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 no ordinary event that Mr. Narendra Modi has dissolved the Assembly in Gujrat and is in a hurry to hold election there by September or October. He is pretending that he is seeking people’s mandate. But, and it is important to note, people’s mandate cannot be sought in extra-ordinarily communally polarised situation as in Gujrat. Such elections cannot be construed as democratic elections under any circumstances.

First of all what was the crisis in Gujrat that an assembly wherein the ruling party enjoyed comfortable majority by itself had to be dissolved? Generally an elected assembly is dissolved only if there is crisis in the house or if a ruling coalition breaks down. No such thing has happened in Gujrat. The ruling party enjoys more than 2/3rd majority and not a single MLA has revolted or deserted the ruling party.

If any action needed it was to dismiss the chief minister Modi for his sins of omissions and commissions. All the right thinking people in the country, opposition political parties and the BJP’s own allies in NDA like Chandrababu Naidu of Telugu Desam Party demanded Modi’s dismissal but the BJP leadership did not relent. It was not Gujrat assembly, which was the real culprit in organising massacre of Muslims in Gujrat but Mr. Narendra Modi. However, Assembly has been dissolved and Mr. Modi is still at the helm of affairs. What an irony and mockery of democracy.

Gujrat, it should be noted, is far from normal. Of and on violent incidents have been taking place. There is palpable tension everywhere and all observers agree that Gujrat society has been polarised as never before. Observers of Gujrat social scene also agree that there is no sense of remorse among the killers. They continue to justify the communal carnage.

The BJP office bearers are projecting the Gujrat elections as people’s mandate and are asking rhetorically what is wrong in seeking people’s mandate? Who needs to seek people’s mandate? Entire assembly or the leader in command who is mainly responsible for the carnage, as all concerned agree? It would have been fine if Mr. Modi had resigned and sought re-election to the house to vindicate his position. Why punish other members of the House who were not responsible for the carnage. Can all be equally responsible? Or the leader has to share the responsibility as per well -established democratic norms. Why Modi is shying away from his responsibility?

He is now talking of Gujrat’s asmita (idenitiy) and had planned Gaurav Yatra (Pride of the Gujrat march). Who knows this march would have precipitated another outburst of violence. Again the opposition parties and secular persons had to protest in unison to stop this madness. Any other government would have long resigned rather than precipitating crisis after crisis. One also would like to ask what is that Modi is proud of that he wanted to take out Gujrat Gaurav yatra.  Is he proud of bloodshed of minorities in Gujrat? Or of utter inefficiency of his administration in tackling unprecedented massacre of Muslims?

No democracy can function the way Narendra Modi wants to function. It is not at all democratic to dissolve an elected assembly before its time has expired. There was no democratic crisis worth the name to do that. If there was any crisis it was crisis of handling the situation with efficiency and honesty. It was crisis of secularism, it was crisis of humanitarian values, it was crisis of respect for human life, it was crisis of honour and dignity of women.

In Narendra Modi’s chief ministership neither human values were respected nor any respect was shown to innocence of children or even of unborn babies. Unborn babies also had no safety. That was brand of Hinduism, which Mr. Modi subscribed to and now takes pride in practising it in Gujrat. But Mr. Modi should remember it is not Hindutva raj of BJP’s dream but secular democracy founded by our great leaders and visionaries like Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru, Sardar Patel and Maulana Abul Kalam Azad. They had respect for all religions and tolerance for others. They decided to remain secular despite horrors of massacre during partition.

And when first general elections were held in 1953 after our secular democratic constitution was adopted and Maulana Azad was given ticket from Rampur he rejected since it was given on the ground that it was Muslim majority area. He maintained he is not only representative of Muslims; he is representative of all Indians and hence subsequently he was given ticket from Haryana. 

These are the ideals of our Constitution, which are sought to be sabotaged by some fundamentalists or fanatics to establish their raj. The Gujrat carnage is being taken as an experiment for winning elections and then trying it out in other states. Rajasthan is sitting atop Gujrat like dynamite. The VHP is very active in Rajasthan to repeat Gujrat. It is well known that the BJP is using Gujrat as a laboratory of Hindutva.

Thus the elections in Gujrat are going to be of great significance for BJP and murder of democracy as far as the country is concerned. Mr. Modi is not seeking people’s mandate but endorsement of Hindutva raj. As for people’s mandate it is far from suitable time for it. How can you ask for people’s mandate when there is no normalcy and people are sharply divided on communal line and minorities are feeling intensely insecure? They do not even have proper houses to live in. Where will they vote?

And voting is not their priority now any way. They are not only deprived of their elementary needs but even of justice. According to Mr. Kingshuk Nag of Times of India, Ahmedabad, justice (for Muslims) is still light years away. Also, there is hardly normalcy in state yet. Mr. Nag writes in his edit page article in TOI on 22nd July 2002 “All over Gujrat, as an uneasy calm prevails, due process of law is being subverted in these and other indirect ways. Consequently, justice for the victims of the mindless violence seems light years away, that is justice is ever done.”

Mr. K.P.S.Gill who was sent to Gujrat to restore normalcy and control communal frenzy also maintains that Gujrat is far from normal. In an interview to The Asian Age (29 July 2002) he said answering a question whether Gujrat has returned to normalcy, he said, “No, I never said that normalcy has returned. I have said we have a situation in which there is absence of violence.”

There are palpable communal tensions in Gujrat, as pointed out before. Only a couple of days ago violence burst out when two scooterists met with an accident, one scooterist being Hindu and other being Muslim. More than 14 persons were injured. There is not only polarisation but also fear and suspicion. Many people of Gujrat are applying for gun licences on account of feeling of intense insecurity. The majority community is also living in fear of retaliation from Muslims, imaginary or real.

No elections can be held in such polarised conditions. Number of eminent citizens including Shri. Gujral, Ex-Prime Minister of India has urged upon the Election Commission not to hold elections in a hurry. All factors should be weighed very carefully before any decision to hold elections is taken by the EC.

In a way Narendra Modi is trying to force the hand of election Commission. The elections should be held within six months of the dissolution of the assembly, as legislative assembly has to meet within six months of its last session. But in order to prevent elections governor’s rule could be imposed. However, the Central Government, which can recommend imposition of President’s rule is led by the BJP and the NDA partners hardly care whether elections are held prematurely.

It is ironical that Prime Minister Shri Vajpayee is hinting at Governor’s rule in Jammu and Kashmir for “fair and free” elections there but hardly considers it necessary for Gujrat. Is it not open partisanship? Should same yardstick not be applied for both the states? What kind of clean government is being provided by the BJP? BJP violated all its electoral promises of transparent governance. It had promised riot-free India in its manifesto and Gujrat has shown what kind of riot-free India BJP had in mind.

Modi thus has tried to create such a situation as to fully exploit for an electoral victory. Everyone before Gujrat carnage thought BJP will lose the next assembly elections and during the carnage people started saying BJP will win hands down if elections are held in such intensely polarised situation. In fact those who knew became sure that elections will soon be held in Gujrat. The BJP asked Narendra Modi to ‘seek people’s mandate in its Goa session in April. ‘People’s mandate’, what a perfect democratic discourse! Those who had blood on hand wanted to vote!

It will not be ‘people’s mandate, it will be simply a plan for Hindutva victory, a mockery of secular democracy. It would be murder of democracy in the name of democracy. It should be prevented and priority should be given to provide relief to the victims of the massacre on one hand, and justice to the victims of carnage. That would be real democracy. Plurality and justice are very important pillars of secular democracy. Elections can wait but not justice and peace.
 

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