head groups rising in an otherwise prosperous Poland is cause of grave worry to the authorities, the intelligentsia, and the people at large.
Not that Poland is alone in Europe in this. Germany itself, and many of the countries it conquered seventy years ago showed repeated signs of anti Semitism, the worse five years ago, but some as recent as late last year and early this year. So much so that when some thieves in December last year stole the sign at the concentration camp, the ironical slogan “Work will make you Free”, there was a national sensation which sent ripples from Moscow in the East to London in the West. There was a collective sigh of relief when police said the thieves were not Nazis, just young men out for a lark. But the controversy has by no means ended.
Former Canadian minister and long-time member of Parliament David Kilgour, who was with us in Krakow and who had also visited the camps, noted that the two large camps, about four kilometres apart and preserved by the Polish Parliament in 1947 as monuments to the Holocaust - Shoah, are “undoubtedly the most inhuman scenes we visitors from around the world have ever seen,” and last year alone about 1.2 million visited the place. Russian soldiers on Jan. 27, 1945, who freed approximately 7000 surviving inmates, including 400 children-many of them barely alive from starvation, said the “perfectly organized” facilities were “the most shocking thing seen and filmed”.
Prisoners came in train cattle cars at Birkenau after 1942, the year Hitler ordered the ‘Final Solution’ for Europe’s Jewry. Healthy men were separated from the others to work in the fields and factories, the rest, including 230,000 children and babies, were taken immediately for “showers”, of cyanide gas in concrete bunkers. A million and more were murdered at these two facilities alone. The rooms of the barracks in the concentration camp now house exhibits which include 800,000 women’s, dresses, 348,000 men’s suits, millions of pairs of shoes, pots and pans, which the victims brought with them because they had been told they were being relocated. The guide told me these grim reminders were carefully preserved. “Care was taken to ensure that anti Jew lobbies could not say the camps had been constructed later to stigmatise Hitler.”
This is required.. As an official of the foreign ministry told me, current Europe politics even has parties which openly call for anti Semitism among their members and supporters as they seek votes to the European Parliament.
The Museum in Schindler's factory, opened just a few weeks ago, carries the education into the Nazi phenomenon further. Only the office block remains of the WWII enamel products factory. But this has been lovingly preserved, its interiors converted into a multi media exposition with a chilling display of Nazi flags, uniforms and guns, the lives of the ordinary people under a world war. With intent, the huge Swastika flags loom over flooring made of Swastika flags on which the visitors have to walk, something which would have been impossible in real life of the times.
The museum also reopens the debate on this German businessman who was a top Nazi but eventually helped save more than one thousand Jews by telling the government they were needed in the war effort, and then helping many of them escape. A grateful Jewish community ensured that his body was buried in Jerusalem., the only non Jew with a Nazi past to be so honoured in death. And yet, many say he was a mere opportunist who played both sides to prosper himself. The Museum does not make him out to be a hero – just tells us in multi media what it meant to be living under murderous and racist military regimes.
Poland, like Germany, has made it a crime to display Swastikas or Nazi flags in public, but it is no crime to buy a copy of Hitler’s book Mein Kampf, in German or a Polish translation. And it does sell, it seems.
Poland drowns murmurs of anti Semitism in festivals of Jewish Culture, and a Museum to Schindler’s List
From John Dayal
Krakow, Poland
The fat lady sang her heart out, and then collapsed on stage. But Kurdish-Jewish singer Ilana Eliya, singing with Jabalayo Ensamble, was made of sterner stuff. After ministrations from a concerned audience in the historic Temple Synagogue, now alas just a tourist attraction and packed to the rafters, she had a sip of water, got on her feet, and completed her song of love and patriotism. She got a standing ovation with what seemed most of Krakow’s remaining Jewish population and the rest strapping young Poles with their girl friends.
There was much that was familiar in her song and music to anyone from west or south Asia. Her voice shifted the octaves between Pakistani singer Reshma and our own Shobha Mudgal singing Sufi song, and the music, part Turkish and with the Kashmiri looking Saaz, seemed nostalgically familiar to the solitary Indian in the audience – this correspondent.
Elia, a child prodigy was on her first visit to Poland, her explanatory speeches interspersing her ballads reminding audiences of what her people had to bear when Iraqi dictators bombed them with poison gas. She had the audience hanging by her lips, for many of the tourists had earlier in the day been to there see the poison gas chambers at Auschwitz in the town nearby, where a million Jews, and thousands of Poles, were industrially murdered by Hitler in World War II.
Ilya’s was one of a series of performances during a weeklong Festival of Jewish Culture, now in its 20th year, which Poland has used artfully to apply some salve to a guilty conscience. The annual festival, together with a massive conservation of the three concentration camps, gas chambers and cremation factories at Auschwitz, and a brand new museum in what was the factory of former Nazi businessman, Oskar Schindler – remember the film Schindler’s List which played in India some years ago -- are but thee of the many social-psychological instruments that the government uses to caution its youth against anti Semitism. An underground current of anti-Semitism, and the occasional crop of neo Nazi and skin head groups rising in an otherwise prosperous Poland is cause of grave worry to the authorities, the intelligentsia, and the people at large.
Not that Poland is alone in Europe in this. Germany itself, and many of the countries it conquered seventy years ago showed repeated signs of anti Semitism, the worse five years ago, but some as recent as late last year and early this year. So much so that when some thieves in December last year stole the sign at the concentration camp, the ironical slogan “Work will make you Free”, there was a national sensation which sent ripples from Moscow in the East to London in the West. There was a collective sigh of relief when police said the thieves were not Nazis, just young men out for a lark. But the controversy has by no means ended.
Former Canadian minister and long-time member of Parliament David Kilgour, who was with us in Krakow and who had also visited the camps, noted that the two large camps, about four kilometres apart and preserved by the Polish Parliament in 1947 as monuments to the Holocaust - Shoah, are “undoubtedly the most inhuman scenes we visitors from around the world have ever seen,” and last year alone about 1.2 million visited the place. Russian soldiers on Jan. 27, 1945, who freed approximately 7000 surviving inmates, including 400 children-many of them barely alive from starvation, said the “perfectly organized” facilities were “the most shocking thing seen and filmed”.
Prisoners came in train cattle cars at Birkenau after 1942, the year Hitler ordered the ‘Final Solution’ for Europe’s Jewry. Healthy men were separated from the others to work in the fields and factories, the rest, including 230,000 children and babies, were taken immediately for “showers”, of cyanide gas in concrete bunkers. A million and more were murdered at these two facilities alone. The rooms of the barracks in the concentration camp now house exhibits which include 800,000 women’s, dresses, 348,000 men’s suits, millions of pairs of shoes, pots and pans, which the victims brought with them because they had been told they were being relocated. The guide told me these grim reminders were carefully preserved. “Care was taken to ensure that anti Jew lobbies could not say the camps had been constructed later to stigmatise Hitler.”
This is required.. As an official of the foreign ministry told me, current Europe politics even has parties which openly call for anti Semitism among their members and supporters as they seek votes to the European Parliament.
The Museum in Schindler's factory, opened just a few weeks ago, carries the education into the Nazi phenomenon further. Only the office block remains of the WWII enamel products factory. But this has been lovingly preserved, its interiors converted into a multi media exposition with a chilling display of Nazi flags, uniforms and guns, the lives of the ordinary people under a world war. With intent, the huge Swastika flags loom over flooring made of Swastika flags on which the visitors have to walk, something which would have been impossible in real life of the times.
The museum also reopens the debate on this German businessman who was a top Nazi but eventually helped save more than one thousand Jews by telling the government they were needed in the war effort, and then helping many of them escape. A grateful Jewish community ensured that his body was buried in Jerusalem., the only non Jew with a Nazi past to be so honoured in death. And yet, many say he was a mere opportunist who played both sides to prosper himself. The Museum does not make him out to be a hero – just tells us in multi media what it meant to be living under murderous and racist military regimes.
Poland, like Germany, has made it a crime to display Swastikas or Nazi flags in public, but it is no crime to buy a copy of Hitler’s book Mein Kampf, in German or a Polish translation. And it does sell, it seems.
