Asghar Ali Engineer is a rights activist and heads the two organisations, Institute of Islamic Studies and Centre for Study of Society and Secularism. He has authored or edited 44 books on such  issues  as  Islam and communal and ethnic problems in India and South Asia in general.  For links to his other articles, please go to the top page of this site.

It is about 10 years since demolition of Babri Masjid on 6th December 1992. The demolition of Babri Masjid itself was a major event, which seriously dented our commitment to secularism. The demolition also created a serious crisis of identity for Indian Muslims and resulted in earth-shaking riots in Mumbai and number of other places in India. In this article we will take a brief look at the communal situation in India in the post-Babri demolition period.

As pointed out above the demolition of Babri Masjid was followed by outburst of communal violence throughout India particularly in Bombay, Ahmedabad, Surat, Calcutta, Kanpur, Malegaon, Bhopal, Delhi and several other places in which hundreds of people lost their lives. In fact the whole decade of eighties and early nineties was a period of great communal crisis.

As it is well-known the Ram Mandir controversy was purely political one; it was neither religious nor even historical in nature. Most eminent historians belonging to secular schools of thought maintained firmly that there is absolutely no historical or archaeological proof for existence of any temple at the site of the Babri mosque. When confronted with the historical and archaeological arguments the Sangh Parivar leaders changed the line of arguments and started saying that it is not historical matter alone, it is basically a matter of faith for the Hindus.

However, in this article we are more concerned with the post-Babri demolition decade and communal situation therein than all these endless arguments. As pointed out the Ram Mandir controversy was raised only to polarise votes between Hindus and Muslims. And there is no doubt that the BJP was great political beneficiary of this controversy. It went on increasing its seats in parliament thanks to the Ram Mandir controversy and through strategic alliances in the elections. It had increased its strength from two to 88 seats in Parliament in 1989 elections itself with the help of this controversy and through alliance with V.P.Singh’s Janata Dal and other secular parties. In 1991 elections this controversy was at its height and the BJP further increased its strength from 89 to 114.

The Narsimha Rao Government, however, continued for full term until 1996. In this election though the BJP increased its strength further. However, it was isolated from other secular parties. It tried to form its government on the basis of being the largest party and hoped that once it forms government other ‘secular’ parties will be tempted to support it for temptation of power. However, until then the secular parties considered the BJP as really untouchable and refused to come to its rescue. Thus the BJP Government failed after 13 days in existence. And Janata Dal was invited to take the reins of power as it managed to gather necessary strength in parliament.

Then it appeared as if the secular parties cared for ideology and refused to compromise with communal forces. But this situation lasted but for a short period and soon number of ‘secular’ parties teamed up with the BJP to ride piggyback to power. It is true that in the post-modernist world ideologies have lost all meaning. However, religious ideologies are gaining in strength and hence religious fundamentalism has gained in strength all over the globe. In India Hindu fundamentalism, as in Pakistan Islamic fundamentalism has gained in strength considerably. But for temptation for power by these secular parties the BJP would not have been in a position to lead the NDA coalition.

Meanwhile the Shiv Sena -BJP alliance came to power in Maharashtra. It is interesting to note that under the Congress Government at the Centre and in Maharashtra the Muslims had suffered so much that in sheer desperation a small section of Muslims voted for the Shiv Sena candidates. Their argument was that it is better to deal with a known enemy than with a hidden enemy. There was also another contributory factor to the victory of Shiv Sena-BJP alliance in 1995.

Angered by the 1992-93 riots in Mumbai in which about 1000 people had died or disappeared, some anti-social elements allegedly led by Dawood Ibrahim and it’s cohorts and aided and abetted by Pakistan’s ISI. It naturally had greatly angered the people of Maharashtra. The Government in Maharshtra at that time was of the Congress and was headed by Shri Sharad Pawar. Also the Shiv Sena made several promises to the voters like providing free houses to the slum dwellers of Mumbai. All this combined the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance won the 1995 assembly elections. 

The BJP of course cashed in on the Ram Mandir sentiments. The Maharashtra was one of the most affected states by the Ram Mandir controversy. The RSS was after all founded by a section of Brahmins in Maharshtra. The Success of the Shiv Sena-BJP alliance was partly the result of Babri Masjid-Ramjanambhoomi controversy. The bomb blast in March 1993, which was result of Mumbai riots of 1992-93 also, as pointed out, contributed to the success of Shiv Sena-BJP alliance in Maharashtra.

