Outlook Magazine 24 January 2011
hindu terror: the bias
Swami And Friends?
Did we get the terror prism all wrong, did majoritarian bias blind us?
by Saba Naqvi
In our mind’s eye, the shadowy terrorist was almost always a Muslim. At times he had a flowing beard and angry eyes, the stereotype beamed at us by the popular media. At other times, he was clean-shaven, if only to deceive us. But after Swami Aseemanand’s confessional statement, the discourse on terror is changing. The big question is: have we been looking at the terror prism all wrong?
True, there is a genuine problem of radical Islam in our neighbourhood and we have a festering insurgency in Kashmir. But if we examine the role of Indian Muslims in terrorism, it is sporadic and with no clear pattern. There were the serial blasts in 2008 carried out by the so-called Indian Mujahideen but half the cases they were blamed for are now being attributed to individuals and groups influenced by extremist Hindutva ideology. In the south, the Al Umma is believed to have carried out the Coimbatore blasts (1998) but there’s been no big strike subsequently. Which is why security expert B. Raman says that “today the threat from Indian Muslim terror groups and from Hindus who have taken to terror would be equal in scale. These Hindu terror groups cannot be dismissed after the Aseemanand confession, whatever the motives of the leak.”
But as a nation, we are loath to break out of ancient prejudices and stereotypes. Given the historical backdrop of Partition and the recent developments in Af-Pak, it is just so much simpler to see the Muslim (Pakistani or Indian) as the perpetrator. The sadhu, sadhvi or swami just doesn’t come to the mind’s eye, though the picture may now be changing. Historian Mahesh Rangarajan says, “Let us never forget that independent India’s first terrorist act was when an assassin shot dead a defenceless 77-year-old man we know as Gandhi. It is this act that led to a ban on several Hindu organisations by the Iron man, Sardar Patel, who called them a terroristic, fascistic creed that spreads the communal poison.”
Examine the history of terrorism and assassinations in India. Gandhi was killed by a Hindu fanatic, Indira by her Sikh bodyguards, Rajiv Gandhi by an LTTE suicide bomber. In the Northeast too, Muslims are not at the root of terror groups. Indeed, the ULFA can be seen as a godchild of the Hindutva ideology. Yet we buy into the global image of Muslims as equal fanatics and equal terrorists. Moreover, stretch the argument further and we can argue that in South Asia as a whole it is majority fundamentalism that takes on frightening dimensions. Besides what is happening in Pakistan, in Bangladesh majority Sunni fundamentalism is gaining ground. Meanwhile, in Sri Lanka it is the Buddhist Sinhala majority that has undermined democracy, using brutal methods to contain all opposition.
It’s in this context that we must examine the psychology of Aseemanand and friends. Pratap Bhanu Mehta, president, Centre for Policy Research, explains that “any ideology that is premised on a deep degree of resentment towards another group will at some point have a violent expression”. At the same time, he says, we have to get out of the identity trap and radically reframe the question on terrorism. “These so-called Hindu terrorists also see themselves as victims like the Christian Right in the US. And we have to factor in the fact that investigative agencies and society at large is predisposed to a certain bias.”
Still, there are specificities. Unlike the Maoists, Islamists or regional terrorists, the Hindu fanatic is not striking at the state or citizens (who are seen as collateral damage). There is a more complicated motive: the idea behind the Malegaon, Ajmer and Hyderabad blasts was to trigger panic and fear in Muslim majority areas, blame the minority community and create a communal polarisation.
There are other worrying questions. The Hindu extremist is not against the system; he is often embedded in the system. The Sangh parivar link is undeniable and here one may point to the huge display of weapons during every ayudha puja by the RSS cadre and politicians like Narendra Modi alike. Since there are several photographs of Modi with Aseemanand, one should ask questions about the reach of these extremists. Historian Christophe Jaffrelot says, “These terrorists are part of the establishment as ex-army officers, doctors working at the helm of five-star hospitals, sadhus or sadhvis and ex-MPs. Interestingly, none of the Abhinav Bharat leaders were from the plebians of the lower castes...who are only used against the Muslims at the time of communal riots.”
He also points to the attitude of the state. “The police forces (at the state and at the national level) have attributed bomb blasts targeting mosques or dargahs to Islamist groups and nobody objected to this nonsense—except for a few news persons. Second, even after Hemant Karkare exposed the Abhinav Bharat in the Malegaon case, many of the guilty men have not been made accountable for what they said or did. Karkare’s FIR mentions many more armymen and Sangh parivar leaders who have not been arrested.” Jaffrelot says the transcripts of the conversations between Abhinav Bharat leaders, retrieved from Malegaon accused Dayanand Pandey’s laptop in 2008, even mentioned their responsibility in the Mecca Masjid blast. Yet, nobody paid attention, “as if in the rule of law prevailing in India, Muslims had to be guilty of violence, whereas Hindus could get away with it. This is the perfect recipe for communal disaster”.
Which is the motive of the terrorist. Over the next few weeks, communal temperatures may again rise as the POTA court in Gujarat is expected to sentence several Muslims for the Godhra train attack. The prosecution has been hankering for the death sentence. In the backdrop of the great Hindu-Muslim faultline, all confessions leaked to the media by a Congress-led dispensation or justice delivered in a state run by Narendra Modi will all be part of a narrative that is sought to be managed by intelligence operatives and politicians alike.
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