[Rattled by the prospects of large scale desertion of
Leuva Patel votes, the nervousness overnight reaching
a feverish pitch after an ad in the local language
newspapers carrying the picture of a former BJP Chief
Minister Keshubhai Patel and his numerous messages
exhorting to dislodge the incumbent Chief Minister,
Modi has become pretty desperate.
So has opted to play his time tested vicious hate card
once again and in a pretty brazen manner without
flinching from rubbing both the Supreme Court and the
Election Commission on the wrong side with the hope
that the mass hysteria generated out of such a move
would be enough to tame the watchdog democratic
institutions of the land into meek and shameful
submission as had happened at the time of the infamous
demolition of the Babri Masjid almost exactly one and
a half decades ago.
But this time, his reckless gamble may turn out to be
terribly counterproductive.]
I/III.
http://in.reuters.com/article/topNews/idINIndia-30849220071206
Modi plays Hindu card in tight Gujarat poll
Thu Dec 6, 2007 8:45pm IST
By Simon Denyer
GODHRA (Reuters) - Narendra Modi, the charismatic but
controversial chief minister of Gujarat, is back on
the offensive, playing the Hindu nationalist card
ahead of this month's state election.
Dressed in a crisp orange waistcoat, Modi is touring
Gujarat, boasting of his development record and
attacking his rival, the Italian-born leader of the
Congress party, Sonia Gandhi, as soft on Muslim
"terrorists".
The vote, in which Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)
is in a straight fight with Congress, is seen as a key
barometer of the country's two main parties' fortunes
as the countdown begins to national polls due by
mid-2009.
But Modi has run into trouble with the country's
powerful Election Commission, which has criticised him
for creating communal hatred and tension, for
justifying the extra-judicial killing of a Muslim
criminal.
Earlier this year, his government admitted that
Sohrabuddin Sheikh had been shot dead by police in a
staged gunbattle, on the pretext that he was
conspiring to kill Modi.
"What should have been done to a man from whom a large
number of AK-47 rifles were recovered, who was on the
search list of police from four states, who attacked
the police, who had relations with Pakistan and wanted
to enter Gujarat?," Modi told a rally on Tuesday.
When the crowd shouted "kill him, kill him", Modi
replied: "Does my government need Soniaben's
permission for this?"
The Election Commission said it had studied video of
the speech, and said it appeared to violate its Code
of Conduct.
"The Commission, prima facie, is of the view that the
references to late Shri Sohrabuddin and linking his
name to terrorism, made in the speech, amounts to
indulging in activity which may aggravate existing
differences, creating mutual hatred and causing
tension between different communities."
It gave Modi until Saturday to reply.
Despite the furore, Modi has shown little sign of
dropping his pro-Hindu agenda, demanding the hanging
of a convicted Muslim militant the next day.
"Soniaben is a guardian of terrorists," he told a
rally in the communally polarised town of Godhra,
complaining a death sentence had still not been
carried out against Mohammed Afzal despite his
conviction for an attack on India's parliament in
2001.
"Afzal Guru is a terrorist. I want to tell her -- 'if
you don't have the courage, send him to Gujarat. We
will hang him here'," the bearded and bespectacled
Modi said, to applause.
CHANGING HIS TUNE
Taking the BJP stronghold would be a major boost for
Congress, which heads the ruling national coalition --
but for now, Modi seems to be maintaining a narrow
lead.
"You can see he has an edge, but Congress can still
tilt the race," said Ajay Umat, editor of the
Gujarati-language daily Divya Bhaskar.
Modi, 56, is seen as the poster boy of Hindutva, BJP's
Hindu revivalist philosophy.
Accused of encouraging communal riots in 2002 in which
up to 2,500 people, most of them Muslims, were killed,
he swept state elections later that year with an
aggressive pro-Hindu and anti-Muslim campaign.
Godhra, where Modi took his campaign on Wednesday, was
the scene of a fire on a train which killed 59 Hindu
pilgrims. The fire was blamed on Muslims and triggered
the 2002 riots.
Until last week, Modi seemed to have softened his
tone, campaigning as a champion of development in one
of India's richest and fastest-growing states, but
also one of its most communally divided.
Analysts said Modi's development message had not
struck a strong enough chord with voters, and this
week he changed his tune.
