“Godhra”. The word is more than just the name of a town located in Panchmahal district in the western Indian state of Gujarat. The word used also indicates an event. A mind-numbing one. A horrifying one. An unimaginable one. A barbaric one. The word “Godhra” records the gruesome killing of some 59 innocent people, including 25 women and 15 children and injuries to 40. Independent India saw many horrors. This was one of the worst of them.
This mind-numbing horror was also the cause of many more horrors, many more events, many more riots, many more political changes. It was also the immediate cause of rioting, which left some 1169 people dead (including those killed in police firing, and assuming all missing as dead).
But this was not the first time, nor the last time, that Godhra witnessed communal vandalism. The town had a long history of bloody communalism. It was well-known for it. Let us take a brief look at the town’s long history of communal violence.
Communal history of Godhra for the record
Panchmahal district, in which Godhra is located, is considered to be communally very sensitive. Chronology of a few communal riots/atrocities, as reported by various sources is appended below:
1928: Murder of P.M. Shah, a leading local representative of Hindus.
1946: Mr. Sadva Hazi and Mr. Chudighar, pro-Pakistani Muslim leaders were responsible for attack on a Parsi Solapuri Fozdar during communal riots. After partition, Mr. Chudighar left for Pakistan.
1948: Mr. Sadva Hazi conspired an attack on the District Collector, Mr. Pimputkar in 1948 but his bodyguard saved him at the cost of his own life. After that, Mr. Sadva Hazi also left for Pakistan in 1948.
On 24th March, 1948, one Hindu was stabbed to death near a mosque in Jahurpur area. Around 2,000 houses of Hindus (including at least 869 initially) were reportedly burnt, besides Hindu temples. After this, 3000 Muslim houses were also burnt. District Collector Pimputkar could save the remaining areas belonging to Hindus by imposing curfew, which lasted for six months.
1965: Shops belonging to the Hindus were set ablaze near police chowki No. 7 by throwing incendiary material from the nearby two Muslim houses, viz. Bidani and Bhopa. It could be possible allegedly because of the Congress MLA belonging to the minority community. His name was Taherali Abdulali, who had won the 1962 Assembly elections from Godhra. PSI of this police chowki, which was near the Railway Station, was also attacked by anti-social elements.
1980: A similar attack was made on the Hindus on 29 October, 1980, which started from the Bus Station of Godhra. This attack was planned by Muslim miscreants who were involved in anti-social activities near the Station Road area.
Five Hindus including two children of five and seven years of age were burnt alive. A Gurudwara was also set on fire, in Shikari Chal of this area. Forty shops belonging to the Hindus were also set on fire in station area. Due to these communal riots, Godhra was put under curfew for one year, which severely affected the business and industries.
1990: Four Hindu teachers, including two women teachers, were murdered (cut into pieces) by miscreants in Saifia Madarsa in Vhorvada area of Godhra on 20 November 1990 in front of children. One Hindu tailor was also stabbed to death in this area. All this was done by anti-social elements allegedly at the instance of the former Congress MLA of the area, Khalpa Abdulrahim Ismail who was the Godhra MLA (of Congress) from 1975 to 1990.
1992: More than 100 houses belonging to Hindus were set on fire near the Railway Station to snatch away this area from Hindus. This area in 2002 was lying vacant as most of the Hindu families had shifted elsewhere.
2002: The bogies of Ahmedabad-bound Sabarmati Express were set on fire on 27 February 2002 by Muslims. S-6 coach carrying karsewaks returning from Ayodhya was targeted as a pre-meditated plan/ conspiracy. 59 innocent men, women and children died and 40 sustained injuries. The attackers had a plan to set on fire the entire train but could not do so because the train was late for four hours and they could not take the advantage of darkness of night.
(Source: Vishwa Sanwad Kendra, Gujarat and The Indian Express dated 30 April 2002 http://archive.indianexpress.com/storyOld.php?storyId=1822, quoting Gujarat’s then MoS for Home Gordhan Zadaphiya)
2003 September: Ganesh idol immersion saw stone pelting and conflicts between Hindus and Muslims. This was reported by rediff.com and The Times of India, but was forgotten by everyone, including the Sangh Parivar leadership. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/riots-in-godhra-during-ganpati-immersions/articleshow/167494.cms
2002 March: On 13 March 2002, a mob of 500 Muslims again attacked Hindus in Jahurpura area of Godhra near the Old Bus Stand. The report of NDTV was:
“Mob Attack in Godhra, 12 Arrested
Wednesday, March 13, 2002 (Godhra): Within a fortnight of the February 27 railway station mayhem and subsequent violent fallout, tension escalated again today with a minority mob allegedly attacking people in the town, leading to police firing. Police said a ‘500-people strong mob of minority community’ attacked people in the Jahurpura area near the Old Bus Stand. They resorted to stone pelting and also ‘opened fire’ with private arms, police said. Police opened fire and hurled tear gas shells to disperse the mob. There was no report of any injury or casualty so far.
Additional forces of police, State Reserve Police and anti-riot Rapid Action Force (RAF) personnel led by senior DSP, Raju Bhargava, rushed to the spot and carried out a combing operation. ‘Twelve persons including two women were picked up from a nearby place of worship,’ police said. The situation was under control but tense, police said”.
Thus Muslims attacked Hindus in Godhra again soon after the 27th February carnage. The Times of India also reported this PTI news, and it can be read today at http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Mob-attacks-people-in-Godhra-12-arrested/articleshow/3682215.cms
All the above details of Godhra (except the 2003 stone pelting and mob attack of March 2002) are also mentioned in an article written on 16 March 2002 titled “Godhra in Ferment even before Independence” published in the Milli Gazette magazine. (Source: http://www.milligazette.com/Archives/15042002/1504200276.htm).
This magazine is considered as a voice of Muslims in India. This is the Indian Muslims’ leading English newspaper and it has also published these details about Godhra.
After the 2002 Godhra carnage, the Nanavati Commission was appointed to probe the carnage which was a full-fledged Commission of Inquiry under the Commission of Inquiry Act, 1952. It submitted its report on the Godhra carnage in September 2008. The report said: “Godhra town is a very sensitive place. There is a high percentage of Muslim population in various places in the district. Communal riots had taken place in Godhra in the years 1925, 1928, 1946, 1948, 1950, 1953, 1980, 1981, 1985, 1986, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991 and 1992. The communal riots that had taken place in 1948 were very serious. Initially, the Muslims had burnt 869 houses of Hindus. Thereafter, the Hindus had burnt 3,071 houses of Muslims”.
The whole report can be read at:
http://www.home.gujarat.gov.in/homedepartment/downloads/godharaincident.pdf
Mahatma Gandhi (1869-1948) had also written about the Muslim communalism in Godhra. The following are the exact words of Gandhiji in Young India, 11 October 1928:
“Two weeks ago, I wrote in Navajivan a note on the tragedy in Godhra, where Shri Purshottam Shah bravely met his death at the hands of his assailants and gave my note the heading Hindu-Muslim Fight in Godhra. Several Hindus did not like the heading and addressed angry letters asking me to correct it (for it was a one sided fight). I found it impossible to accede to their demand. Whether there is one victim or more, whether there is a free fight between the two communities, or whether one assumes the offensive and the other simply suffers, I should describe the event as a fight if the whole series of happenings were the result of a state of war between the two communities. Whether in Godhra or in other places, there is today a state of war between the two communities. Fortunately, the countryside is still free from the war fever (no longer now) which is mainly confined to towns and cities, where, in some form or the other, fighting is continually going on. Even the correspondents, who have written to me about Godhra, do not seem to deny the fact that the happenings arose out of the communal antagonisms that existed there.
If the correspondents had simply addressed themselves to the heading, I should have satisfied myself with writing to them privately and written nothing in Navajivan about it. But there are other letters in which the correspondents have vented their ire on different counts. A volunteer from Ahmedabad, who had been to Godhra, writes:
“You say that you must be silent over these quarrels. Why were you not silent over the Khilafat, and why did you exhort us to join the Muslims? Why are you not silent about your principles of Ahimsa? How can you justify your silence when the two communities are running at each other’s throats and Hindus are being crushed to atoms? How does Ahimsa come there? I invite your attention to two cases:
A Hindu shopkeeper, thus, complained to me: ‘Musalmans purchase bags of rice from my shop, often never paying for them. I cannot insist on payment, for fear of their looting my godowns. I have, therefore, to make an involuntary gift of about 50 to 70 maunds of rice every month?’
Others complained: ‘Musalmans invade our quarters and insult our women in our presence, and we have to sit still. If we dare to protest, we are done for. We dare not even lodge a complaint against them.’
What would you advise in such cases? How would you bring your Ahimsa into play? Or, even here you would prefer to remain silent!”
These and similar other questions have been answered in these pages over and over again, but as they are still being raised, I had better explain my views once more at the risk of repetition.
Ahimsa is not the way of the timid or the cowardly. It is the way of the brave ready to face death. He who perishes sword in hand is, no doubt, brave, but he who faces death without raising his little finger, is braver. But he who surrenders his rice bags for fear of being beaten, is a coward and no votary of Ahimsa. He is innocent of Ahimsa. He, who for fear of being beaten, suffers the women of his household to be insulted, is not manly, but just the reverse. He is fit neither to be a husband nor a father, nor a brother. Such people have no right to complain.