Poland Diary 2
7th July 2010
Hillary sets up new US fund for NGOs fighting for democratic rights; Cuban Padre awarded for questioning Castro brothers
FROM John Dayal
Krakow, Poland:
The Holy Roman Catholic Church and the current Pope may be on the receiving end of public and media criticism in Europe and the United States, but Washington and its European allies have used a Catholic priest from a small Cuban parish, and the memory of Pope John Paul II. to focus on human rights violations and demand early democratisation in Havana, Iran and Burma.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and one of her predecessors, Madeline Albright, “named and shamed’ Cuban President Raul Castro, the Islamic leaders in Teheran and the Yangon junta as they watched Father Jose Conrado Rodriguez receive the second Bronislav Geremek democracy promotion award in the key function of the High Level Democracy Meeting in Krakow, the cultural capital of Poland, earlier this week.
Nelson Mandela was the first recipient of the award founded ten years ago by Albright and Geremek, the then Polish Foreign minister, to “support legitimacy and authority of people form around the world working in promoting democracy and human liberty.” To add substance to the award, Hillary Clinton in her speech announced the formation of an international fund with a seed capital donation of US Dollars Five Million to assist NGOs and groups engaged in freedoms struggles. She did not name any particular country which would be the target of this effort.
Fr Rodriguez, of the Friars Minor Order, is from the province of Santiago de Cuba and has earned acclaim in the Americas for his sharply worded reprimands to President Fidel Castro. The Pastor wrote a letter again to Fidel’s brother and successor General Raul Castro, protesting that police had beaten up his parishioners inside his church. The letter went on to say “We have spent our lives blaming the enemy, and even our friends, for our situation. The collapse of the bloc of communist countries and the US trade embargo has become the scapegoat that bears all our sins. It is not enough, General, to solve the problems, certainly serious and urgent, of food, and of the homes that so many of our countrymen – “with their meagre belongings: fears, sorrows” - have just lost in the recent hurricanes. We are at such a critical moment that we must undertake a thorough examination of our beliefs and our practices, of our aspirations and our objectives. As the great Jose Marti said, You do not found a nation, General, the way you run a military camp.”
Fr Rodriguez, who got a thunderous ovation in the Krakow Opera House together with his statuette, does have an indirect connection with Krakow – when Krakow’s favourite son and former Cardinal, Pope John Paul II visited Cuba in a history-making tour in 1998, among those receiving him was the fiery Parish priest from Santa Teresita del Nino Jesus. Joining him on stage this time was the current Cardinal of Krakow and ministers from Indonesia, the European parliament, Lithuania, South Korea, Canada, and Kenya. India had a low key presence 2-4 July meeting, its delegation headed by an additional secretary from the External Affairs Ministry in New Delhi. Polish foreign minister Radoslav Sikorski played the host.
Though called the Community of Democracies and held in Poland, the show piece of democratic transition from the Soviet era, the Krakow meet was dominated by the US presence, the speeches of the former and present Secretaries of State remaining the dominant voices. Mrs. Clinton was particularly sharp after her concurrent tour of Eastern European countries. In Krakow and in the neighbouring countries Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia, she questioned Moscow, decried the Caucasian habit of coveting other’s lands and the still continuing restrictions on civil rights in some countries. “We seek a community of nations working together to strengthen democracy, and transparency of government processes, sound electoral systems, respect for human rights and the rule of law, active civic education, prevention of official corruption and related core values basic to democratic governance.”
Stressing the importance of democracy both as a central organizing principle of official government foreign policy and as the basis of international alliances of NGOs, she said “We are convinced the time has arrived for the democracies of the world to build upon the experience of the UN and NATO, a new institutional framework for global cooperation among democratic nations.”
She focussed on the "crisis" of governments “around the world are slowly crushing civil society and the human spirit." She named Cuba, Egypt, Iran, Congo, Zimbabwe, Burma, North Korea and China.
As she announced a US fund to assist NGOs and civil society, presumably working in threes and other countries, Mrs Clinton said the United Nations Human Rights Council needs to do more to protect civil society. “Freedom of association is the only freedom defined in the United Nations declaration of human rights that does not enjoy specific attention from the UN human rights machinery. That must change. She spoke of US pressure on organizations, such as the OAS, the EU, the OIC, the African Union, and the Arab League, others, to do more to defend the freedom of association. “We need to make sure words are matched by actions,” said, calling for coordinated diplomatic pressure by allied governments.
An interesting aspect of the meeting was a series of side discussions on the use of the Internet and emerging communication technologies to assist NGOs and Civil society groups in their struggle for democracy. Also discussed was the role of parliamentarians, and women’s groups and civil society participation in economic development. The concluding documents of the group discussions spoke of “developing mechanisms to ensure that the voice of NGOs, Think tanks and other actors is heard is essential to foster the democratic ideal.” At present time, there is a need to give priority to economic and social development and to fight unemployment; both of those have implications for democratic governance,” the documents said.
Hillary sets up new US fund for NGOs fighting for democratic rights; Cuban Padre awarded for questioning Castro brothers
FROM John Dayal
Krakow, Poland:
The Holy Roman Catholic Church and the current Pope may be on the receiving end of public and media criticism in Europe and the United States, but Washington and its European allies have used a Catholic priest from a small Cuban parish, and the memory of Pope John Paul II. to focus on human rights violations and demand early democratisation in Havana, Iran and Burma.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and one of her predecessors, Madeline Albright, “named and shamed’ Cuban President Raul Castro, the Islamic leaders in Teheran and the Yangon junta as they watched Father Jose Conrado Rodriguez receive the second Bronislav Geremek democracy promotion award in the key function of the High Level Democracy Meeting in Krakow, the cultural capital of Poland, earlier this week.
Nelson Mandela was the first recipient of the award founded ten years ago by Albright and Geremek, the then Polish Foreign minister, to “support legitimacy and authority of people form around the world working in promoting democracy and human liberty.” To add substance to the award, Hillary Clinton in her speech announced the formation of an international fund with a seed capital donation of US Dollars Five Million to assist NGOs and groups engaged in freedoms struggles. She did not name any particular country which would be the target of this effort.
Fr Rodriguez, of the Friars Minor Order, is from the province of Santiago de Cuba and has earned acclaim in the Americas for his sharply worded reprimands to President Fidel Castro. The Pastor wrote a letter again to Fidel’s brother and successor General Raul Castro, protesting that police had beaten up his parishioners inside his church. The letter went on to say “We have spent our lives blaming the enemy, and even our friends, for our situation. The collapse of the bloc of communist countries and the US trade embargo has become the scapegoat that bears all our sins. It is not enough, General, to solve the problems, certainly serious and urgent, of food, and of the homes that so many of our countrymen – “with their meagre belongings: fears, sorrows” - have just lost in the recent hurricanes. We are at such a critical moment that we must undertake a thorough examination of our beliefs and our practices, of our aspirations and our objectives. As the great Jose Marti said, You do not found a nation, General, the way you run a military camp.”
Fr Rodriguez, who got a thunderous ovation in the Krakow Opera House together with his statuette, does have an indirect connection with Krakow – when Krakow’s favourite son and former Cardinal, Pope John Paul II visited Cuba in a history-making tour in 1998, among those receiving him was the fiery Parish priest from Santa Teresita del Nino Jesus. Joining him on stage this time was the current Cardinal of Krakow and ministers from Indonesia, the European parliament, Lithuania, South Korea, Canada, and Kenya. India had a low key presence 2-4 July meeting, its delegation headed by an additional secretary from the External Affairs Ministry in New Delhi. Polish foreign minister Radoslav Sikorski played the host.
Though called the Community of Democracies and held in Poland, the show piece of democratic transition from the Soviet era, the Krakow meet was dominated by the US presence, the speeches of the former and present Secretaries of State remaining the dominant voices. Mrs. Clinton was particularly sharp after her concurrent tour of Eastern European countries. In Krakow and in the neighbouring countries Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia, she questioned Moscow, decried the Caucasian habit of coveting other’s lands and the still continuing restrictions on civil rights in some countries. “We seek a community of nations working together to strengthen democracy, and transparency of government processes, sound electoral systems, respect for human rights and the rule of law, active civic education, prevention of official corruption and related core values basic to democratic governance.”
Stressing the importance of democracy both as a central organizing principle of official government foreign policy and as the basis of international alliances of NGOs, she said “We are convinced the time has arrived for the democracies of the world to build upon the experience of the UN and NATO, a new institutional framework for global cooperation among democratic nations.”
She focussed on the "crisis" of governments “around the world are slowly crushing civil society and the human spirit." She named Cuba, Egypt, Iran, Congo, Zimbabwe, Burma, North Korea and China.