COMMUNAL VIOLENCE IN POST-BABRI DEMOLITION PERIOD

It is interesting to note that the number of major communal riots in post-Babri Masjid demolition period went down considerably. Three major riots took place in this period, besides several small riots in which 2 to 6 persons were killed. These three major riots are Coimbatore in in Tamilnadu in1997, Kanpur in U.P. in March 2001 and Malegaon in Maharashtra in October 2001. In Coimbatore riots more than 40 persons were killed while in Kanpur and Malegaon more than 15 persons were killed. In between these major riots more than 150 small riots have taken place throughout India since the Mumbai riots of 1992-93.

However, absence of major riots should not delude us to conclude that the communal situation has eased in India in the post-Babri demolition period. Far from it. It has, on the contrary worsened. Two important trends are quite noticeable in this period. The South India which was relatively free of communalism and communal violence began to experience outburst of communal violence. Thus the Coimbatore communal riot and subsequent bomb blast there during February 1998 is symptomatic of this. The Coimbatore communal riot was result of aggressive communal propaganda by the Hindu Munnani which gave rise to some Muslim youth taking to path of violence to pay the Hindu Munnani in the same coin. Some Muslim youth murdered RSS activists and the Hinud Munnani people murdered Palani Baba, a Muslim saint who was allegedly the inspiration of the Muslim fundamentalist youth. Ms. Jaylalitha also tried to take advantage of the situation and adopted rather pro-Hindutva stance. It is alleged that the Hindu Munnani got political support from her.

The second noticeable trend was anti-Christian attacks after the BJP came to power in Gujrat and after the BJP-led Government consolidated its power at the Centre. The attacks on Christians were not known earlier. Communal riots usually took place between Hindus and Muslims. However, since 1998 anti-Christian violence began and mainly the VHP and Bajrang Dal were involved in these attacks on Christians. After Gujrat number of incidents took place in U.P., Maharashtra, M.P., Bihar and Orissa. Orissa witnessed the ghastly incident of burning alive of a Christian priest  Father Grahm Staines and his two young children at the hands of Bajrang Dal activists. The Wadhwa Commission report also concluded that Bajrang Dal had a hand in this ghastly incident.

The Gujrat also witnessed number of anti-Muslim incidents particularly in the rural areas after the BJP assumed power in Gujrat. The BJP adopted most aggressive communal stance in Gujrat in the post-Babri demolition period. The Bajrang Dal and VHP cadres adopted very aggressive stance against Christian and Muslim minorities in that highly communalised state. 

Since the BJP came to power at the Centre it has to be rather cautious in communal matters to keep the alliance together. Various secular partners of the National Democratic Front have to care for their minority, especially Muslim voters in their respective states, particularly in Andhra Pradesh.  It, therefore, keeps out of the Hindutva agenda, which still includes construction of Ram temple in Ayodhya. But the other constituents of the Sangh Parivar like the Vishwa Hindu Parishad have no such constraints. Thus its office bearers like Mr. Singhal and Pravin Togaria openly talk of starting the construction of Ram temple at Ayodhya from March 2002. The Sangh Parivar is not only keeping the issue alive but is also exploiting it for the forthcoming elections in U.P. in early 2002. 

Since the NDA Government led by BJP has come to power the education system has been greatly communalised. It is well known policy of the BJP to take over most sensitive like Human Resource Ministry which not only controls education but also premier research institutions like the ICHR, ICSSR, NCERT etc. All these key research institutions have now been taken over by the hard core RSS elements. All key research projects are being now monopolised by them. The important Towards Freedom volumes which were critical of the RSS role during freedom struggle and its pro-British stance were suddenly withdrawn from publication. Also, the school text books are being tempered with. Recently the CBSE (Central Board of Secondary Education) suddenly has issued circular to edit out certain portions of history text books written by noted secular historians like Romila Thapar, R.S.Sharma, Bipan Chandra and Satish Chandra. Such selective withdrawal will help indoctrination of young minds and will be prohibitive of encouraging critical understanding of history. The communal forces often temper with history and project the past uncritically as the golden era particularly the past dominated by the majority community rulers and denounce whole sale the past if dominated by minority community rulers.

CONCLUSION

There is no doubt that India has been passing through very critical period in the post-Babri demolition period as far as its secular polity is concerned. Not only political but also social and cultural space has been communalised. The eighties of course witnessed major communal riots but the BJP began to acquire strength by raising historical controversy like the Ramjanambhoomi and communalised politics as never before. But after it came to power as a major partner of NDA it began to monopolise the educational and cultural space which is much more harmful. The Sangh Parivar in U.P. did not allow shooting of the film Water whose script was approved by the Home Ministry. Indian cultural space is being increasingly communalised. Secular space in the fields of education and culture is of vital importance for unity and integrity of India. A long term damage will be done to Indian unity if socio-cultural spaces come under communal ideology. All secular forces should come together to prevent this.

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Centre for Study of Society and Secularism,

Mumbai:- 400 055.