…Where there are fools there are bound to be knaves, where there are cowards there are bound to be bullies, whether they are Hindus or Mussalmans…The question here therefore is not how to teach one of the two communities a lesson or how to humanize it, but how to teach a coward to be brave…”
Thus, it is clear that Gandhiji mentioned the murder of Purshottam Shah, which happened in 1928. It shows that Muslims were ever aggressive against Hindus in Godhra- taking rice bags without paying, and insulting Hindu women after invading their quarters. These statements of Mahatma Gandhi can also be read in his Collected Works, Volume 43, pages 81-82.
http://www.gandhiashramsevagram.org/gandhi-literature/mahatma-gandhi-collected-works-volume-43.pdf
The entire happenings in Godhra—How the massacre occurred
Having seen Godhra’s history of violence, let us now see the exact horrible, lurid details of the massacre of 27 February 2002 with the background.
The Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) had organized a ‘Purnahuti Yagya’ in the holy Hindu city of Ayodhya in February-March 2002. It declared 15th March 2002 as the date for the beginning of the construction of Ram temple at Ayodhya. People participating in this ‘Yagya’ had simply participated and gone home. They did not stay in Ayodhya until 15 March 2002 for the construction of the Ram temple in Ayodhya at the undisputed site (majority of the undisputed land was owned by VHP and affiliated bodies and the Supreme Court of India in its order of 1994 had said that the undisputed land can be given to its owners).
People from all parts of the country went to Ayodhya, participated in this event, i.e. the Purnahuti Yagya and returned home from mid-February to 27 February 2002. A trainload of such people called ‘karsevaks’ or ‘Ramsevaks’ were returning to Ahmedabad in Gujarat from Ayodhya after participating in the Purnahuti Yagya. Whether they were all members of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad or just ordinary people supporting the VHP’s stance on the Ram temple in Ayodhya is not known to the author.
The train, the Sabarmati Express was supposed to reach Ahmedabad early in the morning. It was running more than four hours late (Source: India Today, dated 11th March 2002). Shortly after the train left the Godhra railway station at 7: 48 a.m., a mob (the estimates of the numbers of which have ranged from 500 to 2000) stopped it. This was 500-700 meters away from the Godhra railway station, at Signal Falia area. The train was not burnt at the railway station, but at Signal Falia. That is why the attackers could not burn the train from outside. Had it been on a railway platform, they would not have found it too high. But at Signal Falia, it was too high. Hence, some of them entered the train cutting the vestible from the side coach no. S-7 and set it afire from inside and then went out again.
The mob was reportedly armed with petrol bombs, acid bombs and swords. The attackers poured petrol into the compartment and then set it afire. Two thousand people were standing on all sides to prevent the karsevaks from running away and saving their lives from the fire [they stoned the train to ensure that]. The karsevaks were literally caught between devil and the deep sea. There was fire inside and armed Muslim attackers outside. 59 karsevaks were horrifically burnt to death. 57 bodies were recovered in the day on 27 February and a child’s body late night while one injured died on 3 April 2002 to make the toll 59. The bodies were charred. The victims included 15 children, including babies and toddlers and some old people of above 65.
Account of a 16-year-old survivor
Gayatri Panchal, a 16-year-old eleventh class student, was also amongst those who were returning from Ayodhya. She is a surviving witness to the inhuman atrocious cruelty in which right in front of her eyes two of her sisters and parents were burnt alive.
Harshadbhai Panchal, a resident of Ramol in Gujarat, left for karseva at Ayodhya on 22nd February, together with his wife, Nita and three daughters, Pratiksha, Chhaya and Gayatri. His sister-in-law, her son, her neighbour Poojaben and her would-be husband were also accompanying him.
Harshadbhai and his family, Poojaben and her husband were in one compartment, while his sister-in-law and her husband and their son were in another compartment. The only survivor out of these ten, Gayatri, says about this horrible event that:
“On the 27th morning, at around 8 a.m. the train left Godhra Station. The karsevaks were loudly chanting the Ram Dhoon. The train had hardly gone a few meters, when it suddenly stopped. Somebody had perhaps pulled the chain to stop the train. Before anybody could know what had happened, we saw a huge mob approaching the train. People were carrying weapons like Gupti, Spears, Swords and such other deadly weapons in their hands and were throwing stones at the train. We all got frightened and somehow closed the windows and the doors of the compartment. People outside were shouting loudly, saying ‘Maro, Kato’ and were attacking the train. A loudspeaker from the Masjid (i.e. Mosque) closeby was also very loudly shouting ‘Maro, Kato, Laden na dushmano ne Maro.’ (“Cut, kill, kill the enemies of Laden”) These attackers were so fierce that they managed to break the windows and close the doors from outside before pouring petrol inside and setting the compartment on fire so that nobody could escape alive. A number of attackers entered the compartment and were beating the karsevaks and looting their belongings. The compartments were drenched in petrol all over. We were terrified and were shouting for help but who was there to help us? A few policemen were later seen approaching the compartment but they were also whisked away by the furious mob outside. There was so much of smoke in the compartment that we were unable to see each other and also getting suffocated. Going out was too difficult, however, myself and Pooja somehow managed to jump out through the windows. Pooja was hurt in her back and was unable to stand up. People outside were trying to hold us to take us away but we could escape and run under the burning train and succeeded in crawling towards the cabin. I have seen my parents and sisters being burnt alive right in front of my eyes.” Luckily, Gayatri was not hurt too badly. “We somehow managed to go up to the station and meet our aunty (Masi). After the compartments were completely burnt, the crowd started withering. We saw that even amongst them were men, women and youngsters like us, both male and female. I returned here after evacuating the dead bodies of my family members at Godhra Station. Out of 18 of us, ten had laid their lives.”
Gayatri’s father was a carpenter, whereas her mother worked in the Madhyanha Bhojan Yojna (i.e. Mid-day meal scheme). Her elder sister, Pratiksha was serving in the Collectorate. In spite of what had happened, Gayatri still feels that she would any time once again venture to go for karseva. She says, “I shall not allow the sacrifice of my parents to go in vain.” (Source: VSK, Gujarat and various English dailies such as The Indian Express dated 28th February 2002)
Some foreign dailies reported quoting the Associated Press:
“Sixteen-year-old Gayatri Panchal saw her mother, father and two sisters die before her eyes in the train fire as they returned home after participating in a religious ceremony at Ayodhya.
‘… I saw flames everywhere. My mother was in flames, her clothes were on fire,’ she said. ‘Someone pulled me out of the compartment and then I saw my father’s body being taken out. He was covered in black. Then I fainted.’” https://www.mrt.com/news/article/Violence-Spreads-Across-Indian-State-7754265.php
A Dalit karsevak, Umakant Govindbhai of Saijpur was 25 years of age and working in the Collector’s Office. Umakant, who was trying to break the closed door and get away, was pelted with stones by the attackers and pushed with the bamboos inside the coach according to an article by Dr. Suvarna Raval in Marathi daily Tarun Bharat dated 21 July 2002.
The Times of India reported one year later, on 27 February 2003:
“For the four Panchal sisters — Komal (20), Avani (19), Gayatri (17) and Priyanka (15) — the last year has been full of tears. Their father Harshad Panchal, mother Mita Panchal, sisters Pratiksha and Chhaya fell prey to the barbarity in Godhra on February 27. And, life was never the same again.
The result. Gayatri, a topper in SSC, today is sickly and struggling with education at grade XII. Lost without their parents the girls often go to bed in tears, as memories of the tragedy come flooding back every day. Said Komal, ‘We are trying to get on with life but it is difficult. Life seems meaningless without the love and affection of parents.’”
This sort of massacre was not seen anywhere in independent India. Nor could this compare with any other event—such as the murder of Indira Gandhi, or any of the brutal murders of political opponents in Kannur district of Kerala state of India, which is known for violent clashes. The terrorist attack on the Akshardham temple of 24 September 2002 or various other attacks on temples in India or bomb blasts in various places could, in no way, compare with this horrific massacre.
Godhra was not an act of sudden eruption of violence or terrorism. Many say it was terrorism. But terrorism is completely different. The terror is temporary, the pain is momentary. Indira Gandhi (1917-1984) was shot dead by bullets. Murders occurring anywhere are mostly the result of stabbing or bullet shots.
But Godhra was not that. It was much worse. It was an act of a pre-meditated conspiracy of barbarism and not real terrorism. Godhra was not done by one or two terrorists. It was done by a mob, a mass mob of 500+ people, ordinary people, not terrorists undergone training in training camps. Not terrorists armed with AK-47, AK-56 rifles or grenades. They were locals, not foreigners. The local Muslims did the barbaric, communal and sadistic act of Godhra to further a premeditated plan.
The reaction of the English media
The rioting in Gujarat in the first three days after Godhra was a result of not just the massacre at Godhra. It was the result of something else, namely the reaction of the Left- liberal-secular media and politicians.
The media in general and TV channels like Star News and NDTV (who then had a partnership) in particular, almost all English newspaper editors of the print media, and almost all non-BJP, non-Shiv Sena politicians belong to this Left-liberal-secular brigade. And almost every non-BJP leader, who came on TV on 27 February 2002 in India, rubbed salt into the wounds of the anguished people. This was done by rationalizing or justifying the Godhra carnage. The foreign newspapers were worse than the Indian media, as we will see later.