As she announced a US fund to assist NGOs and civil society, presumably working in threes and other countries, Mrs Clinton said the United Nations Human Rights Council needs to do more to protect civil society. “Freedom of association is the only freedom defined in the United Nations declaration of human rights that does not enjoy specific attention from the UN human rights machinery. That must change. She spoke of US pressure on organizations, such as the OAS, the EU, the OIC, the African Union, and the Arab League, others, to do more to defend the freedom of association. “We need to make sure words are matched by actions,” said, calling for coordinated diplomatic pressure by allied governments.
An interesting aspect of the meeting was a series of side discussions on the use of the Internet and emerging communication technologies to assist NGOs and Civil society groups in their struggle for democracy. Also discussed was the role of parliamentarians, and women’s groups and civil society participation in economic development. The concluding documents of the group discussions spoke of “developing mechanisms to ensure that the voice of NGOs, Think tanks and other actors is heard is essential to foster the democratic ideal.” At present time, there is a need to give priority to economic and social development and to fight unemployment; both of those have implications for democratic governance,” the documents said.
Poland Diary 1
Polish president Komorowski wins vote, walks tight rope between Russia and US
From John Dayal
Warsaw, 6 July 2010
Ignoring sentiment and a subtle pressure from the Catholic Church, a highly polarized Poland electorate last night voted acting president Bronislaw Komorowski to power with his agenda for rapid privatization and a balance between Russia and nuclear ally United States, with whom his government two days ago signed a missile defence pact.
“Pragmatic” Komorowski won 53 per cent of the votes against Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who fought passionately on the memory of his twin brother, the late President Lech Kaczynski who died with 96 others on 10 April while flying to a memorial meeting in Katyn in Russia where Stalin’s Russian army had allegedly shot dead over 20,000 polish soldiers during the World War II.
The Church patently sided with Kaczynski and his Law and Justice Party, as did a large chunk of the traditional and rural poor in the highly Catholic post-communist Poland. But Komorowski’s poll managers in the Civic Platform party, a right of the centre group, marshalled a last minute turnout of the younger voters and the emerging middle class to beat back the tough but controversial leader of the Law and Justice party. Kaczynski received 46.99 per cent of the vote in a 55.31 per cent turnout, which was a huge change from the apathy shown by voters in the first round.
Komorowski, a former defence minister, was Marshal of the Sejm -- Speaker of the Lower house of the Polish Parliament – at the time of the air crash and was automatically elevated President under the country’s constitution. He managed a high profile support base when he decided to fight the elections, preponed from their scheduled date in autumn this year. Poland’s modern-age hero Lech Walesa, the founder of Solidarity movement, backed him, as did men of the caliber of film maestro Andrei Wajda who told this correspondent at Komorowski’s victory headquarters, aptly in a building housing Coca Cola and many bank headquarters; “He is the man for the future, the man who will make Poland a major in the European Union.’ Wajda also praised the new president as a man who supported free speech and the arts – an abiding virtue in the land of music immortal Chopin.
The media here has noticed that Komorowski has had to dilute many of his policies to win over the Poles. Among his talking points was his party’s alliance with the UK’s ruling Tories, speaking of a larger alliance in the European Union which Poland will head in the second half of next year.
Despite a powerful Opposition, and a church looking over his shoulders, Komorowski hopes to have an easier time in his newly won term because his Civic Platform party now controls both the Presidency and the Parliament. “Polish democracy has won,” Komorowski told widely cheering, but visibly well off, supporters in his headquarters as he and his wife made an appearance last Sunday night in a US-inspired made for television event late Sunday night after polling officially ended.
Komorowski has been Minister of National Defence from 2000 to 2001 and Deputy Speaker from 2005 to 2007. His party backs church positions against abortion and gay marriages, but strongly calls for privatization of the remaining public sectors of Polish economy, direct elections to local body chiefs such as mayors and other electoral reforms,. labour law reform, and a 15% flat tax.
Symbolic possibly of modern Poland, a country which has repeatedly seen its nobility and intelligentsia murdered en masse by invading armies over the last several centuries, Komorowski traces his origins to an old and noble family which was active against the communist regime, many relatives ending up in prison.
International observers here noted that the elections coincided with a high profile trip to Poland and Eastern Europe by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. She participated in ceremonies marking ten years of Council for Democracy – for which international media had been invited – but took time off to supervise the signing of a deal with Poland last Saturday allowing a revised missile-shield program to defend against potential threats from Iran or elsewhere. It has been reported that Poland also received a Patriot missile battery, manned by American soldiers and situated at the military base at Morag, some 250 kilometers north of Warsaw and just 60 kilometers from the border with Russia's Kaliningrad territory.
From John Dayal
Warsaw, 6 July 2010
Ignoring sentiment and a subtle pressure from the Catholic Church, a highly polarized Poland electorate last night voted acting president Bronislaw Komorowski to power with his agenda for rapid privatization and a balance between Russia and nuclear ally United States, with whom his government two days ago signed a missile defence pact.
“Pragmatic” Komorowski won 53 per cent of the votes against Jaroslaw Kaczynski, who fought passionately on the memory of his twin brother, the late President Lech Kaczynski who died with 96 others on 10 April while flying to a memorial meeting in Katyn in Russia where Stalin’s Russian army had allegedly shot dead over 20,000 polish soldiers during the World War II.
The Church patently sided with Kaczynski and his Law and Justice Party, as did a large chunk of the traditional and rural poor in the highly Catholic post-communist Poland. But Komorowski’s poll managers in the Civic Platform party, a right of the centre group, marshalled a last minute turnout of the younger voters and the emerging middle class to beat back the tough but controversial leader of the Law and Justice party. Kaczynski received 46.99 per cent of the vote in a 55.31 per cent turnout, which was a huge change from the apathy shown by voters in the first round.
Komorowski, a former defence minister, was Marshal of the Sejm -- Speaker of the Lower house of the Polish Parliament – at the time of the air crash and was automatically elevated President under the country’s constitution. He managed a high profile support base when he decided to fight the elections, preponed from their scheduled date in autumn this year. Poland’s modern-age hero Lech Walesa, the founder of Solidarity movement, backed him, as did men of the caliber of film maestro Andrei Wajda who told this correspondent at Komorowski’s victory headquarters, aptly in a building housing Coca Cola and many bank headquarters; “He is the man for the future, the man who will make Poland a major in the European Union.’ Wajda also praised the new president as a man who supported free speech and the arts – an abiding virtue in the land of music immortal Chopin.
The media here has noticed that Komorowski has had to dilute many of his policies to win over the Poles. Among his talking points was his party’s alliance with the UK’s ruling Tories, speaking of a larger alliance in the European Union which Poland will head in the second half of next year.
Despite a powerful Opposition, and a church looking over his shoulders, Komorowski hopes to have an easier time in his newly won term because his Civic Platform party now controls both the Presidency and the Parliament. “Polish democracy has won,” Komorowski told widely cheering, but visibly well off, supporters in his headquarters as he and his wife made an appearance last Sunday night in a US-inspired made for television event late Sunday night after polling officially ended.
Komorowski has been Minister of National Defence from 2000 to 2001 and Deputy Speaker from 2005 to 2007. His party backs church positions against abortion and gay marriages, but strongly calls for privatization of the remaining public sectors of Polish economy, direct elections to local body chiefs such as mayors and other electoral reforms,. labour law reform, and a 15% flat tax.
Symbolic possibly of modern Poland, a country which has repeatedly seen its nobility and intelligentsia murdered en masse by invading armies over the last several centuries, Komorowski traces his origins to an old and noble family which was active against the communist regime, many relatives ending up in prison.
International observers here noted that the elections coincided with a high profile trip to Poland and Eastern Europe by US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton. She participated in ceremonies marking ten years of Council for Democracy – for which international media had been invited – but took time off to supervise the signing of a deal with Poland last Saturday allowing a revised missile-shield program to defend against potential threats from Iran or elsewhere. It has been reported that Poland also received a Patriot missile battery, manned by American soldiers and situated at the military base at Morag, some 250 kilometers north of Warsaw and just 60 kilometers from the border with Russia's Kaliningrad territory.
Friday, June 25, 2010
Sangh dominates Orissa's schools
BHUBANESWAR, [PRASHANTI,] JUNE 25 2010-06-25
Radical Hindu groups in the Indian state of Orissa may have stolen a march on Christians by developing a large network of schools in rural areas of the state neglected by the Church, an education expert fears.
