Tewatia Report reveals truth of Godhra 2002
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Arvind Lavakare
27 Mar 2014
If the Gujarat 2002 tragedy had been confined to charred bodies of 58 kar sevaks in a compartment of the Sabarmati Express at Godhra railway station on February 27, a milestone chapter in India’s political history would not have come about. All that would have happened is a Railway inquiry under Nitish Kumar’s Ministry. That too would have been an event which would have prevented the current political scenario of heartburn, hatred and hype.
But that was not to be. Chief Minister Narendra Modi’s kismet had ordained otherwise. Even after undergoing the incalculable stress of being subjected to media calumny — scorn, spit and sundry — for 12 years, Modi is having to prove he personally did no wrong in that tragedy. The public continues to be victims of the ludicrous logic that a Sate Chief Minister must take the responsibility for everything that happens under his watch — from an increased divorce rate to the galloping upsurge in consumption of unhealthy fast food. That is why Chief Minister Modi remains under eternal suspicion. Perhaps the only proof he has not been asked to submit is his birth certificate.
First of all, his critics have never quite understood that human rage over one’s kith and kin being burnt to death by unknown forces simply cannot be bottled. Only saints and robots are immune to sensibilities. That is why the families and close ones of the 58 kar sevaks were seized by the evil thought of revenge. The inevitable happened against the imaginary adversary. And, bursting like a tornado-cum-typhoon.
The media stoked matters. As subsequent events revealed, some of the fourth estateimagined gory acts of vendetta such as ripping the stomach of a pregnant woman. Violence did happen, certainly, but so much of it was made to appear as though a mini world war had broken out in Gujarat.
For instance, media persons came out with figures of hundreds butchered even as, they said, Chief Minister Modi simply watched — nay, even encouraged the “murderers” and “rioters”. The TV channels went berserk, latching on to repeated showing of every single act of assault and arson. To seeing was added a lot of hearsay.
Figures of dead were also guesstimated. Some cited the number as hundreds, some others as thousands. Nobody gave cemetery or graveyard data. Nobody, it seemed, cared for the truth. Hence, it seems to suit everyone to forget the official figure informed to Parliament in 2005 through a written statement by the Minister of State for Home of the UPA Government. That official statement of the Government in power (not the BJP, remember) said that 254 Hindus and 790 Muslims were killed in those post-Godhra riots. That made a total of 1044 of which, 24.33 per cent were Hindus including those killed by police bullets fired under Modi Government’s orders. So where was the so-called “genocide” and “holocaust” that the psychologically sick pseudo-secularists talk about non-stop?
If the “bad” media, along with certain vested interests and “secular” Hindu bashers, were to a great extent responsible for this dastardly distortion of events, the BJP itself was pathetically incompetent in its communications skills. Instead of appointing a full-time outfit tasked only with ascertaining the correct facts and figures and meeting the media three times a day at fixed hours, the party as a whole seemed so paralysed in this crucial aspect of running a national political party.
Even today, despite what its past President, Venkaiah Naidu, told a national newspaper recently, the BJP media spokespersons seem unable to prove that Chief Minister Modi was willing to resign in 2002 but was asked to continue by the party itself — and with Atal Bihari Vajpayee’s consent at that! (The Sunday Express, March 9, 2014, Idea Exchange Page)
In this matter of inadequate communication skills, the BJP’s biggest failure must lie in its inability to publicise the findings of a report of April 2002 which was virtually blacked out by the media. The report was based on a field study done under the aegis of Council for International Affairs and Human Rights, Delhi. According to the typed version of that report sent to me by the Council’s Secretary General, Shyam Khosla, the study team was headed by Justice D.S.Tewatia, Vice-Chairman of the Council and a former Chief Justice of Calcutta and Punjab and Haryana High Courts. Its other members were JC Batra, senior advocate, Supreme Court of India, Krishan Singh Arya, Academician, Chandigarh, Jawahar Lal Kaul, former Assistant Editor, Jansatta, Delhi, and BK Kuthiala, Dean, Faculty of Media Studies, GJ University Hisar.
Following are some of the conclusions of the Justice Tewatia Report:
1. Preparations for enacting Godhra carnage were made in advance.
2. There were no quarrels or fights between Hindus and Muslim passengers on the train.
3. There were no quarrels or fights between the vendors and the Hindu pilgrims on the platform of Godhra Railway Station.
4. The intention of the mob was to put to death all the pilgrims travelling by the Sabarmati Express.
5. The fire-fighting system available in Godhra was weakened and its arrival at the place of incident willfully delayed by the mob with the open participation of a Congress Councillor, Haji Balal.
6. The demographic changes in Godhra in recent years have made it a centre for jihadi activities.
7. The Army was requisitioned and deployed in time.
8. The police was on many occasions overwhelmed by the rioting mobs that were massive and carried more lethal weapons than the police did.
9. Barring a few exceptions, the police was not found to be communally motivated.
10. By converting half-baked news stories into major headlines, print as well as electronic media widened the psychological hiatus between Muslims and Hindus.
One cannot but believe that if the whole Tewatia Report had been sufficiently publicised (including through an advertising campaign), Narendra Modi would not have had to undergo the calumny of scorn and shame of the last 12 years.
But who knows. That kismet of his may well play out startlingly — from scorn and shame to the summit of this nation’s PM’s post.http://www.niticentral.com/2014/03/27/tevatia-report-reveals-truth-of-godhra-2002-204434.html