At that time, Vir Sanghvi (1956-) was the Chief Editor of The Hindustan Times. He wrote an article titled “One Way Ticket” in The Hindustan Times on 28 February 2002. He must have written it on 27th February itself, the day of the massacre in Godhra. This is the full text of his article:
“There is something profoundly worrying in the response of what might be called the secular establishment to the massacre in Godhra. Though there is some dispute over the details, we now know what happened on the railway track. A mob of 2,000 people stopped the Sabarmati Express shortly after it pulled out of Godhra station. The train contained several bogeys full of kar sewaks who were on their way back to Ahmedabad after participating in the Poorna Ahuti Yagya at Ayodhya. The mob attacked the train with petrol and acid bombs. According to some witnesses, explosives were also used. Four bogies were gutted and at least 57 people, including over a dozen children, were burnt alive.
Some versions have it that the kar sewaks shouted anti-Muslim slogans; others that they taunted and harassed Muslim passengers. According to these versions, the Muslim passengers got off at Godhra and appealed to members of their community for help. Others say that the slogans were enough to enrage the local Muslims and that the attack was revenge.
It will be some time before we can establish the veracity of these versions, but some things seem clear. There is no suggestion that the kar sewaks started the violence. The worst that has been said is that they misbehaved with a few passengers. Equally, it does seem extraordinary that slogans shouted from a moving train or at a railway platform should have been enough to enrage local Muslims, enough for 2,000 of them to have quickly assembled at eight in the morning, having already managed to procure petrol bombs and acid bombs.
Even if you dispute the version of some of the kar sewaks – that the attack was premeditated and that the mob was ready and waiting – there can be no denying that what happened was indefensible, unforgivable and impossible to explain away as a consequence of great provocation.
And yet, this is precisely how the secular establishment has reacted.
Nearly every non-BJP leader who appeared on TV on Wednesday and almost all of the media have treated the massacre as a response to the Ayodhya movement. This is fair enough in so far as the victims were kar sewaks.
But almost nobody has bothered to make the obvious follow-up point: this was not something the kar sewaks brought on themselves. If a trainload of VHP volunteers had been attacked while returning after the demolition of the Babri Masjid in December 1992, this would still have been wrong, but at least one could have understood the provocation.
This time, however, there has been no real provocation at all. It is possible that the VHP may defy the government and the courts and go ahead with the temple construction eventually. But, as of now, this has not happened. Nor has there been any real confrontation at Ayodhya – as yet.
And yet, the sub-text to all secular commentary is the same: the kar sewaks had it coming to them.
Basically, they condemn the crime; but blame the victims.
Try and take the incident out of the secular construct that we, in India, have perfected and see how bizarre such an attitude sounds in other contexts. Did we say that New York had it coming when the Twin Towers were attacked last year? Then too, there was enormous resentment among fundamentalist Muslims about America’s policies, but we didn’t even consider whether this resentment was justified or not.
Instead we took the line that all sensible people must take: any massacre is bad and deserves to be condemned.
When Graham Staines and his children were burnt alive, did we say that Christian missionaries had made themselves unpopular by engaging in conversion and so, they had it coming? No, of course, we didn’t.
Why then are these poor kar sewaks an exception? Why have we de-humanised them to the extent that we don’t even see the incident as the human tragedy that it undoubtedly was and treat it as just another consequence of the VHP’s fundamentalist policies?
The answer, I suspect, is that we are programmed to see Hindu-Muslim relations in simplistic terms: Hindus provoke, Muslims suffer.
When this formula does not work- it is clear now that a well-armed Muslim mob murdered unarmed Hindus – we simply do not know how to cope. We shy away from the truth – that some Muslims committed an act that is indefensible – and resort to blaming the victims.
Of course, there are always ‘rational reasons’ offered for this stand. Muslims are in a minority and therefore, they deserve special consideration. Muslims already face discrimination so why make it harder for them? If you report the truth then you will inflame Hindu sentiments and this would be irresponsible. And so on. I know the arguments well because – like most journalists – I have used them myself. And I still argue that they are often valid and necessary.
But there comes a time when this kind of rigidly ‘secularist’ construct not only goes too far; it also becomes counter-productive. When everybody can see that a trainload of Hindus was massacred by a Muslim mob, you gain nothing by blaming the murders on the VHP or arguing that the dead men and women had it coming to them.
Not only does this insult the dead (What about the children? Did they also have it coming?), but it also insults the intelligence of the reader. Even moderate Hindus, of the sort that loathe the VHP, are appalled by the stories that are now coming out of Gujarat: stories with uncomfortable reminders of 1947 with details about how the bogies were first locked from outside and then set on fire and how the women’s compartment suffered the most damage.
Any media – indeed, any secular establishment – that fails to take into account the genuine concerns of people risks losing its own credibility. Something like that happened in the mid-Eighties when an aggressive hard secularism on the part of the press and government led even moderate Hindus to believe that they had become second class citizens in their own country. It was this Hindu backlash that brought the Ayodhya movement – till then a fringe activity – to the forefront and fuelled the rise of L.K. Advani’s BJP.
My fear is that something similar will happen once again. The VHP will ask the obvious question of Hindus: why is it a tragedy when Staines is burnt alive and merely an ‘inevitable political development’ when the same fate befalls 57 kar sewaks?
Because, as secularists, we can provide no good answer, it is the VHP’s responses that will be believed. Once again, Hindus will believe that their suffering is of no consequence and will be tempted to see the building of a temple at Ayodhya as an expression of Hindu pride in the face of secular indifference.
But even if this were not to happen, even if there was no danger of a Hindu backlash, I still think that the secular establishment should pause for thought.
There is one question we need to ask ourselves: have we become such prisoners of our own rhetoric that even a horrific massacre becomes nothing more than occasion for Sangh Parivar-bashing?”
URL: http://www.hvk.org/specialreports/guild/1.html
Today it can also be read on Vir Sanghvi’s personal website at http://www.virsanghvi.com/Article-Details.aspx?key=611
When he had written it, no riots had taken place in Gujarat. But his article indicates that he knew that a backlash would take place in Gujarat, after the response of the self-styled secular brigade to Godhra. See his two sentences: “Even moderate Hindus, of the sort that loathe the VHP, are appalled by the stories that are now coming out of Gujarat: stories with uncomfortable reminders of 1947 with details about how the bogies were first locked from outside and then set on fire and how the women’s compartment suffered the most damage” and “My fear is that something similar will happen once again”.
What Vir Sanghvi wrote in that article explains everything, not just about Godhra, but everything that followed after Godhra too. The behavior of the newspaper editors, who call themselves ‘secularists’, on all major issues too is explained by this self-confessed article (such as their response to all major communal riots in India and all clashes between the Hindus and other minorities).
See his statement: “We are programmed to see Hindu-Muslim relations in the simplistic terms: Hindus provoke, Muslims suffer.”
This is the first and biggest admission of pseudo-secularism from Vir Sanghvi, not just for himself, but also for his entire fellow self-styled secularists.
When any person views any happenings in a biased way, i.e., one person suffers and the other provokes, it also shows his moral and mental bankruptcy. Irrespective of whether a VHP member thrashes a Muslim or whether Muslims thrash or burn alive a trainload of VHP members, the self-styled secularist newspaper editors will continue to bash the VHP and hold it responsible for all the troubles. They will not bother to see who has suffered, and try to investigate who is at fault, but simply close their eyes and blame one group, i.e. the Hindu group during the Hindu-Muslim conflicts.
Something similar was said by the great Congress leader, Kanhaiyalal Munshi (1887-1971): “If every time there is an inter-communal conflict, the majority is blamed regardless of the merits of the question… the springs of traditional tolerance will dry up.” (Source: Pilgrimage to Freedom by K.M. Munshi, p. 312 published by Bharatiya Vidya Bhavan).
He also wrote on the same page: “While the majority exercises patience and tolerance, the minorities should learn to adjust themselves to the majority. Otherwise the future is uncertain and an explosion cannot be avoided”.
Inability to judge any situation on merits, whether XYZ person attacked ABC person and killed him, or it was the other way round but simply judge it on the names of the persons, i.e. ABC or XYZ or the identities of the persons, Hindu or Muslim, i.e. ABC provokes and XYZ suffers, shows that the ‘neutral’ observer (in this case, the secularists) is partial with prejudice and jaundiced vision.
In reality, the Hindu-Muslim relations in India have been different. It is, in fact, often a case of the minority community starting the riots. Ganesh Kanate, a staunch anti-BJP and anti-Sangh Parivar journalist with Communist leanings, wrote in his weekly column in the English daily The Hitavada dated 15 August 2003, “Muslims start riots and then suffer heavily in the riots which they themselves start.” Ganesh Kanate too said that Muslims start most of the riots. The report of the Congress’ Home Ministry blamed Muslims for starting 23 out of 24 riots between 1968 and 1970 (in Bhiwandi). This was quoted by the ex-Prime Minister of India Atal Bihari Vajpayee (1924-2018) in Parliament on 14 May 1970. This writer would like to make it clear that he feels that every case should be judged on merit, on who is at fault, without any prejudice against any community.
Dr Koenraad Elst also wrote in his book “BJP Vis-à-vis Hindu resurgence”: “Another example is riot reporting. Riots, though mostly started by Muslims (e.g. the Mumbai riots of December 1992 and of January 1993), are systematically reported in the world media as “pogroms” committed by well-prepared and well-armed Hindu death squads against poor defenceless Muslims. In journalistic and scholarly references, Advani’s peaceful 1990 Rath Yatra has become a proverbially violent “blood yatra”.”
Almost the entire secularist media rationalized Godhra. After rationalizing Godhra, they added that they are by not ‘justifying’ it (for token). To say that they all justified Godhra will be a bit too harsh. But there is absolutely no doubt that they rationalized Godhra and, some of them, partially justified it.