Since 1978, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS, national volunteer corps) has built a network of 793 schools in the eastern state with a faculty of 12,000 teachers, local reports say.
“The RSS has spearheaded the movement, successfully penetrating into the educational systems of both the grassroots and centralized regulatory commissions,” Angana Chatterji is a professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the California Institute of Integral Studies, USA.
“A whole new generation is being grown indoctrinated in Hindutva (Hindu ideology). It is a devious strategy to teach hate to the young,” the paper claims, with as many as 55 of the top 100 10th grade students now coming from these schools.
“The RSS made it clear that the schools, called Shishu Mandirs, together with the Ekal Vidyalayas (single-teacher primary schools in villages), were set up to counter the influence of the schools run by the Church,” John Dayal, secretary general of the All India Christian Council, said.
He lamented that Christian schools, which are mostly located in metropolitan cities and towns, have earned the reputation of being elite English language institutions for the rich and powerful.
Barring a few exceptions, there are hardly any Christian schools in rural areas, Dayal added, and the RSS-run schools fill the vacuum, providing high quality education without the elitism. “The Church needs to do a rethinking in this regard,” he warned.
Father Anselm Biswal, former director of social work, agreed. “The schools that we have are no match for the RSS schools,” he said. “What we require today is a commitment and direction to the issue of education”.
In this year’s annual examinations for the tenth class, children of the RSS schools, many of them sons and daughters of government officials, took the top positions across Orissa.
BHUBANESWAR, [PRASHANTI,] JUNE 25 2010-06-25
Radical Hindu groups in the Indian state of Orissa may have stolen a march on Christians by developing a large network of schools in rural areas of the state neglected by the Church, an education expert fears.
Since 1978, the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS, national volunteer corps) has built a network of 793 schools in the eastern state with a faculty of 12,000 teachers, local reports say.
“The RSS has spearheaded the movement, successfully penetrating into the educational systems of both the grassroots and centralized regulatory commissions,” Angana Chatterji is a professor of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the California Institute of Integral Studies, USA.
“A whole new generation is being grown indoctrinated in Hindutva (Hindu ideology). It is a devious strategy to teach hate to the young,” the paper claims, with as many as 55 of the top 100 10th grade students now coming from these schools.
“The RSS made it clear that the schools, called Shishu Mandirs, together with the Ekal Vidyalayas (single-teacher primary schools in villages), were set up to counter the influence of the schools run by the Church,” John Dayal, secretary general of the All India Christian Council, said.
He lamented that Christian schools, which are mostly located in metropolitan cities and towns, have earned the reputation of being elite English language institutions for the rich and powerful.
Barring a few exceptions, there are hardly any Christian schools in rural areas, Dayal added, and the RSS-run schools fill the vacuum, providing high quality education without the elitism. “The Church needs to do a rethinking in this regard,” he warned.
Father Anselm Biswal, former director of social work, agreed. “The schools that we have are no match for the RSS schools,” he said. “What we require today is a commitment and direction to the issue of education”.
In this year’s annual examinations for the tenth class, children of the RSS schools, many of them sons and daughters of government officials, took the top positions across Orissa.
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Chistian Copmmunity tells Sonia's Council to revise Law against Communal Violence
Observations of the Christian Community on Proposed Communal violence Prevention Bill 2005/10
National Advisory Council meeting 24th June 2010
A. The Christian community, approximately 2.4 per cent of the Indian population, is yet to emerge from the trauma of the violence against it in Kandhamal District of Orissa in 2007 and 2008, which saw mass murder, unprecedented arson, gang rapes and coercive change of religion, among other crimes, and the continuing acts of violence against its members, individual pastors, priests, nuns, institutions, prayer meetings and tract distribution, across the country but more viciously in Karnataka, Orissa, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Punjab, Uttarakhand, and occasionally even in the National Capital Region of Delhi. This experience is marked by our understanding of the protection given to the aggressors, issues of command responsibility and impunity, and a callous attitude towards Christianity which is seen even in official circles as an alien religion, and its faithful as so much lesser citizens in the exercise of their Constitutional rights. This experience, as much as our empathy with the experiences of our brothers and sisters in the Dalit community, the Tribal people and members of the Sikh and Muslim faiths, guides our understating of communal violence, and our response to the Communal Violence Control and Prevention Bill through its various incarnations from when it was first moved in Parliament in 2005 till the last Cabinet note of December 2009.
The Catholic Bishops Conference of India gave a detailed note to the Government some time ago. On behalf of the All India Christian Council, its office bearers also conveyed to Government our feelings. Other denominations and groups have also communicated with the government. The Christian community consists of several ecclesiastical groups and denominations, apart from ranging across all linguistic and ethnic groups in the country as is proper for its 2,000 year old history of existence in this great country.
It may be mentioned that we entirely support the major recommendations made by the Muslim community groups and by concerned Civil society. We strongly feel any Law to be relevant must empower the people, specially the survivor-victims. It must in no way further empower the State and the political apparatus to harass religious minorities.
This note therefore covers not just the experience of the Catholic and Episcopal groups in all their diversity as already enunciated by them, but also the experiences and needs if the membership of the All India Christian Council from the Evangelical and Pentecost churches, Independent Church groups and pastors, and above all, the common Christians, specially Tribal and Dalits, who may worship in their house, or go to a Church, and who are untied in their faith in the Salvation assured by Jesus Christ.
B. Needless to say, the proposed CV Bill is ignorant of the diversity of the minority communities, and specifically of the following issues of the Christian Community.
1. Dalit Christians: 60 per cent of all Christians in India trace their origins from the Dalit communities, now called the Scheduled Castes. They live with their fellow Indians in Dalit colonies, semi urban hovels, and village Cheris. They are subject to all atrocities faced by the others. In addition, they are targeted for being Christians, taunted, vilified and subject to sustained hate campaigns. And yet they do not get the hope or the security provided by anti-atrocity laws, or other provisions of the IPC.
2. TRIBALS: A large number of tribals are Christinas in the States of Rajasdthan, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Andhra, Chhatisgarh, Orissa and Jharkhand, apart from the Tribals of the North-Eastern region. The tribals of the so-called Chhotanagpur region particularly suffer from administrative and communal action, and find little or no recourse in the law. The experience in Kandhamal has brought this to the fore.
3. PLACES OF WORSHIP: While large cathedrals are landmarks in cities, the churches in small towns and villages may be just a kutcha hut or a log cabin. Often, both in Catholic and Protestant traditions, prayers are held within the house together with family members and neighbours. Sometimes, prayers are also held in the open on Sundays and other special days. Increasingly house churches have been targeted and often the police has been a party to the violence.
4. VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN: Nuns of the Catholic, Orthodox and of some Episcopal churches, as well as wives of Evangelical and Independent pastors have been particularly targeted in Madhya Pradesh, up to and including gang grape and sexual coercion, with the police entirely inactive, if not complicit. The Nuns can be identified at a distance and are therefore vulnerable all the more.
5. DIFFUSED POPULATION: Apart from certain districts, the Christian population is widely dispersed, and ingle families or a small cluster becomes very vulnerable.
6. PATTERN OF VIOLENCE: Though populations are dispersed in the major states – barring Kerala, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Goa, -- the violence is consistent. And yet authorities, especially the police dismiss it as “sporadic” unrelated and unconnected violence. The overall Pattern of Violence is never taken into account while taking preventive or curative measures.
7. HATE CAMPAIGNS: For the last forty years, there has been a consistent and sustained hate campaign against Christians, often officially supported. Where huge temples exist in government building and even in police stations, it is perhaps difficult to expect a secular approach from subordinate officials and policemen. The hate campaign in media is supported by partisanship in the district administration, further aggravating the communal harmony in those regions. These include refusal to distribute religious tracts and refusal of permission to sell or distribute Bibles, permission for holding Healing Ministries and Prayer meetings on public or private grounds and fields, and mis-reporting in the mass media painting the Christians in a negative light.
The following is an internal commentary by the All India Christian Council and its expert associates, which takes into account the above and assesses the new Bill with its suggestions.
C. OUR OBSERVATIONS ON THE CV BILL
The government has proposed a law to prevent control and deal with the aftermath of communal violence, which would include caste-based or religiously-motivated violence. Communal violence is recognised as a problem which runs deeper than simply undermining law and order. The UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief echoed the NCM in emphasising that communal violence is most likely to occur in a situation in which the following elements are present:
• Long-standing antagonism along religious lines;
• A specific occurrence triggering an emotional response among members of religious communities;
• A sense among perpetrators and the religious community to which they belong that communal violence is justifiable;
• A sense among perpetrators that the reaction of police to communal violence would be absent, partisan or ineffective.
