Rembering The "Reichstag - On - The - Railways" After 2 Years
The incident of Godhra almost 2 years and 2 months back is still haunting. If the burning of the S-6 compartment of the Down Sabarmati Express at the outer signal point after the Godhra railway station' and the eruption of a brutal genocide against the Muslim population of Gujrat was mentioned as the Hindu-nazi version of the Reichstag event of 1933' this mention was a prophetic one. The similarity of Godhra and Reichstag is not only that both the burnings occurred on the same date ? the twenty seventh of February. But streams of reportages after the merciless massacre of the Muslims' falsely named as a 'communal riot'' even in the bourgeois media' including forensic evidences' point the same accusing finger in both the cases — a fabricated ploy accident' followed by a howl' " ... ... to be blamed for that"; then immediate clampdown of a fascist/nazi rule ending in Holocaust' ... ... History almost repeated itself' but sadly' for this case' not as a farce' but rather as a miniature edition of a same horrid production in the next century!
The sinister signal of Godhra is still green. Two years have passed' so many things happened' but by overall count' the Indo-nazis got bolder' stronger' and more cunning' though sometimes they were caught nearly red-handed.
The Gujrat state govt and its administrative' law-enforcing and judicial legs' in spite of showing farce-of-a-democracy nakedly' and being rebuffed repeatedly [though gently] by the Supreme Court' is still there' and got the "peoples' mandate" in a 'democratic' election. The saffron brigade at first howled that thousands of assembled Muslims threw petrol from the outside after halting the train forcefully' but after becoming nabbed down by the forensic dept for a while tried to boot out the report [even including the deputy PM did the same]' but quickly turned to saying' " ... we knew that' we're telling that for long' that the Muslim terrorists [what else the Muslims are in their perception] send some inside the bogey' they poured petrol' ignited' and fled away ... ..."; and what is more ? the police of the state did arrest 'culprits' for both the allegations very swiftly! And one must not be dumbfounded to find that none of the hundreds of prisoners arrested under POTA [the law that do not show any respect to any 'human rights' of the prisoners whatsoever] in the post-Godhra period is Hindu and more than 99% are Muslims! They could show the Muslim population of Gujrat and of India as a whole that to live in India they must obey the RSS led Indo-nazis' they must not cry foul to any of the latter's activities. Were any of those guilty of demolishing Babri Maszid and sparking the torch of communal violence after that punished? Did any harm happen to the killers of Gujrat? And dare any Muslim' even if he/she is a member of now famed cricketer Irfan's family' raise any question regarding the recent past? Questioning is too far' even they avoid the mention of that recent past — thousands of Muslims killed brutally' hundreds suffered rapes' many more thousands evicted from their homes and had to live in un-liveable relief-camps and had to bear almost the same trauma of concentration camps. And still The Chief Minister is a blessed SANGH-SEVAK' so are the RSS hooligans' consequently nothing touched him or them.
But hindutva could not help the political face of the RSS ? the BJP to ride to the govt of its own except in Gujrat. So was constructed the slogan of 'development'; and with the blood stained hand at the back and the honeyed hand holding the slogan of 'development' the BJP bowed to the electorates and won elections in 3 more important states even without counting the seats of its NDA allies. Is not it a remarkable development' a progress of the Fascists in 2 years? Now the same experiment is going to repeat in the parliament election. And this time more cunningly: suddenly pyjama-clad pictures of the PM started appearing in the Dailies' and on the first day of the change over' with a front page top-right heading that more sets of sheroyanis and chost-pyjamas are on the way for him from Pakistan. And the deputy PM assured the reporters that no communal tension would happen during his Yatra this time' he is secular too and also his Yatra-Rath ? why' are not there two Muslims among the cut-outs that are carried on his Rath? And this is also a despicable brand of Indo-secularism; so economically and culturally backward these sub-continental countries are that Jaat-Dharm can be seen/known and shown by apparels and appearances!!!
Those who believed that in so much Pluralist India a Hindu Fundamentalist org can never ride to governmental power' those who hopes that the ensuing parliamentary election will give BJP and its allies a good snubbing: those persons are requested to ponder on the following 2 points. Firstly' the NDA' however heterogeneous it is' and however tall claims of "secularism" those parties made' ultimately willingly or unwillingly had helped and is still helping the BJP to advance. Secondly' The BJP could persuade the NDA to accept the Hindu-agenda of RSS; the little dilution or toning down doesn't matter; those NDA partners didn't matter at all during and after the Gujrat carnage' haven't they?
Thirdly' the non-BJP' anti-BJP parties: the Mayabati-ji's BSP' or even Mulayam-ji's SP: the former calls Manu-badis as enemies and BJP is obviously Manu-badi' but the BSP had many times became their ally and ruled UP jointly' including phases of ruptures is alliance; the latter' mockingly called by the BJP as "mollah-mulayam"' stunned its "secular" and "communist" allies by starting to talk with BJP about adjustment in the coming election just before some months! Nobody should have stunned ? Indian Secularism is like this' not even skin deep. There are the "lefts"' the Congress' ... ... Congress is so well known that it needs no discussion. They are the 'creator' of the 'Indian brand of secularism'' which actually meant governmental / state encouragement of all religions' de-facto meaning more encouragement to the religion and religious practises of the majority' i.e. Hinduism. And their 'secularism' was 'proved' in the Babri Mosque demolition case' they were in the central governmental power then. And all the "lefts" and their allies could do by their 'movements' against communalism is helping BJP to emerge more powerful: just look at the short history of last 15 years. Their misrule' their hollowness in terms of Ideology' their abject surrender to imperialists' to globalisation' their fake 'struggles'' their effort to limit all struggles within the parliamentary-constitutional arena ... all this contributed positively to the growth of BJP' and more importantly the growth of Hindu communalism' even in West Bengal during last two decades; Calcutta riots and long Curfew days in the post-mosque-demolition period cannot be forgotten!
One big difference between Godhra and Reichstag is pretty disturbing and agonising: — When the Nazis rode to power of the govt by steadily increasing their support base' simultaneously the Communists were advancing; if not anything else' only the election results of the Reichstag and the provinces in the nineteen twenties and early thirties may throw some light on this matter' can show the extent of the influence of the organised working class. But when the Indo-fascists are rising' advancing' and in many countries in the world the right swing of the ruling classes are furthering' there is still continuing the low ebb of working class struggle in India and the world over in spite of' of course' the recent spurt of movements of the class in some part of the globe. In the 1930s there was an International Communist Movement' whatever errors and mistakes and deviations notwithstanding. And particularly after 1991 the fall' defeat of that movement' the disarrayed-ness of the working class' etc are all too vivid. And this difference makes our tasks and tasks of all revolutionary communists' with reference to the subject under discussion' all the more difficult. Those tasks centre on a single point ? to organise the workers [and obviously' other toilers] into a class organisation' imbue them' cultivate in them the working class consciousness; so that from the revolutionary perspective they can start the work with a real anti-fascist' anti-communal program' the first ones of which will be to win over the toiling masses from the fold of the enemy camp and forward the toiling classes' struggle against the ruling classes. And these have to be done in the sub-continental basis' because the history of the sub-continent is interwoven' the knots are interwoven. This generation must wipe out the muck produced by the two-nation theory' the notorious riots' the artificial partition of the subcontinent' etc. If the signal of Godhra is telling something it is this.
Comments:
No Comments for View