The concocted ‘provocations’
As Vir Sanghvi says, some versions have it that karsevaks shouted anti-Muslim slogans, others that they taunted and harassed Muslim passengers. This too is completely wrong. This was only the detailed part of the provocations. Most of them treated the Godhra massacre as a response to the VHP’s Ram temple agitation. The Ayodhya movement itself was held as a provocation for this massacre.
Weeklies like India Today, The Week, Outlook and fortnightly Frontline also published stark lies on this subject by concocting imaginary provocations such as altercations between karsevaks and the Muslim tea-vendors on the Godhra railway station, or attempted kidnapping of a Muslim girl by the karsevaks at the station, or any number of imaginary details.
Despite knowing fully well that Godhra was a well-planned conspiracy, a large section of the Indian media forcibly did seeking of provocations to defend it as deed done on the spur of the moment. Vir Sanghvi’s The Hindustan Times carried a front-page headline on Godhra on 28th February 2002 titled “Gujarat Hit by Ayodhya Backlash”, i.e. it held that the Ayodhya movement was the main and the biggest cause of the Godhra massacre. So much so that the headline ignored the act and simply reported the ‘provocation’, which too was altogether imaginary. The Hindustan Times did not bother to give the headline as: “58 karsevaks burnt to death in a ghastly attack in Godhra” or something of the sort.
In its editorial on this issue, The Hindu, the largest circulated English daily from South India, said in its issue dated 1st March, 2002:
“Deadly spiral
THE GRISLY GODHRA (Gujarat) episode of arson on Wednesday that left 50-odd passengers of the Sabarmati Express dead—most of them Karsevaks returning from Ayodhya—and the backlash of mindless violence it had triggered elsewhere in the State, as rampaging mobs have in a series of reprisals hit back at the minority community and its properties, are clear, disturbing pointers to the explosive communal build-up across the country as a direct consequence of the VHP’s provocative and destructive campaign for the construction of a Ram temple in Ayodhya. What happened in Godhra, about which there are different and conflicting versions, is a dastardly act and it deserves to be condemned unequivocally and in the strongest of terms, and no provocation can even remotely be brought in to justify the slaughter of innocent people. No effort should be spared by the government to track down the culprits and bring them to justice at the earliest, even as quick measures are taken to ensure that the vicious spiral of violence does not get out of hand and a sense of security is restored among the people.
This said, one cannot but pinpoint the harsh reality that events such as the horrors of Godhra were tragically predictable as a result of the wounding and aggressive communal campaign of the VHP. It has been ruthlessly pursuing its agenda of commencing the temple construction on 15th March, ‘come-what-may’, and whipping up communal passions through mass mobilisation of Ramsevaks—some one million of them—across the country. The whole build-up, which started gaining momentum about a month ago— with the VHP and its Sangh Parivar giving an ultimatum to the Vajpayee Government to handover the so-called ‘undisputed’ part of the acquired land—has been typical of the much-too-familiar strategy of the Sangh Parivar… (The rest of the editorial is full of Sangh Parivar-bashing, and alleges that Advani’s 1990 Rath Yatra saw communal disturbance all along its route)”
Around one week after the Godhra massacre, there was a malicious email circulated, copied from an Islamic website purporting to be a news portal, making horrible character assassinating and fake charges on the dead kar sewaks of Godhra. Prem Shankar Jha revealed this in Outlook dated 25 March 2002. He wrote:
“I am writing this column primarily to keep my promise to a young boy. About a week after the burning of the train at Godhra, a mysterious e-mail began to circulate in places as far apart as Delhi, Mumbai and Ann Arbor, Michigan. It gave what was purportedly the true story of the events that led to the burning of the train at Godhra. This is what the e-mail said:
“The tragic incident of Sabarmati Express that occurred at about 1 km away from Godhra railway station has thrown a question mark to those people who claim to be secular or liberal. Many aspects and facts have been ignored and which I would like to bring to your notice. Compartment no S-6, alongwith two other compartments, of the Sabarmati Express was carrying the kar sevaks of the VHP. And it was due to these kar sevaks from compartment no S-6 that the incident occurred. The actual story didn’t start from Godhra as being told everywhere but it started from a place from Daahod 75 km before Godhra railway station. At about 5:30 to 6:00 am the train reached Daahod railway station. These kar sevaks, after having tea and snacks at the railway stall, broke down the stall after having some argument with the stall owner and they proceeded back to the departing train. The stall owner then filed an NC against kar sevaks at the local police station about the above incident. Then about 7:00 to 7:15 am the train reached Godhra railway station. All the kar sevaks came out from their reserved compartments and started to have tea and snacks, at the small tea stall on the platform, which was being run by an old bearded man from the minority community. There was a servant helping this old man in the stall. The kar sevaks on purpose argued with this old man and then bate him up and pulled his beard. This was all planned to humiliate the old man since he was from the minority community. These kar sevaks kept repeating the slogan, ‘Mandir ka nirmaan karo, Babar ki aulad ko bahar karo‘ (start building the mandir and throw the sons of Babar i.e the Muslims out of the country). Hearing the chaos, the daughter (16) of the old man who was also present at the station came forward and tried to save her father from kar sevaks. She kept pleading and begging to them to stop beating her father and leave him alone. But instead of listening to her woes, the kar sevaks lifted the young girl and took her inside their compartment (S-6) and closed the compartment door shut. The train started to move out of the platform of Godhra railway station. The old man kept banging on the compartment doors and pleaded to leave his daughter. Just before the train could move out completely from the platform, two stall vendors jumped into the last bogey that comes after the guard cabin. And with the intention of saving the girl they pulled the chain and stopped the train. By the time the train halted completely, it was 1 km away from the railway station.
“These two men then came to the bogey in which the girl was and started to bang at the door and requested the kar sevaks to leave the girl alone. Hearing all these chaos, people in the vicinity near to the tracks started to gather towards the train. The boys and the mob (that also included women) that had now gathered near the compartment requested the kar sevaks to return the girl back. But instead of returning the girl, they started closing their windows. This infuriated the mob and they retaliated by pelting stones at the compartment. The compartment adjoining compartment S-6 on both sides contained kar sevaks of the VHP. These kar sevaks were carrying banners that had long bamboo sticks attached to them. These kar sevaks got down and started attacking with bamboo sticks on the mob gathered to save the girl. This was like adding insult to injury for the crowd gathered and their anger was now uncontrollable. The crowd started to bring diesel and petrol from trucks and rickshaws standing at the garages. They didn’t bring the fuel from any petrol pump as being reported everywhere nor was this act of burning pre-planned as being mentioned by many people but it happened all of a sudden out of sheer frustration and anger. After hearing about this incident, member of VHP living in that area started burning down the garages in Signal Fadia, they also burnt down Badshah Masjid, at Shehra Bhagaad (small area in Godhra). Reliable resources have reported all these information and facts to me (and) their information can’t be doubted. I would also mention my sources namely Mr Anil Soni and Neelam Soni (reporters of Gujarat Samachar newspaper and also member of PTI and ANI) have worked hard to dig the true facts and they duly deserve words of appraisal for their hard work.”
The letter then gave Soni’s residential, office and mobile phone numbers. The story was disturbing to say the least. Much of it had already appeared in print. But there were strange inconsistencies. Would kar sevaks force a girl into a compartment occupied by their families? Soni’s mobile number gave the prefix as 0098 and not 098. Lastly, I was familiar with a First Information Report (FIR) but had never heard of an NC. So, I rang up Anil Soni in Godhra to get more details. That was when I got my first surprise. Soni not only categorically denied having ever filed such a story, but also claimed that the contents of the mail were the exact opposite of what had happened. We were interrupted by another phone call (his life was being made miserable by inquiries). The next day when I called him again, he was out but I got his young son Vimal on the line. Vimal told me in great detail what his father had actually found out at the site of the tragedy. He said it was pre-planned and went on to add chilling details that his father had not included in his stories. He ended by entreating me to publicise the fact that his father did not file such a story. I am fulfilling my promise to him.”
https://www.outlookindia.com/magazine/story/the-mystery-e-mail/214976
That was fine. But after that Outlook should have published Anil Soni’s report on Godhra which said that the attack was pre-meditated and that the mob was ready and waiting, and that no one’s stall was destroyed by karsewaks, there was no attempt (successful or unsuccessful) to kidnap any Muslim girl and the train reached Godhra at 7:42 am and not 7 to 7:15 am. Prem Shankar Jha is an extremely anti-BJP, anti-Narendra Modi man. But his article revealed the reality of the mail. But he believed that mail at first, and got a ‘surprise’ when he called Anil Soni to ‘find out more details’. He should have realized that had Anil Soni really filed such a report, it would have appeared in the leading Indian news agency Press Trust of India (PTI) in his name, not in a fake mail, whose contents were obviously false.
Varsha Bhosle wrote on Rediff.com on 11 March 2002:
“… (the fake mail) gave 3 phone numbers of the Sonis. Well, I found Mr Soni at (02672) 40264. He said, “Are you calling up about the emails? That is complete bogus and rubbish. It is the work of my enemies.”
That’s how Islamists work – knowing well what “secularists” *like* to believe.