The Communal Violence (Prevention, Control and Rehabilitation of Victims) Bill, 2009, was first introduced on 26 November 2005, and has undergone a series of revisions, which include the adoption of a number of recommendations issued by the NCM. It is expected to be introduced in the Lok Sabha in 2010, having received Cabinet approval in December 2009.
PROVISIONS:
The purpose of the Bill is outlined in the Statement of Objects and Reasons:
“Communal violence threatens the secular fabric, unity, integrity and internal security of a nation. With a view to empowering the State Governments and the Central Government to take effective measures to provide for the prevention and control of communal violence and to rehabilitate the victims of such violence, for speedy investigation and trial of offences including imposition of enhanced punishments, than those provided in the Indian Penal Code, on persons involved in communal violence and for matters connected therewith, it has been decided to enact a law by Parliament.”
The current version of the Bill sets out a series of measures to these ends, and includes the following provisions:
• Article 3(1) groups a number of offences under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and other laws in a schedule. If one or more of these offences are committed “in such manner and on such a scale which involves the use of criminal force or violence against any group, caste or community, resulting in grievous hurt, loss of life, or extensive damage or destruction of property” and where “such use of criminal force or violence is committed with a view to create disharmony or feelings of enmity, hatred or ill-will between different groups, castes or communities”, resulting in an imminent “threat to the secular fabric, integrity, unity or internal security of India”, a state government is required to notify this as a “communally disturbed area”.
• Article 4 specifies that a state government may request the central government to deploy armed forces in these circumstances.
• Article 5 provides for preventative measures to be taken by a district magistrate prior to any outbreak of communal violence.
• Articles 6-10 provide for preventative measures to be taken by the “competent authority” after an area has been designated as communally disturbed.
• Articles 11-16 proscribe and stipulate punishments for certain acts associated with communal violence, including possessing weapons or threatening witnesses;
• Article 17 stipulates punishments for public servants or competent authorities who act in a mala fide manner or wilfully fail to exercise lawful authority, and thereby fail to prevent communal violence.
• Article 19 provides that punishments stipulated for scheduled offences must be doubled if the offences are committed on a scale and in a manner which constitute communal violence.
• Article 21 provides for the declaration of police stations within the scheduled area, and for the provision of women police officers to investigate scheduled offences committed against women or children.
• Article 22 provides for the review of cases where the investigating officer does not file a charge sheet within three months of a First Information Report (FIR) being registered.
• Article 23 provides for the constitution of “Special Investigation Teams” if the state government believes the investigation of offences was not carried out in a fair and impartial manner.
• Articles 24-37 provide for the establishment and procedure of “Special Courts” for the trial of scheduled offences, and for the appointment of public prosecutors. Article 32 provides for concealing the identities of witnesses testifying before a special court.
• Articles 38-41 provide for the creation and functions of a “State Communal Disturbance Relief and Rehabilitation Council” by the relevant state government, including several ex officio members and several members nominated by the state government, including representatives of all major religious communities. Article 40 stipulates the functions of the council in planning relief efforts, including advising the state government on compensation and the establishment of relief camps, taking a range of remedial measures for the welfare of victims and the reparation of damage, recommending measures for activating a “district communal harmony committee” and reporting to the government on shortcomings in remedial measures. Article 41 stipulates the preparation of a plan “for promotion of communal harmony and prevention of communal violence” to be recommended for adoption by the council to the state government.
• Articles 42-44 provide for the creation and functions of a district equivalent of the state committee, to act as the implementing body for relief and rehabilitation measures.
• Articles 45-48 provide for the creation and functions of a national equivalent of the state committee, with responsibilities including advising relevant state governments on relief, rehabilitation and compensation and making recommendations to the central government.
• Articles 49-52 provide for state governments to establish schemes for the compensation of victims of communal violence.
• Articles 53-54 provide for the payment of compensation for damages by offenders.
• Articles 55-56 set out special powers of the central government to deal with communal violence. These include directing the
relevant state government to take appropriate measures, and declaring a “communally disturbed area” if the state fails to do so when necessary, and deploying armed forces under the authority of the central government.
• Article 58 provides that there should be no discrimination in the provision of relief or compensation “on the ground of sex, caste, community, descent or religion”.
D. OUR CRITIQUE:
The principle of a CV Bill has been welcomed by religious minorities in India, and it has the potential to add positively to India’s excellent body of legislation protecting against acts of discrimination or prejudicial violence. However, there exist legitimate concerns about the effectiveness of the 2005 and the 2009 drafts of the Bill, which have been voiced by civil society and religious minority organisations, by the NCM and by the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief in the report of her 2008 visit to India. The Special Rapporteur recommended specifically that the legislation “should take into account the concerns of religious minorities” (paragraph 67).
The most serious, substantive and prominent concerns about the Bill in its current form include the following:
1. The Bill does not define “communal violence” adequately, and therefore cannot protect against it effectively. Firstly, it construes communal violence as disharmony between two different communities, or mass rioting by one community against another, but it does not recognise the process by which communal tension or hatred is incited, and it does not recognise the phenomenon of state complicity in the incitement or execution of communal violence. Secondly, the premise of the “communally disturbed area” does not do justice to the reality of communal violence as experienced by some religious minorities, especially Christians: certain states see frequent, well-targeted, single incidents of religiously-motivated violence, which are often orchestrated by extremist organisations, and this pattern of violence would not be addressed under the provisions of the Bill. Thirdly, the Bill inadequately covers the possible range of offences which might constitute “communal violence” (including specific forms of sexual violence), and the implications of this context for evidentiary standards in the investigative process.
2. The Bill does not provide for sufficient safeguards against the poor or discriminatory exercise of power by those responsible for protecting the rights of victims, which is a recurrent problem in cases of communal violence. The Special Rapporteur noted that civil society organisations have “voiced their concern that the sweeping powers given by the Bill to state governments could be misused to intimidate members of the minority community” (paragraph 40). Article 17 provides for the prosecution of public servants for the dereliction of duty, but this requires the prior sanction of the state government, and if the state government is complicit in (or not unfavourable towards) the communal violence, it becomes extremely unlikely that discriminatory behaviour or the dereliction of duty by public servants will be prosecuted. Article 22 of the Bill provides for the review of every case in which the investigating officer does not file a charge sheet within three months of an FIR being registered, but this may be circumvented by the common tactic whereby police officers fail to register FIRs according to proper procedure. Article 57, the so-called “good faith” clause, provides immunity for officials; however, the standard of mens rea, or command responsibility, should be enshrined in the Bill, so that superior authorities are held accountable for the unlawful activities of their subordinates. The NCM made a number of relevant additional recommendations to increase accountability: That the reports of any commissions of inquiry should be made public as a matter of course; that the National Human Rights Commission should be mandated to monitor the performance of special courts; and that those found guilty of involvement in communal violence should be debarred permanently from government jobs and from contesting any office.
3. The Bill should provide additional measures to protect witnesses or victims from intimidation. Article 15 criminalises acts which threaten witnesses, and Article 32 provides that the identity of witnesses may be concealed. However, the Bill should draw upon the guidelines of the Supreme Court and recommendations of the Law Commission. It would be strengthened considerably by providing for the police protection of witnesses at risk of threat or intimidation. Incentivising witnesses by providing travel and maintenance expenses (as recommended in Article 21(2)(ii) of The Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act), would further protect against witnesses preferring to stay silent rather than risking intimidation as a consequence of giving evidence. In addition, the rights of persons displaced into camps as a result of communal violence, as outlined in Article 40(b), should be in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, including the provision of education to displaced children (principle 23) and ensuring that camps continue until the establishment of suitable conditions and the means for the displaced persons to return voluntarily, in safety and with dignity, to their homes, or to resettle voluntarily (principle 28).
4. The Bill should set out a uniform, binding scheme for the provision of compensation to victims of communal violence, to address the inconsistencies shown in previous cases. It should establish the rights of victims or their dependents to financial compensation, and should also provide compensation to rebuild places of worship damaged or destroyed as a result of communal violence. This was among the recommendations of the NCM not included among the amendments in the 2009 version of the Bill.