Gandhi has campaigned in Gujarat this month, but her
rallies have been subdued, if well attended. Modi's,
by contrast, were always lively.
Mixing humour and vitriol, his delivery and timing
perfect, he had the crowd eating out of his hand as he
slammed Congress for suggesting there was no proof of
Lord Ram's existence during a court battle earlier
this year.
"I ask you, was Lord Ram born? Was Sita Ram's wife?
Was Sita kidnapped by Ravana? Did Hanuman rescue
Sita?" he asked in his deep, gravelly voice, pausing
after each question for affirmation from the crowd.
"You know it all, but the Congress doesn't. Go and
tell them," he said, to a sea of laughter. "If they
can lie about Lord Ram, then they can lie about me."
II/III.
http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jjQZLghy4qE8Dz3KGw7ie_QStGiQ
Indian reporter fears for life after Muslim massacre
expose
NEW DELHI (AFP) — An Indian journalist who secretly
filmed right-wing Hindus boasting about the mass
murder of Muslims during riots in 2002 in the western
state of Gujarat says he now fears for his life.
Reporter Ashish Khetan is also a "very disappointed"
man -- saying his sting operation that again
highlighted the alleged complicity of state officials
in the massacres had failed to result in any action
being taken.
In addition, Hindu nationalists linked to the killings
look set to cruise to re-election in state elections
this month.
"I got them to speak to me, make self-damning
revelations, details of the killings and rapes," the
31-year-old, a Hindu, told AFP in an interview.
During a six-month undercover mission, Khetan tracked
down more than a dozen hardline Hindu activists
belonging to various groups allied to Gujarat's ruling
Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) administration.
The BJP rules Gujarat, and is India's main opposition
party on the national level. It has consistently
denied any involvement in the massacres five years ago
in which at least 2,000 Muslims were killed.
The expose was published by the weekly news magazine
Tehelka in October, and made headlines for barely a
week.
"Despite the evidence, the political reaction to the
expose has been at best tepid and I feel very, very
disappointed. There has been no action," Khetan said.
The rioting broke out after a Muslim mob was accused
of torching a train, burning 59 Hindus alive, on
February 27, 2002.
An enquiry by the state-run railways later ruled the
fire on the train which sparked the riots was an
accident.
The video tapes Khetan filmed showed Hindu zealots
apparently boasting of how they took "revenge," and
how they allegedly had the backing of BJP officials
and state chief minister Narendra Modi who is widely
expected to be re-elected when Gujarat goes to the
polls on December 11 and 16.
Khetan stumbled onto the story when he heard a chance
remark by a university official in Gujarat that he
organised attacks against Muslims and supplied weapons
during the riots.
"I was churning with emotion -- sheer terror of being
found out and hope of uncovering the truth," the
reporter said in a telephone interview.
Khetan said he introduced himself to his contacts as a
university student researching a paper on Hindu
revivalism: "I said I was a hardcore Hindu who wanted
to know what they had done to raise the status and
prestige of Hindus."
"There was this sense of gloating, boasting at their
sense of achievement at what they had managed to
accomplish," he said.
More shocking, he said, was the attitude of ordinary
Gujaratis.
"There was no remorse, no shame -- just the view that
the Muslims had it coming. It shows how much the mind
of an average Gujarati has been poisoned," Khetan
said.
He said the sting included moments of heart-stopping
fear.
"Once I was travelling with one of the men in his car
when he got a phone call. After finishing the call, he
turned to me and said he had been warned about a Delhi
journalist doing a sting operation on the riots.
"I kept a straight face, though I did break into a
cold sweat," he said.
Minutes later, the car turned into a dirt track and
stopped at a desolate spot: "I also saw another car
with two men inside... I was so scared. All they had
to do was frisk me to find the spy cams. But they went
their separate ways."
Disillusioned by the attitude of Indian politicians,
Khetan said he was also shocked to receive "hate mails
and even threats from journalists."
"My work has angered a lot of people. Who knows, some
fanatic sitting in some corner of the country may have
made a plan to kill me," he said. "Yes I am afraid
that I could be on the hit list of some fanatic or
another."