The portal whence the “news” was lifted proclaims to disseminate “Original Accurate News for the Ummah” and the item in question is written by Rajeel Sheikh and was published on March 2 (which was when I read it, 3 days before dorks sought to enlighten me).”
https://www.rediff.com/news/2002/mar/11varsha.htm
It is only after this malicious and false claim which was first made on an Islamic website [that website alleged that Jews did 9/11, called killings of terrorists in Kashmir as ‘Indian Army’s terrorism’, etc], falsely in the name of a PTI reporter Anil Soni, that the slander of the dead kar sewaks of Godhra reached unimaginably low levels. This claim was sent through numerous emails everywhere, including to British and American newspapers. After this, this claim was copied further by various newspapers in India and abroad, and various weeklies.
The Independent (UK) insulted the dead kar sewaks and made false allegations. The report written by Peter Popham published on 20 March 2002 said:
“…What happened in car S/6 was the hideous finale. The story began nearly 36 hours earlier.
… Many were also drunk or stoned, or equipped to get that way: flexible, tolerant Hinduism has no hard and fast rules about such things. And they were coming back to Gujarat, the only state in the Indian union that is still “dry”. All the more reason to have a bottle or two tucked away.
… The train was late: after a day and a half, it was running four and a half hours behind schedule. That’s why it arrived in Godhra not at 2.55am, as scheduled, but at 7.15am. By this time, the karsevaks were much the worse for wear.
Trouble had started at Dahod station, nearly one hour and 75km up the tracks. The train had reached Dahod around 6am, and a number of karsevaks got out of compartment S/6 to have tea and snacks at a stall on the platform. Already they were drunk and unruly. An argument broke out between the Hindus and the Muslim man running the tea stall – according to one account, they refused to pay unless he chanted “Jai Shri Ram”, the chant of Lord Ram’s devotees. He refused to oblige, and they started to smash up his stall, before climbing back into the carriage. The stallholder filed a complaint with the railway police.
At Godhra, a similar scene ensued. The karsevaks, now noisily drunk, poured on to the platform, ordered more tea and snacks, consumed them, and then made difficulties. Exactly what transpired between the bearded Muslim stallholder and the travellers varies from one account to another. But all witness accounts seen by The Independent agree that there was a row. “They argued with the old man on purpose,” one witness said, on condition of anonymity. “They pulled his beard and beat him up… They kept repeating the slogan ‘mandir ki nirmaan karo, Babar ki aulad ko bahar karo’.” (“Build the temple and throw out the Muslims…”)
Suddenly the row took a dangerous new turn: the karsevaks grabbed hold of a Muslim woman. Her identity, and how she became involved, remain ambiguous, but four different witnesses mention this event. One says it was the 16-year-old daughter of the abused tea-seller. She “came forward and tried to save her father”. Another mentions a woman washing clothes by the railway line being hauled away. A third describes how a Muslim girl wearing a burqa and taking a shortcut to school through the station platform was pounced on and dragged into the carriage. All agree that a Muslim woman was hauled into the carriage by the karsevaks, who slammed the door and would not let her go. Refusing to be quoted by name, a local policeman confirms the story.
And suddenly, what had been just an ugly little fracas, a drunken pantomime of power and subjugation, became something far more explosive.
The karsevaks were too drunk for their own good, or they would have chosen a different station at which to pull such a stunt. Because now the social geography of Godhra came into play.
…Godhra station, to the regret of the Hindus, is located in an area that is now entirely Muslim. And a huddle of Muslim-owned businesses sprang up in shacks alongside the tracks, many of them motor-repair yards. This little slum, known as Signal Fadia, has all the material a riot could require: stacks of bricks, petrol, and paraffin and calor gas cylinders. But it also had the necessary human material: a community impoverished and bitter and surviving on the margins of criminality.
The woman seized by the karsevaks was dragged into compartment S/6, and word of what had happened began to spread. “The girl began screaming for help,” said Ahmed, a wood dealer who was waiting for a train going the other way. “Muslims who were travelling on the train got off. People began pouring on to the platform to try to rescue her. I ran home – I could see trouble was brewing…”
The train moved off, and the gathering crowd began pelting the carriage with bricks. Inside the train, someone pulled the emergency cord; the train stopped, then moved off again; the cord was pulled again 1km out of the station, and this time the train stopped and stayed stopped. “People in the vicinity… started to gather near the train,” says one witness. “The mob… requested that the karsevaks return the girl. But instead of returning the girl, they started closing their windows. This infuriated the mob…”
The brawl had become a battle, with the karsevaks piling in with their swords and sticks, and a crowd now said to be 1,000-strong streaming in from the slum, bringing petrol, gas, rags – anything that would burn. Their gas cylinders broke the bars on the windows and exploded inside; the petrol bombs flew through and set the upholstery and the people trapped inside on fire. By the time that the police arrived in strength one hour later, there was nothing to be saved…”
Does this author think that 15 children were also drunk including babies and toddlers? What about the 25 women? All this nonsense and character assassination of the killed Hindus done by this newspaper is not even worth repudiating. This report is mostly based on the fake mail, but goes even lower by accusing the dead kar sewaks of being drunk, which even that mail did not say. But this report of The Independent was copied further by other newspapers, like Pakistan’s The Dawn on 22 March 2002 [https://www.dawn.com/news/27190/hindu-zealots-sparked-gujarat-riots-paper]. This malicious fake email circulated in the name of PTI reporter Anil Soni did the damage.
This writer Peter Popham is on Twitter at https://twitter.com/peterpopham?lang=en
The Independent’s report can be read here https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/asia/the-hate-train-5361630.html This newspaper should be asked to apologize, and withdraw that article. Its email is newseditor@independent.co.uk and complaints can be made here https://www.independent.co.uk/topic/user-policies
Frontline fortnightly which is a Communist magazine, which has slandered the dead Godhra victims and de-humanized them, and defended their killers, too wrote in an article by Dionne Bunsha in its print edition dated 20 July 2002: “However, false news that kar sevaks kidnapped a young Muslim woman from the Godhra station platform was also circulated widely through e-mail.”
That email was denied by Anil Soni. Its contents were a bit too extreme. So after that, the Indian secularists and Islamists tried to blame the dead, but in a little less extreme way. There was an ‘independent fact-finding report’ by Kamal Mitra Chenoy, S.P.Shukla, K.S.Subramanian, and Achin Vanaik in April 2002 on the situation in Gujarat. This report was full of lies (e.g. It lied that the daughters of Ehsan Jafri had been raped and killed in the riots on 28 February 2002 while in reality they were safe in USA). This report was given in Outlook magazine. Outlook reported:
“A Report To the Nation by An Independent Fact Finding Mission
The Sabarmati Express was late, not an uncommon event, and arrived in Godhra on platform number 1, almost five hours late at 7.43 AM instead of the scheduled time 2.55 AM… Some kar sewaks refused to pay for the tea and snacks and got into an altercation with the vendors. An old Ghanchi vendor, who is absconding, was ordered to shout pro-Rama slogans and his beard was reportedly pulled when he refused. [Our comment: If he was absconding, then how could anyone conclude that his beard was pulled? As a minimum, the vendor should make such a claim.] This was followed immediately by stone throwing and physical assaults started. A Muslim lady Jaitinbibi was waiting for the train to Vadodara [Baroda] scheduled at around 8 AM along with her two young daughters, Sophiya and Shahidi. On seeing the fracas, they tried to leave the station. While doing this, they were stopped by a kar sewak who grabbed one of the teenaged daughters Sophiya and tried to drag her inside the compartment, but contrary to later press reports and rumours failed to do so. Subsequently this family left for Vadodora, but a journalist who spoke with them and has photocopies of their railway tickets, confirmed the story to us…
…Apparently incensed by reports of the misbehaviour with members of their community by the kar sewaks and the molestation, even rumoured abduction, of a Muslim woman, a mob of up to 2,000 people allegedly of Ghanchis from Singal Faliya attacked the train with stones and fire bombs. The kar sewaks of almost equal strength threw stones back. The main target of the Ghanchi mob appears to have been coach S6 which was badly burnt and in which 58 passengers, including 26 women, 12 children and 20 men died…”
https://www.outlookindia.com/website/story/gujarat-carnage-2002/215160
This report slandered the dead Ram sewaks, falsely accused them of not paying for tea and snacks at the station for Rs 5, falsely accused the dead of pulling the beard of a vendor etc, and of trying to (unsuccessfully) kidnap a Muslim girl Sophia Sheikh. This same charge of the Ram sewaks attempting to abduct (unsuccessfully) this girl was repeated by Tehelka in October 2007.
After the fake mail, they needed to find a girl who they could show as one who was ‘attempted to be kidnapped’. Sophia Sheikh did exist in reality.
The full-fledged Commission of Inquiry, the Nanavati Commission gave its report on 26 September 2008 and said that Godhra was a well-planned attack by Muslims. India Today reported in an article written on 27 September 2008:
“(The Nanavati Commission report says) A night before the incident, they (the conspirators) held a meeting in Aman Guest House opposite the station owned by an accused Razak Kurkur. Then they brought 140 litres petrol from the petrol pump closeby in seven plastic cans. The petrol was … kept it in the room of (Aman) guest house (in Godhra, which is opposite Railway Station) ….
The Nanavati Commission has discounted one of the main theories of a section of human rights activists that one of the Ramsevaks travelling on the Sabarmati train coming from Ayodhya had tried to abduct a Muslim girl called Sofiabanu Shaikh at Godhra railway station on February 27, 2002 morning. After interviewing Shaikh the Commission found several gaps in her story and concluded that she was parroting what perhaps had been fed to her a few days after the incident.