E. Aftermath of 2008 anti-Christian violence in Orissa
In August to October 2008, Orissa witnessed the worst spate of communal violence ever faced by the Christian community in post-independence India, including brutal murders and rapes, widespread destruction of churches and property, and forcible conversions to Hinduism. The attacks, centred in Kandhamal district, were catalysed by the assassination on 23 August 2008 of Lakshmananda Saraswati, local head of the radical Hindu nationalist group VHP, by assailants believed to have been Maoists. On 24 August, when his remains were paraded around the district, mobs began setting up roadblocks, shouting Hindu nationalist and violent anti-Christian slogans, openly blaming Christians for the murder and calling for revenge as they attacked Christian targets. Although rural poverty and underlying issues of ethnic tensions over entitlements in Kandhamal played a role in the violence, these were not the primary causes but provided a context for the radicalisation of one community and the incitement of violence. The Orissa chief minister publicly acknowledged the role of extremist Hindu nationalist organisations in the violence in the legislative assembly for the first time in November 2009.
The violence which started in August 2008 continued for over eight weeks. At least 50,000 were displaced and 70 were killed; among the victims were Hindus opposing the rioters. Widespread anti-Christian attacks had also taken place in Kandhamal in December 2007, impunity for which laid the foundations for the second more serious wave of violence in 2008. The state government failed to implement detailed recommendations made by India’s NCM in early 2008.
F. SOCIAL CONTEXT:
Rural poverty is endemic in southern Orissa, the area in which the violence was centred, and the rural poverty ratio actually increased in this area during the period 1983-2000. There exist deep underlying issues of entitlement in Kandhamal, which created a context for the instigation of the 2008 violence: one such issue is the classification of Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities, which was formalised in 1950. Both communities trace their ancestry to the indigenous inhabitants of the land, and constitute a single ethnic, linguistic and cultural group. However, Kandhamal is designated as a ‘Scheduled Area’ under the provision of the fifth schedule of the constitution, and as such, certain entitlements are reserved for the Scheduled Tribes, including freehold (patta) ownership of land. This is a potential cause of tension between Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Moreover, Christians of Scheduled Caste background or ancestry are not eligible to the same entitlements as Scheduled Castes (see section 4.3 above). It is in the interest of those Scheduled Castes who profess Christianity to be reclassified as Scheduled Tribes, as this would reverse their double disenfranchisement, so tensions among Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes can therefore take on a religious colouring in the right circumstances.
Although these factors of ethnicity and entitlement provided a context for the violence, it is important to emphasise that Christians in the area have been drawn from both Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities. During the violence, Christians from both communities were attacked.
The extremist Hindu nationalist presence in Kandhamal has played upon existing sensitivities, and co-opted them onto a religious nationalist template. Extremist Hindu nationalists have been operational in the area for around 40 years, and they originate from a non-indigenous, caste Hindu, trader community. Their agenda has been the preservation of Hindu purity, including the prevention of cow slaughter and of religious conversions. Christians, as the largest religious minority in the area, constitute a threatening ‘other’, and provide a ready scapegoat.
The local prominence of Naxalites, or Maoist insurgents, creates an additional layer of complication. Naxalites were almost certainly responsible for the assassination of Swami Lakshmananda Saraswati, which precipitated the mass violence against Christians. There are numerous theories about the Naxalites’ motivation for the murder, one of which is that it was an act of retribution against his activities, and that it was calculated to gain support from disenfranchised people in the area, including Christians. The palpable absence of state machinery from the area, means that the scene has been set for something of a ‘turf war’ between Hindu extremists and Naxalites.
G. ISSUES ARISING FROM CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE OF KANDHAMAL FAST TRACK COURTS:
We had welcomed the Fast track courts and had high hopes from the two Additional Sessions Judges and the Public prosecutors. We feel betrayed after the lapse of one year. Out of 12 deaths by murder, where judgement is pronounced, there was only one conviction; and accused in 11 deaths are acquitted. Justice, reconciliation and peace remain an unfulfilled objective. There are legitimate fears of impunity on a large scale. Local lawyers suggest that the majority of crimes have not been registered properly by the police, and the majority of cases which reach the courts have resulted in acquittals. There is also widespread evidence of endemic bias and dereliction of duty in the investigation and prosecution of offences. As of now, lawyers in Kandhamal said that of 3,223 complaints submitted to the police; only 831 had been registered as First Information Reports (FIRs). The judicial system in place has been partially successful, but the realities of trying cases in a rural situation amidst widespread fear, combined with poverty and illiteracy, create special needs which the current system is failing to address adequately. Many witnesses or victims are reluctant to testify in court for fear of retribution and lack of confidence in the efficacy of the system, and they have been intimidated and threatened, sometimes by mobs outside courtrooms;
We suggest that the new CV bill take care of the following issues:
1. The Fast Track courts should be set up outside the affected area, preferably in a neighbouring district, and in special cases, in an adjoining state to remove any inference with the course of justice.
2. The Judges appointed should be subjected to review for their performances by superior courts to weed out bigotry and vested interest, if any
3. Special public prosecutors be appointed at government expense out a panel whetted by civil society and survivors-victims
4. Survivor-victims are allowed to arrange their own lawyers to assist the Special PPs.
5. Survivor Victims be allowed to file additional FIRs other than those filed by police suo motu
6. Survivor-Victims’ lawyers be allowed to cross examine defence witness and intervene properly in the judicial court process.
7. Witnesses security and transport be taken care of by government in a foolproof witness protection programme
8. In case of gender violence cases, in camera proceedings be arranged
9. Adequate security be provided in court premises and environments
10. Legal observers / amicus curie be allowed to monitor the course of the trial
11. Special Investigation Teams be set up in case police investigations are found to be inadequate.
John Dayal
Secretary General, All India Christian Council
National Advisory Council meeting 24th June 2010
A. The Christian community, approximately 2.4 per cent of the Indian population, is yet to emerge from the trauma of the violence against it in Kandhamal District of Orissa in 2007 and 2008, which saw mass murder, unprecedented arson, gang rapes and coercive change of religion, among other crimes, and the continuing acts of violence against its members, individual pastors, priests, nuns, institutions, prayer meetings and tract distribution, across the country but more viciously in Karnataka, Orissa, Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Punjab, Uttarakhand, and occasionally even in the National Capital Region of Delhi. This experience is marked by our understanding of the protection given to the aggressors, issues of command responsibility and impunity, and a callous attitude towards Christianity which is seen even in official circles as an alien religion, and its faithful as so much lesser citizens in the exercise of their Constitutional rights. This experience, as much as our empathy with the experiences of our brothers and sisters in the Dalit community, the Tribal people and members of the Sikh and Muslim faiths, guides our understating of communal violence, and our response to the Communal Violence Control and Prevention Bill through its various incarnations from when it was first moved in Parliament in 2005 till the last Cabinet note of December 2009.
The Catholic Bishops Conference of India gave a detailed note to the Government some time ago. On behalf of the All India Christian Council, its office bearers also conveyed to Government our feelings. Other denominations and groups have also communicated with the government. The Christian community consists of several ecclesiastical groups and denominations, apart from ranging across all linguistic and ethnic groups in the country as is proper for its 2,000 year old history of existence in this great country.
It may be mentioned that we entirely support the major recommendations made by the Muslim community groups and by concerned Civil society. We strongly feel any Law to be relevant must empower the people, specially the survivor-victims. It must in no way further empower the State and the political apparatus to harass religious minorities.
This note therefore covers not just the experience of the Catholic and Episcopal groups in all their diversity as already enunciated by them, but also the experiences and needs if the membership of the All India Christian Council from the Evangelical and Pentecost churches, Independent Church groups and pastors, and above all, the common Christians, specially Tribal and Dalits, who may worship in their house, or go to a Church, and who are untied in their faith in the Salvation assured by Jesus Christ.
B. Needless to say, the proposed CV Bill is ignorant of the diversity of the minority communities, and specifically of the following issues of the Christian Community.
1. Dalit Christians: 60 per cent of all Christians in India trace their origins from the Dalit communities, now called the Scheduled Castes. They live with their fellow Indians in Dalit colonies, semi urban hovels, and village Cheris. They are subject to all atrocities faced by the others. In addition, they are targeted for being Christians, taunted, vilified and subject to sustained hate campaigns. And yet they do not get the hope or the security provided by anti-atrocity laws, or other provisions of the IPC.