III.
http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/12/06/asia/AS-FEA-India-Politics-and-Violence.php
Five years after anti-Muslim violence, divisive leader
campaigns across Indian state
The Associated Press
Thursday, December 6, 2007
AHMADABAD, India: In the narrow alleys where Muslim
families cowered from a murderous Hindu mob, the
survivors still fear one man above all others.
Narendra Modi's bearded face stares from street
corners, T-shirts, key chains and mugs in this western
Indian city, where he's in the midst of a grueling
re-election campaign for the top post in the state of
Gujarat.
The first round of voting begins next Tuesday.
His supporters see Modi as a savvy technocrat, the
architect of western Gujarat state's economic miracle
and an icon to the cause of Hindu fundamentalism that
swept India at the turn of the millennium before
fading in the last three years.
But to many others — particularly Muslims — the former
tea stall vendor will always be defined by the wave of
anti-Muslim violence by Hindu hard-liners that left
more than 1,000 people dead in 2002. They see his rise
to the top job in Gujarat — home state of the revered
Indian independence leader Mohandas Gandhi — as a
terrifying chapter of intolerance.
"When I see his face or hear his voice, I get so mad,"
said Urmat Bibi Pathan, 60, a Muslim whose son was
killed in the violence. "If Modi came here I would
say: 'I blame you. Everything was done by you.'"
She's referring to the sectarian violence that erupted
as retaliation after 59 Hindus were killed when a
train car burst into flames in Godhra, a town in
Gujarat. Hindu nationalist groups blamed the blaze on
a Muslim mob, and launched a three-month pogrom
against Muslims across the state.
Human rights activists, independent panels and even
other Hindu nationalists have accused Modi of doing
little to stop the killings. In his previous campaign,
Modi's posters showed the flaming train car from
Godhra.
Sonia Gandhi, head of the ruling Congress party,
recently called the Modi administration "peddlers of
religion and death," though analysts believe she's
reluctant to directly mention the 2002 violence for
fear of angering Hindu voters.
The United States has been skeptical of Modi as well,
refusing to issue him a diplomatic visa in 2005
because Indian investigators held his administration
responsible for the violence.
Modi has denied the accusations and says his
government protects Hindus and Muslims alike. His
staff denied several requests for an interview.
Modi won his previous two elections in landslide
votes. While he's the favorite once again, this
campaign has been far tighter. The election will be
held in two phases, next Tuesday and again on Dec. 16
due to the huge voting population in the massive rural
state.
Members of Modi's Bharatiya Janata Party say he is an
economic visionary, a future prime minister in the
making.
He began his political career with the country's
largest militant Hindu movement, the RSS — the parent
organization of the BJP. The RSS was influenced by
1930s German fascism and has been widely accused of
stoking religious hatred with its aggressively
anti-Muslim views.
After the 2002 violence, Modi became a leading face of
"Hindutva," the doctrine that predominantly Hindu
India should be governed by Hindu beliefs. That
philosophy ruled the national government while the BJP
was in power from 1998 to 2004, but has sputtered
since Gandhi's Congress party came back to power in
2004.
Some see the race in Gujarat, a BJP stronghold, as the
party's last stand.
"If they lose Gujarat, they lose everything," said
Tridip Suhrud, a political scientist in Ahmadabad, the
state's biggest city.
Suhrud said losing Gujarat would be a "huge loss of
face" for the BJP because it would mean voters failed
to connect with both "Hindutva" and the party's
trumpeting of its economic wins.
Gujarat has always been one of India's wealthiest
states, and under Modi, the prosperity has grown,
thanks largely to a booming manufacturing sector. He
has pushed through major infrastructure projects like
raising the giant Narmada Dam, which allowed for more
hydroelectric power in the state, and attracting
billions of dollars in foreign investment.
"In five years, he has done more than the Congress
party did in the past 40 years," said Vijay Shah,
owner of a framing business in Ahmadabad. "Modi is the
leader to take Gujarat to the next stage."
Modi is revered in much of the state, where
neighborhoods and villages are plastered with Modi's
posters. Most analysts predict a BJP victory.
For survivors of the 2002 violence, that's a
frightening prospect.
"If Modi wins," said Mehboop Sheikh, a tailor who
barely escaped a rampaging mob, "it could happen
again."
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