The report concluded that the story of a Muslim girl’s abduction was falsely spread on that morning of the unfortunate incident. This rumour was part of a conspiracy in order to collect a crowd to attack the train…”
This shows that such a girl indeed existed, and made such a claim of unsuccessfully attempted abduction, but she was not truthful in making it (and the other side was not alive to state its position). Nanavati Commission concluded that she had been parroting what was tutored to her a few days after the incident (i.e., after that fake email).
Even if any such attempt of abduction had been made by one or two kar sewaks, why would the mob have killed the entire coach’s 59 passengers, who had nothing to do with that, including old women screaming ‘Don’t kill us’, a total of 25 women and 15 children, including babies and toddlers? They would, at maximum have tried to recover the girl, and at the utmost, asked her to identify the abductors and targeted the abductors, instead of burning 59 passengers of the coach.
The then RSS spokesman M.G. Vaidya wrote in Marathi daily Tarun Bharat in July 2002:
“The headline in The Times of India dated 28th February read: “MOB ATTACKS GUJARAT TRAIN, 55 DIE.”
The writer of this report is Sajjad Shaikh. While identifying the reasons for the Godhra massacre, he writes, “Karsevaks in the train misbehaved with some washerwomen of Signal Falia”. Besides, he also cites: “The rumour of an attack on a religious place in Dahod” as one of the reasons for the Godhra incident. Here, he wants to suggest that though it is not pardonable to burn alive 55 persons, due to the reasons cited by him, it is understandable.
This primary lead news report focused the blame on the karsevaks from the very initial stages and did not attempt to investigate how the train was stopped at Signal Falia where a mob of a thousand was already waiting with sticks, petrol bombs, missiles and stones.
In the 1st March issue of The Times of India, Siddharth Varadarajan, a reporter, writes, “While official enquiry will establish the extent to which the attack on the Sabarmati Express was pre- meditated, there can be no doubt about the planned nature of the violence directed against Gujarat’s Muslims on Thursday (28th February)”. The double standards are evident from his report, which differentiates the incidents of 27th February from the incidents of 28th February. While examining the pre-meditation behind the Godhra attacks on 27th February, he says that it is “official enquiry” which will decide whether the attack on karsevaks was pre-meditated or not. But when it comes to violent reaction of Hindus on 28th February, he takes it in his own hands to pass a judgment that the attacks by the Hindus on Gujarat’s Muslims were “pre-planned” in nature. Obviously, what had been a heinous crime was rationalized and what had been a spontaneous reaction was condemned as a ‘pre-planned’ one.
This news report was carried just two days after the Godhra carnage. The gruesome murders of the karsevaks is mentioned only once in the 450-plus word report and rest of the report is full of gory descriptions of how the Muslims are being brutally killed in the aftermath.”
URL: http://www.hindunet.org/hvk/articles/0702/99.html
The Hindu reported the incidents of 27 February as follows in its issue dated 28th February 2002:
“57 killed as a mob torches train in Gujarat” was the headline. The writer of this report, Manas Dasgupta, stated that: “Eye-witnesses said that about 1,200 Ramsevaks were travelling in the train. The local people in the Muslim-dominated Godhra town had been “irritated” by the abusive language used by the Ramsevaks while they were going to Ayodhya by the same train a few days ago. They had reportedly raised slogans as the train approached Godhra on the return journey this morning.”
Luckily, journalists in India did not go to the extent that The Independent went, as far as accusing the dead 59 of being ‘drunk’ was concerned. But The Independent’s report showed the true face of the Indian media men and women. They also reported in much the same way, the difference was only in the extent.
The secularists of the Indian media did not give any attention to the ‘provocations’ after the September 11 attacks. At that time, many warnings were given before 11 September 2001 to the USA by Osama bin Laden’s Al Qaeda to change its policy towards Muslims or face the consequences. But nobody even recollected those warnings or questioned the USA’s policies on Muslims after the attacks. There was in fact, only a condemnation of the Islamic terrorism of the Al Qaeda and a concern about the danger the world faces because of it.
However, the VHP and the Sangh Parivar were held responsible for the Godhra carnage and bashed continuously even after Godhra. This tirade against the Sangh Parivar was noticed by Vir Sanghvi in his article’s last paragraph: “Have we become such prisoners of our own rhetoric that even a horrific massacre becomes nothing more than an occasion for Sangh Parivar bashing?”
The most important point is of ‘dehumanization of karsewaks’. This approach of the media of dehumanizing the dead karsevaks including 15 children angered the entire nation. More so Gujarat, in which is Godhra situated.
Even if the karsevaks had indeed misbehaved with anyone, or refused to pay for tea and snacks, or shouted anti-Muslim slogans, or taunted or harassed Muslim passengers, or done any of the numerous things which have been charged (all charges are inconsistent and varying, which shows that the aim was to forcibly concoct ‘provocations’), even if it was mentioned, the blame should not have been put on the dead. This is because no one insults the dead.
But, in this case, even though the karsevaks did nothing, baseless and absolutely wrong allegations were made to blame the dead for their own death. Even if they had indulged in any sort of misbehavior, such a massacre and brutal roasting cannot be rationalized. And here instead of blaming the Muslims who roasted the train, much of the media— the TV channels in particular—and the politicians made such allegations on people who were not even alive to refute the false charges. The people who lost their lives in a human tragedy, in a gruesome massacre, a well- planned attack, were falsely accused and blamed for something which they did not do. The aim was to show the dead 59 as victims of their own follies, and not of Muslims’ intolerance.
The people of Gujarat were used to this policy of the TV channels and the print media. They were used to the continuous bashing of the karsevaks, of the Ayodhya movement, of the VHP and the continuous defence of the Muslims. But the people thought that the Godhra massacre was just a bit too much. At least, such a horrifying massacre of innocent people including 15 children will make the hearts of the secularists bleed. At least, in such a huge tragedy, will the media stop insulting the karsevaks and condemning the VHP and the Ramjanmabhoomi movement? At least now, will the media condemn the fundamentalist Muslims and call them Jehadis and criticize them for the unprovoked massacre?
But nothing of the sort happened. The media continued its usual ways. And Vir Sanghvi’s fear of a Hindu backlash became a terrifying reality on 28th February 2002, which was Thursday. But after the backlash, Vir Sanghvi forgot his own words which he uttered before the Hindu retaliation. He himself had indirectly warned of retaliation and anger in the Hindus but forgot it while condemning the post-Godhra riots and calling Narendra Modi a ‘mass murderer’ many times in his newspaper’s editorial page.
This Hindu anger continued not just until the riots but until much later, until at least December 2002. On 12th December 2002 were held the Gujarat Assembly elections. The BJP won a huge majority of 127 out of the 182 seats with the Indian National Congress (INC) winning just 51. BJP’s vote share was 50 per cent, a huge 11 per cent more than the Congress’ 39 per cent. Saurashtra and Kutch, which did not see any riots even in the first three days after Godhra, also saw the BJP not just winning, but winning ‘hands down’ (39 out of 58 seats).
As per weekly India Today (30 December 2002), out of the 102 riot-affected seats, the BJP won 79 seats. These numbers are also dubious. But let us assume that they are true. That means the BJP won 48 out of the remaining 80 non-riot affected seats. Sixty per cent is still a huge majority considering that the BJP was in power in the state from 1995, which it lost within one and half years, and then uninterrupted from 1998. Despite anti-incumbency, this performance of the party was at least partially due to the Hindu anger after Godhra and the ‘secularist’ brigade’s reaction to it, e.g. at that time the then top Congress leader Shankersinh Vaghela alleged that the Godhra massacre was done by VHP-BJP to put the blame on Muslims, and not by Muslims.
This Left-liberal-secular brigade also tried to keep the number of attackers, i.e. Muslims at Godhra as less as they could. Columnist Kuldip Nayar (1923-2018) gave it as 500 in an article in the Deccan Herald dated 3 April 2002. India Today weekly, in its issue dated 11 March 2002, also gave the number of attackers as over 500. On Godhra, Kuldip Nayar wrote in an article published on 6 July 2002: “Narendra Modi would have created a Godhra train incident if it had not happened. The tragedy is that some Muslims played into his hands”.
Others kept reducing the figure to 1,000, while some gave it 1,500. But the true figure seems to be 2,000 as given by Vir Sanghvi and the Justice Tewatia Committee. Alok Tiwari, another secularist editor, also gave the number of Hindus killed in Godhra as 56 (instead of 58 which it was at that time) while saying: “Just because 56 Hindus were killed doesn’t mean that they should kill hundreds of Muslims…”. This figure of the attackers is not important in the sense that it does not really matter whether it is 2,000 or 1,500 who attacked the train. But it simply discloses the attitude of the secularists, which is—keep the Hindu suffering as low as possible, Muslim atrocities as low as possible and inflate and exaggerate Muslim sufferings as much as possible.
And they try to keep increasing the number of Muslims killed in the Gujarat riots, ignoring completely the hundreds of Hindus also killed in the riots.
Godhra was planned, post-Godhra was a result of provocation
It is impossible for Godhra to have been the result of petty quarrels at the Godhra railway station. Slogans shouted from a moving train or a railway platform or even true or false rumours of attempted abduction of a girl cannot make 2,000 Muslims assemble in five minutes already having managed to procure petrol bombs and acid bombs, that too at 8 am. 140 litre of petrol was bought in cans a day before the massacre. Initially, many said the same about Godhra being planned.
