The Hindu - August 19, 2004 | Opinion - Editorials
URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2004/08/19/stories/2004081901631000.htm
PROFOUND INDICTMENT
IF A FINAL and comprehensive indictment of the Narendra Modi Government in Gujarat regarding its complicity in the post-Godhra riots was ever needed, it has come in the form of the Supreme Court's order on Tuesday. A bench comprising Justices Ruma Pal, S.B. Sinha and S.H. Kapadia has directed the Gujarat Government to constitute a high-level police team headed by the Director General of Police to re-examine more than 2000 cases of summary closure of riot cases in the aftermath of Godhra. The story regarding an unprecedented number of such summary closures, based on an affidavit filed in December 2003 by Harsh Mandar in the National Human Rights Commission vs. the State of Gujarat case, first appeared in The Hindu on April 14, 2004. In what appears to be a telling comment on the Modi Government's response to the riot cases, the apex court has identified a complete breakdown of the law enforcement machinery by calling the situation in the State `unprecedented' and `abnormal'. That the rule of law has been compromised repeatedly is borne out by the fact that the Supreme Court has taken the initiative to set guidelines for transparency in the review of all such cases: the State Government and the police team reinvestigating these cases will have to post on the Internet reasons for closing a case after revisiting it, and the Court will have to be apprised of the progress of this re-examination every three months.
Earlier judgments of the Court regarding the post-Godhra riots were severe and trend setting but they dealt with individual cases — the Best Bakery and Bilkis Bano cases are such instances. In ordering the reopening of half the 4252 cases, the bench has concluded that there was a collective failure of the entire governmental machinery as well as a failure of the trial courts to dispense justice. What has, however, received little attention is the spectacle of contradictory statements emerging out of the depositions before the judicial commission investigating the 2002 riots. The failure of the former Ahmedabad Police Commissioner, P.C. Pande, to explain why his officers were unable to prevent the massacres of Gulberg Society and Naroda Patiya on February 28, 2002, and the sensational 172-page affidavit filed by Additional Director General of Police, R.B. Sreekumar, documenting in detail the direct role of police officials and politicians in the post-Godhra violence, testify to the absence of a Constitution-abiding and responsible government in Gujarat.
A series of indictments by the highest court in the land has, however, not deterred Chief Minister Modi or dented his party's steadfast faith in his abilities. The Bharatiya Janata Party has refused to express contrition over what happened in 2002, while rhetorically and perversely rationalising the pogrom as an illustration of action-reaction theory. It is no coincidence that most of the cases closed summarily were those in which members of the Sangh Parivar had been named as perpetrators of the inhuman crime. A few examples will suffice. The First Information Report filed on the basis of a complaint by Babubhai Sheikh in the Naroda Patiya case mentioned Vishwa Hindu Parishad State general secretary, Jaydeep Patel, as allegedly instigating and carrying out arson and looting. In another FIR filed in Naroda Gam, the complainant had named BJP legislator Maya Kodnani and Jaydeep Patel. The day is not far when Mr. Modi and his party will have to explain to the country whether or not shielding politicians and activists of the Sangh Parivar from the rule of law amounts to a breakdown of the constitutional machinery in Gujarat.
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