2. TRIBALS: A large number of tribals are Christinas in the States of Rajasdthan, Madhya Pradesh, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Andhra, Chhatisgarh, Orissa and Jharkhand, apart from the Tribals of the North-Eastern region. The tribals of the so-called Chhotanagpur region particularly suffer from administrative and communal action, and find little or no recourse in the law. The experience in Kandhamal has brought this to the fore.
3. PLACES OF WORSHIP: While large cathedrals are landmarks in cities, the churches in small towns and villages may be just a kutcha hut or a log cabin. Often, both in Catholic and Protestant traditions, prayers are held within the house together with family members and neighbours. Sometimes, prayers are also held in the open on Sundays and other special days. Increasingly house churches have been targeted and often the police has been a party to the violence.
4. VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN: Nuns of the Catholic, Orthodox and of some Episcopal churches, as well as wives of Evangelical and Independent pastors have been particularly targeted in Madhya Pradesh, up to and including gang grape and sexual coercion, with the police entirely inactive, if not complicit. The Nuns can be identified at a distance and are therefore vulnerable all the more.
5. DIFFUSED POPULATION: Apart from certain districts, the Christian population is widely dispersed, and ingle families or a small cluster becomes very vulnerable.
6. PATTERN OF VIOLENCE: Though populations are dispersed in the major states – barring Kerala, Meghalaya, Nagaland and Goa, -- the violence is consistent. And yet authorities, especially the police dismiss it as “sporadic” unrelated and unconnected violence. The overall Pattern of Violence is never taken into account while taking preventive or curative measures.
7. HATE CAMPAIGNS: For the last forty years, there has been a consistent and sustained hate campaign against Christians, often officially supported. Where huge temples exist in government building and even in police stations, it is perhaps difficult to expect a secular approach from subordinate officials and policemen. The hate campaign in media is supported by partisanship in the district administration, further aggravating the communal harmony in those regions. These include refusal to distribute religious tracts and refusal of permission to sell or distribute Bibles, permission for holding Healing Ministries and Prayer meetings on public or private grounds and fields, and mis-reporting in the mass media painting the Christians in a negative light.
The following is an internal commentary by the All India Christian Council and its expert associates, which takes into account the above and assesses the new Bill with its suggestions.
C. OUR OBSERVATIONS ON THE CV BILL
The government has proposed a law to prevent control and deal with the aftermath of communal violence, which would include caste-based or religiously-motivated violence. Communal violence is recognised as a problem which runs deeper than simply undermining law and order. The UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief echoed the NCM in emphasising that communal violence is most likely to occur in a situation in which the following elements are present:
• Long-standing antagonism along religious lines;
• A specific occurrence triggering an emotional response among members of religious communities;
• A sense among perpetrators and the religious community to which they belong that communal violence is justifiable;
• A sense among perpetrators that the reaction of police to communal violence would be absent, partisan or ineffective.
The Communal Violence (Prevention, Control and Rehabilitation of Victims) Bill, 2009, was first introduced on 26 November 2005, and has undergone a series of revisions, which include the adoption of a number of recommendations issued by the NCM. It is expected to be introduced in the Lok Sabha in 2010, having received Cabinet approval in December 2009.
PROVISIONS:
The purpose of the Bill is outlined in the Statement of Objects and Reasons:
“Communal violence threatens the secular fabric, unity, integrity and internal security of a nation. With a view to empowering the State Governments and the Central Government to take effective measures to provide for the prevention and control of communal violence and to rehabilitate the victims of such violence, for speedy investigation and trial of offences including imposition of enhanced punishments, than those provided in the Indian Penal Code, on persons involved in communal violence and for matters connected therewith, it has been decided to enact a law by Parliament.”
The current version of the Bill sets out a series of measures to these ends, and includes the following provisions:
• Article 3(1) groups a number of offences under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and other laws in a schedule. If one or more of these offences are committed “in such manner and on such a scale which involves the use of criminal force or violence against any group, caste or community, resulting in grievous hurt, loss of life, or extensive damage or destruction of property” and where “such use of criminal force or violence is committed with a view to create disharmony or feelings of enmity, hatred or ill-will between different groups, castes or communities”, resulting in an imminent “threat to the secular fabric, integrity, unity or internal security of India”, a state government is required to notify this as a “communally disturbed area”.
• Article 4 specifies that a state government may request the central government to deploy armed forces in these circumstances.
• Article 5 provides for preventative measures to be taken by a district magistrate prior to any outbreak of communal violence.
• Articles 6-10 provide for preventative measures to be taken by the “competent authority” after an area has been designated as communally disturbed.
• Articles 11-16 proscribe and stipulate punishments for certain acts associated with communal violence, including possessing weapons or threatening witnesses;
• Article 17 stipulates punishments for public servants or competent authorities who act in a mala fide manner or wilfully fail to exercise lawful authority, and thereby fail to prevent communal violence.
• Article 19 provides that punishments stipulated for scheduled offences must be doubled if the offences are committed on a scale and in a manner which constitute communal violence.
• Article 21 provides for the declaration of police stations within the scheduled area, and for the provision of women police officers to investigate scheduled offences committed against women or children.
• Article 22 provides for the review of cases where the investigating officer does not file a charge sheet within three months of a First Information Report (FIR) being registered.
• Article 23 provides for the constitution of “Special Investigation Teams” if the state government believes the investigation of offences was not carried out in a fair and impartial manner.
• Articles 24-37 provide for the establishment and procedure of “Special Courts” for the trial of scheduled offences, and for the appointment of public prosecutors. Article 32 provides for concealing the identities of witnesses testifying before a special court.
• Articles 38-41 provide for the creation and functions of a “State Communal Disturbance Relief and Rehabilitation Council” by the relevant state government, including several ex officio members and several members nominated by the state government, including representatives of all major religious communities. Article 40 stipulates the functions of the council in planning relief efforts, including advising the state government on compensation and the establishment of relief camps, taking a range of remedial measures for the welfare of victims and the reparation of damage, recommending measures for activating a “district communal harmony committee” and reporting to the government on shortcomings in remedial measures. Article 41 stipulates the preparation of a plan “for promotion of communal harmony and prevention of communal violence” to be recommended for adoption by the council to the state government.
• Articles 42-44 provide for the creation and functions of a district equivalent of the state committee, to act as the implementing body for relief and rehabilitation measures.
• Articles 45-48 provide for the creation and functions of a national equivalent of the state committee, with responsibilities including advising relevant state governments on relief, rehabilitation and compensation and making recommendations to the central government.
• Articles 49-52 provide for state governments to establish schemes for the compensation of victims of communal violence.
• Articles 53-54 provide for the payment of compensation for damages by offenders.
• Articles 55-56 set out special powers of the central government to deal with communal violence. These include directing the
relevant state government to take appropriate measures, and declaring a “communally disturbed area” if the state fails to do so when necessary, and deploying armed forces under the authority of the central government.
• Article 58 provides that there should be no discrimination in the provision of relief or compensation “on the ground of sex, caste, community, descent or religion”.
D. OUR CRITIQUE:
The principle of a CV Bill has been welcomed by religious minorities in India, and it has the potential to add positively to India’s excellent body of legislation protecting against acts of discrimination or prejudicial violence. However, there exist legitimate concerns about the effectiveness of the 2005 and the 2009 drafts of the Bill, which have been voiced by civil society and religious minority organisations, by the NCM and by the UN Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief in the report of her 2008 visit to India. The Special Rapporteur recommended specifically that the legislation “should take into account the concerns of religious minorities” (paragraph 67).
The most serious, substantive and prominent concerns about the Bill in its current form include the following:
1. The Bill does not define “communal violence” adequately, and therefore cannot protect against it effectively. Firstly, it construes communal violence as disharmony between two different communities, or mass rioting by one community against another, but it does not recognise the process by which communal tension or hatred is incited, and it does not recognise the phenomenon of state complicity in the incitement or execution of communal violence. Secondly, the premise of the “communally disturbed area” does not do justice to the reality of communal violence as experienced by some religious minorities, especially Christians: certain states see frequent, well-targeted, single incidents of religiously-motivated violence, which are often orchestrated by extremist organisations, and this pattern of violence would not be addressed under the provisions of the Bill. Thirdly, the Bill inadequately covers the possible range of offences which might constitute “communal violence” (including specific forms of sexual violence), and the implications of this context for evidentiary standards in the investigative process.