For the train to have been attacked, the attackers (Muslims) had to surround in on at least two sides. If it was on the spur of the moment, it would have been very difficult for the Muslims to surround the train on both sides. How could at least 500 Muslims reach the other side of the train? If that was the case, then the karsevaks would have ran out of the train and saved their lives, by running from the second side before Muslims reached there.
Kuldip Nayar, known for his anti-RSS, anti-BJP and pro-Muslim views, wrote in an article published on 3 April 2002: “I have no doubt that the (Godhra) attack was a well-planned one. Otherwise, it is not possible for a mob of 500 carrying petrol and kerosene to assemble in three minutes in an area that can only be reached by running through prickly bushes.”
On 3 March 2002, The Indian Express wrote: “…the burning of the train (Godhra) was a pre-meditated act by a well-armed and primed up Muslim mob. Because even if there was a provocation, a mob of this size, with so much incendiary power in its hands and so much hatred in its head does not collect in a place like Godhra in a few minutes. Somebody was expecting the arrival of this train and had laid an ambush.”
Later India Today reported in its 22 July 2002 issue: “The theory that there was a conspiracy behind the massacre gains credence in the light of the accounts of the five firemen who fought the blaze. They have told investigators that Haji Bilal, Godhra municipality councillor and prime accused in the case, obstructed their fire tender and tried to prevent them from putting out the fire in the coach. Vijay Sharma, one of the firemen, says Bilal had called the fire brigade on the night of February 26 and asked for the names of the firemen who would be on duty the next morning. Coincidentally, that same evening a water tanker attached to the fire station and a fire tender both developed serious engine snags. It would, of course, be naive to think that conspirators depend on coincidences to accomplish their deadly missions.”
Haji Bilal was found guilty by the trial court, and given death penalty. He was found guilty of obstructing the fire brigade which rushed to douze the fire. He trying to sabotage the fire brigade equipment and call to know the names of the firemen who would be on duty the next morning on 26 February night is conclusive evidence that the massacre was planned well in advance, and could not be the result of any ‘provocation’. Even if, for argument’s sake, there was any unsuccessful attempt to kidnap a girl on 27 February morning, it doesn’t change the fact that the attack was planned.
There was a judicial confession by an accused in February 2003 that Godhra was planned, 140 litre of petrol been purchased in 7 cans of 20 litre capacity the previous night, and that he had himself taken part in the massacre. A judicial confession is a conclusive proof. Though he later retracted his confession in August 2003, his judicial confession before a judge in court in February 2003 removes all possible doubts anyone can ever have about Godhra.
The Times of India reported on 7 February 2003:
“VADODARA: Zabir Bin Yamin Behra has given the Godhra carnage case a new twist and stunned everyone by accusing Maulana Hussain Umarji of hatching the conspiracy. He has also confessed his own involvement in the case. Behra has a long criminal history.
He has committed both petty and serious crimes and has mostly operated in the station area of Godhra town since a young age. He belongs to the same rung of people as Abdul Razzak Mohammed Kurkur and others. Both the Godhra railway police station and the town police station have offences registered against him…
…Besides having a hand in the burning of the coach, Behra confessed to removing ornaments and valuables of passengers, when the mob attacked the train.”
In this report, The Times of India did not mention that this confession was to court, i.e. a judicial confession, which it mentioned in another report, which can be read by opening this link: https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/city/ahmedabad/behera-shifted-to-prison-in-nadiad/articleshow/39605079.cms
He also confessed to looting ornaments and valuables of the passengers before burning the train, thereby proving the testimony of 16-year-old Gayatri Panchal who survived the attack and said exactly the same, as correct.
PTI reported on 6 February 2003, as reported in The Tribune on 7 February 2003:
“The maulvi’s arrest by the police from the Signal Falia area in the wee hours followed disclosures by one of the accused, Zabir Bin Yamin Behra, who claimed that Umarji was the brain behind the train carnage. The 56-year-old religious leader was arrested in a joint operation by the railway and city police. Behra, during his confession before city Chief Judicial Magistrate yesterday, alleged that the maulvi had “masterminded” the carnage and instigated youths for “planned attack” on February 26, a day before kar sevaks were to return from Ayodhya after participating in “shila poojan”.”
https://www.tribuneindia.com/2003/20030207/main4.htm
Rediff.com reported on 19 February 2003:
“Gujarat to slap POTA against Godhra accused
February 19, 2003 20:18 IST
The Gujarat government has decided to slap the Prevention of Terrorism Act against all the accused involved in the Sabarmati Express carnage, state Home Minister Amit Shah said on Wednesday [19 February 2003].
“The decision was taken on Tuesday [18 Feb] after one of the accused, Zabir Bin Yamiun Behra, confessed in the court that the conspiracy was hatched three-four days before the carnage and that Maulvi Husain Umarji was the main conspirator,” Shah said.
…Meanwhile the Special Investigation Team officials, in the application moved to additional sessions judge of Godhra K C Kela, stated that the conspiracy to torch the train was hatched in Aman Guest House, owned by another prime accused Razzak Kurkur, in the town.
The application, according to sources, also mentions that accused, Salim Panwala, who is still absconding, was supposed to keep a check on timings of Sabarmati Express arriving at Godhra station, while it was decided that petrol would be transported through loading rickshaws.
The petrol was brought by accused Shaukat Lalu, Hussain Lalu and Zabir Bin Yameen and Imran, stated the application, according to reports from Godhra.
The SIT also stated that as per the conspiracy vendors at the station would enter into a verbal altercation with the karsevaks arriving from Ayodhya.
…Zabir Yamin Behra, an accused in the case, had confessed before a magistrate that Maulvi Umarji had agreed to give Rs 1500 each per month to the members of the core team for torching the coach…”
http://www.rediff.com/news/2003/feb/19guj.htm
After this confession, the report in India Today in the 24 February 2003 issue was:
“…Umarji, a prominent leader of the Deobandi-Tableegh Jamaat movement in the Godhra region, has been charged with being part of the conspiracy as well as obstructing investigations by protecting the accused. The mob that burnt down compartment S-6 is believed to have been drawn from the local Ghanchi community, zealous followers of the Tableegh Jamaat, a puritanical sect that set up shop in Godhra in the mid-1970s….
…What cornered Umarji was the confessional statement of Jabir Binyamin Behera, the principal accused in the Godhra case. Arrested on January 22, Behera gave the court of the chief metropolitan magistrate, Godhra, crucial details.
Besides implicating Umarji, Behera also referred to the role of Razak Kurkur, another accused in the case. Kurkur’s Aman Guest House, located near the Godhra railway station, was virtually the base of terror. At 9.30 p.m. on February 26, 2002, the evening before the murders, six people held a war council at Aman Guest House. They included Behera, Kurkur, Salim Paanwala, alias Badam, and Salim Zarda. They decided to set the Sabarmati Express on fire.
The strategy was simple: at the slightest provocation from the Ramsevaks, or even without one, begin a full-fledged assault. At 10.15 p.m., the conspirators bought seven 20-litre cans of fuel from Kalabhai petrol pump and stored them at Aman Guest House. [Our comment: This was also stated by the Nanavati Commission] …
…(Salim Panwala) told Behera that the train was running four and a half hours late. It would not arrive at the scheduled time of 3.30 a.m. The original plan of killing the Ramsevaks in pre-dawn darkness had to be dropped.
The plotters regrouped at 6 a.m. and finally attacked the train a little after 8 a.m. A mob of Ghanchi Muslims from the nearby Signal Fadia colony had already been primed. The 140 litres of petrol was transported to the railway station on a rickshaw. The initial idea was to fling the petrol into coach S-6 through the windows.
At about 7 ft, these proved too high. Behera and a few others then cut down the canvas cover of the rear vestibule of coach S-6. They clambered in, broke open the door and emptied the seven cans of petrol inside. It took a few burning rags to do the rest…”
This judicial confession should have been mentioned repeatedly by the media post February 2003 whenever reporting on Godhra. This was needed even more when the Banerjee Committee constituted by the then Union Railway Minister Lalu Yadav gave a report calling Godhra an ‘accident’ in January 2005 in its interim report, and in March 2006 in its final report, and when the Committee was declared illegal and its appointment was quashed by the Gujarat High Court in October 2006. Instead, this judicial confession was suppressed totally and unnecessary confusion was sought to be deliberately created on Godhra.
Such a horrific crime should not be committed even against animals. If 59 animals had been locked in a train, pushed back into the fire as they tried to come out and then roasted to death with bodies charred, it too would have been considered as a gruesome tragedy by all sensible people. But false charges were made on Godhra victims; the incident was condemned merely for token with the blame put on the roasted women and children and men, and the VHP. Vir Sanghvi said that the karsevaks had been dehumanized. They were actually treated even worse than animals.
And when the things were really a result of provocation, the ‘secularist’ media largely just ignored it. The big ‘provocation’, Godhra, was far more than a ‘provocation’ but the cause of the retaliation. The post-Godhra riots were reported ignoring Godhra completely. Only the Hindu retaliation of the first three days was decried. And even after so many years, whenever the post-Godhra riots are mentioned, Godhra is completely ignored and it is made to sound as if the BJP Government of the state indulged in ruthless, unprovoked killings of Muslims in alliance with the VHP and the Bajrang Dal.
The difference in attitude is revealed from the reactions. After Godhra, it was said by the ‘secular’ media: “The government must bring the culprits to justice. The crime deserves to be condemned. But it is inevitable and predictable because of VHP’s Ayodhya movement…VHP bashing…” and after Godhra, it was said: “Holocaust…pogrom…genocide…massacre… Modi must quit… international shame…are we like Rwanda…Hitler…”
Vir Sanghvi said, “If you report the truth, then you will inflame Hindu sentiments and this would be irresponsible. And so on.” That is to say, Vir Sanghvi admitted that the secularists utter ‘stark lies’, no matter what interest in mind. In reality, they inflamed Hindu sentiments by insulting the dead kar sewaks. Had they told the reality that ‘Muslims killed the 59 kar sewaks in a planned attack’ and then said ‘but its revenge should not be taken on other Muslims’, then perhaps the Hindu retaliation could have been prevented. This was the position taken by the RSS – blaming the attackers but calling for restraint.
On 27 February 2002, senior Congress leader and former Gujarat Chief Minister, the late Amarsinh Chaudhary (1941-2004) came on TV at night and while condemning the attack, also blamed karsevaks for provoking it by alleging that they refused to pay for tea at the station. (Again following Vir Sanghvi’s observation—they condemn the crime, but blame the victims.) This statement of Chaudhary had a devastating effect.
Pro-RSS weekly Organiser reported the incident in its issue dated 10 March 2002, which covered events in full till 27th February. While reporting on this issue, Organiser reported a news item titled “RSS condemns the killings and calls for restraint” and this report carried the statement of the then RSS Joint General Secretary, Madan Das Devi that ‘RSS urges Hindu society to exercise restraint after the Godhra attack’. RSS had asked the Hindu society to not retaliate after Godhra before the riots had started.
This is the scanned copy of the report of Organiser dated 10 March 2002. The scanned copy of the report of another appeal issued on 27 February by the then General Secretary of RSS, Mohan Bhagwat, as reported by Organiser on the same page of the same issue, is seen below.
Mohan Bhagwat urged people to shun acts like even sloganeering, apart from stone pelting and anything that would violate peace.
India Today dated 11 March 2002, carrying events till 28th February 2002, reported on the last page of the cover story:
“The mood in the state is militant. A procession of 10,000 marched with the bodies of 11 people from Ramol village near Ahmedabad, who had died in the train. They were shouting slogans like: ‘Tumhari shahidi bekar nahi jayegi, Mandir bana kar hi rahenge’ (Your sacrifice will not go in vain, we will build the temple)… This incident drew mixed reactions from the Congress, the main opposition party in the state. While senior party leader Amarsinh Chaudhary condemned the attack, he also blamed Ramsevaks for provoking the incident. Senior AICC member, Ahmed Patel condemned it strongly. They will have time to react. The bloody cycle of violence so familiar with Gujarat may just have begun.”
So, India Today knew on 28th February itself that a bloody cycle of violence had begun and could continue in Gujarat for several days. But, in fact, it stopped only after three days, though petty and stray rioting continued subsequently in Ahmedabad, Vadodara and some places near Godhra. Weekly Outlook (a known anti-BJP, anti-Narendra Modi weekly) in its issue dated 11 March 2002 (i.e. on 28 February) also reported:
“Gujarat has always been a communal tinderbox and even a small spark ignites big trouble. The ghost of Godhra looks set to walk its streets for months.” (URL: http://www.outlookindia.com/article/200-On-The–Human-Richter/214849 ).
Difference between Godhra and other tragic incidents
Some people have asked: “Why did riots occur only after Godhra? Why was nobody targeted after the Akshardham temple attack (of 24 September 2002)—or after the attacks on Mumbai on 26 November 2008?” The answers are many. The terrorist attacks in many parts of India such as Mumbai, Jammu, New Delhi, etc. are acts of terrorism done by terrorists, whereas Godhra was not terrorism, but communalism and sadistic barbarism.
The attackers also differed. Terrorists are people who are considered to have no religion. Those who attacked the Akshardham temple were called ‘terrorists’ by the media, and rightly so. Two foreign terrorists killed more than 30 people in the attack, and both terrorists were killed. It was not done by local Muslims. Nobody said in the media “Muslims kill 30 Hindus in Akshardham”. It was said, “Terrorists attack the Akshardham temple”. Had the Indian media, the TV channels in particular, and the non-BJP politicians, who came on TV on 27 February 2002, called the Godhra incident as a ‘human tragedy’ and reacted exactly like they did after terrorist attacks in Mumbai or Akshardham, maybe the riots which occurred, could have been avoided.
Most importantly, the mob in Godhra numbered well over 1,000 and as per the report of the Tewatia Committee, the mob was 2,000 in strength. Since only 35 people were arrested for the attack on 27th February, as reported by various English newspapers the next day, it was found to be grossly inadequate by the masses. M.M. Singh—one of the finest police officers Gujarat has ever produced—also said that the police should have cordoned off the area in Godhra after the massacre. This, in his opinion, would have pacified Hindu sentiments to some extent at the very outset. His opinion was reported in India Today weekly (18 March 2002 issue), which also reported:
“The blame for the initial explosion on 28th February is being pinned on the Modi government for its failure to arrest those responsible for the Godhra massacre. The slum from where the train attack was launched was illegally constructed on Railways land and each of the 10 main suspects involved in the attack has a criminal background. Some even enjoyed political patronage. Haji Bilal, one of the main accused, was known for his links with smugglers and traffickers. Such was his notoriety, claims a BJP MLA, that ‘a few months ago the authorities had difficulty pasting a notice on his door’. On 27th February, the VHP asked the State government to act against them and when it failed, the public anger was directed against all Muslims.”
The Justice Tewatia Committee report said:
“Based on the information collected from official and non-official sources at Godhra, Ahemdabad and Vadodara the Study Team is of the considered opinion that:
1. The local administration did not respond with speed to the Godhra carnage. The police remained a passive spectator and hesitated to use force against the miscreants. It made no attempt to apprehend the leaders of the mob that indulged in burning alive innocent pilgrims returning from Ayodhya. However, the administration took preventive measures after the VHP gave a call for Gujarat bandh in protest against the attack on the train.”
This was, in all likelihood, for fear of being called ‘communal’.
Since it was done by local Muslims and most of the culprits went scot-free and the media kept insulting the dead karsevaks and condemning the VHP, the angered masses exploded in Ahmedabad and 25 other places on 28 February.
The Indian Express dated 28 February 2002 reported:
“‘After pelting stones, they started pouring kerosene in our compartments and set them afire. Only a few of us managed to come out of the broken windows. The adults and the old people were stuck inside. The old women were pleading, ‘don’t kill us’ but they just didn’t listen,’ says Gayatri Panchal (16), who says 3-4 people ran after her as soon as she jumped off the train.”
Mid-Day dated 6 March 2002 reported:
“Sixty-five-year-old Devika Luhana was trembling with anger as she alighted from the ill-fated train. “It was vandalism at its worst. They did not even spare old people like me and pelted stones indiscriminately. They will all go to hell for this act of malice,” said Devika, who could not even retrieve her bag as she ran for her life.
“They stormed inside the women’s bogie, and before we could react, they set the entire bogie on fire. Some of us managed to escape, but a number of our sisters got trapped…it was horrifying,” said Hetal Patel, a member of Durga Vahini.
Terror still haunts 13-year-old Gyanprakash as he bursts into tears from time to time. “I cannot forget the sight of people burning in front of me,” he says while recuperating at the Ahmedabad city hospital. Gyanprakash was on the S2 coach of the Sabarmati Express when it was set ablaze in Godhra on Wednesday. His family was returning to Ahmedabad after attending a relative’s funeral. They had boarded the train at Kanpur. Gyanprakash recalls the horror: “The train had just left Godhra but stopped a little way away from the station. Suddenly, stones were being thrown at the train. The pelting continued for almost an hour. Then something was hurled into our coach and there was smoke everywhere.
“It was so suffocating I could hardly breathe. I heard my father telling me to get off the train. I went to the door but saw that people trying to get off were being stabbed. I went to the other side and jumped off.””
That is, old women were pleading: “Don’t kill us” but the attackers did not spare anyone, neither children nor old people, and certainly not the women. Most horrific was the attackers’ act of not allowing anyone to escape and watching with their eyes 59 Hindus roasting to death, crying with pain, pleading for mercy. (Those who did come out like Gayatri Panchal were also tried to be pushed back.) Had the 2,000 attackers shot dead these 59 people with bullets, it would not have been so horrific. Had they set the train afire and ran away, it would not have angered the masses so much. But these attackers were indescribable barbarians. They watched and pushed back into fire the victims including 15 children and roasted them to death in a horrific manner.
Can anyone imagine 2,000 Hindus burning to death 59 Muslims at Karachi Railway Station in Pakistan? If Hindus of Pakistan muster the courage to do that, one can only imagine the retaliation after that!
To know why the masses retaliated, look at the photos of the victims. These pictures were shown on TV channels on 27th February and in Gujarati dailies the next day.
WARNING: Gruesome pictures.
Anyone who understands human sufferings will realize the cause of the retaliation in Gujarat after looking at these pictures. However, some politicians and media people are blind to Hindu suffering. For some people, Hindus in general and VHP supporters in particular, are not even considered human beings. These gruesome killings also were not enough to soften the hardened hearts of the so-called secularists. One wonders then, what will ever make them condemn Muslims for any act, if they defend Muslims for Godhra and blame these children, who were roasted.
To read the full chapter, read the book “Gujarat Riots: The True Story”.
https://www.amazon.in/Gujarat-Riots-True-Story-Truth/dp/1482841649/
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