2. The Bill does not provide for sufficient safeguards against the poor or discriminatory exercise of power by those responsible for protecting the rights of victims, which is a recurrent problem in cases of communal violence. The Special Rapporteur noted that civil society organisations have “voiced their concern that the sweeping powers given by the Bill to state governments could be misused to intimidate members of the minority community” (paragraph 40). Article 17 provides for the prosecution of public servants for the dereliction of duty, but this requires the prior sanction of the state government, and if the state government is complicit in (or not unfavourable towards) the communal violence, it becomes extremely unlikely that discriminatory behaviour or the dereliction of duty by public servants will be prosecuted. Article 22 of the Bill provides for the review of every case in which the investigating officer does not file a charge sheet within three months of an FIR being registered, but this may be circumvented by the common tactic whereby police officers fail to register FIRs according to proper procedure. Article 57, the so-called “good faith” clause, provides immunity for officials; however, the standard of mens rea, or command responsibility, should be enshrined in the Bill, so that superior authorities are held accountable for the unlawful activities of their subordinates. The NCM made a number of relevant additional recommendations to increase accountability: That the reports of any commissions of inquiry should be made public as a matter of course; that the National Human Rights Commission should be mandated to monitor the performance of special courts; and that those found guilty of involvement in communal violence should be debarred permanently from government jobs and from contesting any office.
3. The Bill should provide additional measures to protect witnesses or victims from intimidation. Article 15 criminalises acts which threaten witnesses, and Article 32 provides that the identity of witnesses may be concealed. However, the Bill should draw upon the guidelines of the Supreme Court and recommendations of the Law Commission. It would be strengthened considerably by providing for the police protection of witnesses at risk of threat or intimidation. Incentivising witnesses by providing travel and maintenance expenses (as recommended in Article 21(2)(ii) of The Scheduled Castes and the Scheduled Tribes (Prevention of Atrocities) Act), would further protect against witnesses preferring to stay silent rather than risking intimidation as a consequence of giving evidence. In addition, the rights of persons displaced into camps as a result of communal violence, as outlined in Article 40(b), should be in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Internal Displacement, including the provision of education to displaced children (principle 23) and ensuring that camps continue until the establishment of suitable conditions and the means for the displaced persons to return voluntarily, in safety and with dignity, to their homes, or to resettle voluntarily (principle 28).
4. The Bill should set out a uniform, binding scheme for the provision of compensation to victims of communal violence, to address the inconsistencies shown in previous cases. It should establish the rights of victims or their dependents to financial compensation, and should also provide compensation to rebuild places of worship damaged or destroyed as a result of communal violence. This was among the recommendations of the NCM not included among the amendments in the 2009 version of the Bill.
E. Aftermath of 2008 anti-Christian violence in Orissa
In August to October 2008, Orissa witnessed the worst spate of communal violence ever faced by the Christian community in post-independence India, including brutal murders and rapes, widespread destruction of churches and property, and forcible conversions to Hinduism. The attacks, centred in Kandhamal district, were catalysed by the assassination on 23 August 2008 of Lakshmananda Saraswati, local head of the radical Hindu nationalist group VHP, by assailants believed to have been Maoists. On 24 August, when his remains were paraded around the district, mobs began setting up roadblocks, shouting Hindu nationalist and violent anti-Christian slogans, openly blaming Christians for the murder and calling for revenge as they attacked Christian targets. Although rural poverty and underlying issues of ethnic tensions over entitlements in Kandhamal played a role in the violence, these were not the primary causes but provided a context for the radicalisation of one community and the incitement of violence. The Orissa chief minister publicly acknowledged the role of extremist Hindu nationalist organisations in the violence in the legislative assembly for the first time in November 2009.
The violence which started in August 2008 continued for over eight weeks. At least 50,000 were displaced and 70 were killed; among the victims were Hindus opposing the rioters. Widespread anti-Christian attacks had also taken place in Kandhamal in December 2007, impunity for which laid the foundations for the second more serious wave of violence in 2008. The state government failed to implement detailed recommendations made by India’s NCM in early 2008.
F. SOCIAL CONTEXT:
Rural poverty is endemic in southern Orissa, the area in which the violence was centred, and the rural poverty ratio actually increased in this area during the period 1983-2000. There exist deep underlying issues of entitlement in Kandhamal, which created a context for the instigation of the 2008 violence: one such issue is the classification of Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities, which was formalised in 1950. Both communities trace their ancestry to the indigenous inhabitants of the land, and constitute a single ethnic, linguistic and cultural group. However, Kandhamal is designated as a ‘Scheduled Area’ under the provision of the fifth schedule of the constitution, and as such, certain entitlements are reserved for the Scheduled Tribes, including freehold (patta) ownership of land. This is a potential cause of tension between Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes. Moreover, Christians of Scheduled Caste background or ancestry are not eligible to the same entitlements as Scheduled Castes (see section 4.3 above). It is in the interest of those Scheduled Castes who profess Christianity to be reclassified as Scheduled Tribes, as this would reverse their double disenfranchisement, so tensions among Scheduled Castes and Scheduled Tribes can therefore take on a religious colouring in the right circumstances.
Although these factors of ethnicity and entitlement provided a context for the violence, it is important to emphasise that Christians in the area have been drawn from both Scheduled Caste and Scheduled Tribe communities. During the violence, Christians from both communities were attacked.
The extremist Hindu nationalist presence in Kandhamal has played upon existing sensitivities, and co-opted them onto a religious nationalist template. Extremist Hindu nationalists have been operational in the area for around 40 years, and they originate from a non-indigenous, caste Hindu, trader community. Their agenda has been the preservation of Hindu purity, including the prevention of cow slaughter and of religious conversions. Christians, as the largest religious minority in the area, constitute a threatening ‘other’, and provide a ready scapegoat.
The local prominence of Naxalites, or Maoist insurgents, creates an additional layer of complication. Naxalites were almost certainly responsible for the assassination of Swami Lakshmananda Saraswati, which precipitated the mass violence against Christians. There are numerous theories about the Naxalites’ motivation for the murder, one of which is that it was an act of retribution against his activities, and that it was calculated to gain support from disenfranchised people in the area, including Christians. The palpable absence of state machinery from the area, means that the scene has been set for something of a ‘turf war’ between Hindu extremists and Naxalites.
G. ISSUES ARISING FROM CHRISTIAN EXPERIENCE OF KANDHAMAL FAST TRACK COURTS:
We had welcomed the Fast track courts and had high hopes from the two Additional Sessions Judges and the Public prosecutors. We feel betrayed after the lapse of one year. Out of 12 deaths by murder, where judgement is pronounced, there was only one conviction; and accused in 11 deaths are acquitted. Justice, reconciliation and peace remain an unfulfilled objective. There are legitimate fears of impunity on a large scale. Local lawyers suggest that the majority of crimes have not been registered properly by the police, and the majority of cases which reach the courts have resulted in acquittals. There is also widespread evidence of endemic bias and dereliction of duty in the investigation and prosecution of offences. As of now, lawyers in Kandhamal said that of 3,223 complaints submitted to the police; only 831 had been registered as First Information Reports (FIRs). The judicial system in place has been partially successful, but the realities of trying cases in a rural situation amidst widespread fear, combined with poverty and illiteracy, create special needs which the current system is failing to address adequately. Many witnesses or victims are reluctant to testify in court for fear of retribution and lack of confidence in the efficacy of the system, and they have been intimidated and threatened, sometimes by mobs outside courtrooms;
We suggest that the new CV bill take care of the following issues:
1. The Fast Track courts should be set up outside the affected area, preferably in a neighbouring district, and in special cases, in an adjoining state to remove any inference with the course of justice.
2. The Judges appointed should be subjected to review for their performances by superior courts to weed out bigotry and vested interest, if any
3. Special public prosecutors be appointed at government expense out a panel whetted by civil society and survivors-victims
4. Survivor-victims are allowed to arrange their own lawyers to assist the Special PPs.
5. Survivor Victims be allowed to file additional FIRs other than those filed by police suo motu
6. Survivor-Victims’ lawyers be allowed to cross examine defence witness and intervene properly in the judicial court process.
7. Witnesses security and transport be taken care of by government in a foolproof witness protection programme
8. In case of gender violence cases, in camera proceedings be arranged
9. Adequate security be provided in court premises and environments
10. Legal observers / amicus curie be allowed to monitor the course of the trial
11. Special Investigation Teams be set up in case police investigations are found to be inadequate.
John Dayal
Secretary General, All India Christian Council
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