India: Better Representation Muslims in western Uttar Pradesh, breeds radical Hindus ?

Business Standard

In UP, resentment breeds radical Hindus

With a rise in the clout of Muslims in western Uttar Pradesh, Hindus feel the need to assert their identity more than ever

Mayank Mishra  |  Meerut  January 9, 2016

Chahat, 6, has very little idea about what she is doing. But she does not hesitate for a second when asked to show her skills with a sword. She is one of the 50 boys and girls who are regulars at an akhara-cum-training-camp in Rori village, located on the outskirts of Ghaziabad district.

Her explanation, “desh ka naam badhana hai (have to contribute to the country’s glory)” on why she is part of this group does not quite match with the statements of the organisers, though. “We are imparting mental and physical training to our children so that they are ready to take on the mentality of Islamic jihad,” observes Chetna Sharma, a Meerut-based lawyer and president of Hindu Swabhiman. She has instrumental in setting up such camps in western Uttar Pradesh.

She recounts a number of stories of what she calls “love jihad” in and around Meerut. “The strategy keeps changing but the motive of trapping innocent Hindu girls remains the same. Whether by organising pool parties or by enticing young minds through other means, there is definitely a conspiracy,” says Sharma, sitting in her house while showing pictures of some recent incidents on her laptop.

Sharma is not alone in believing that something like this is going on. There are many others who see a “wider design” whenever any incident of Hindu girl falling in love with a Muslim boy comes to light.

One such incident was reported in Shamli district last month. In the last week of December, a mahapanchayat was called in Shamli to protest against the perceived failure of the police to trace a 23-year-old Hindu woman who had gone missing with a Muslim man in his early 40s. The mahapanchayat brought the latent communal tension to the fore yet again.

“A perception is gaining ground among Hindus in the region is that it is increasingly becoming very difficult to have daughters in the family. Family members worry about their safety whenever they venture out,” says Vikash Baliyan, an aspiring politician who runs a weekly, Krishi Nazar, in Muzaffarnagar.

However, Jamiat Ulama-I-Hind’s Moosa Kazmi says that it is unfortunate that incidents of a Hindu woman falling in love with a Muslim  are given communal colour.

But the perception persists, and has reached even villages in the region. A number of people in Jadauga village — on the outskirts of Muzaffarnagar — kept referring to such incidents, giving the impression that all is not well between the two communities.

It is due to the perception that some Hindu groups like the one headed Sharma have decided to impart physical and mental training to young boys and girls. One such training camp is being held in the premises of a retired army official Parvinder Arya in Rori village. “I have served in Kashmir and have seen the plight of Hindus there. I do not want the same thing to happen in western Uttar Pradesh,” says Arya.

Sharma claims that 20 such training camps are operational in the region and within a year, her organisation plans to cover most of the villages in the region.

At each training camp, boys and girls are getting trained with lathis, swords, bow and arrow, among others, with occasional shouts of “Jai Shri Ram” and “Jai Maha Kali”. “I want them to be physically fit and mentally strong to take on enemies once the situation arises,” says Arya, as the trainees alternate between doing push-ups and sit-ups. The training camp currently has around 60 boys and girls. The one in Rori village has been running for the last two years. And, Arya claims that the trained boys have started camps in other villages as well.

What explains the radicalisation of Hindus in the region? Recent economic and political changes in the state and the region offer some answers. Number of Muslim MLAs in Uttar Pradesh went up from 56 in 2007 to 69 in 2009. What is more, the members of the community did even better in urban local body (ULB) elections.

Analysis of ULB elections of 2012 by AK Verma of the Kanpur-based Christ Church College shows that, “In the 12 nagar nigams, though no Muslim was elected as mayor, 21.4 per cent Muslims were elected as members. In the nagar palikas, Muslims account for 31.9 per cent of the presidents and 33.86 per cent of the members. In the urban panchayats, 26.6 per cent of the presidents and 30.7 per cent of the members are Muslims.” His research shows that in two western Uttar Pradesh districts of Saharanpur and Bijnor, Muslims swept the polls.

“In a multi-cornered contest like in Uttar Pradesh, the votes of Muslims have become very significant for parties. Since the proportion of Muslims in the western part of the state is even more, they are sought after by political parties. Their growing representation in elected positions is a result of that,” argues Sudhir Panwar, Lucknow-based political scientist.

Political empowerment of the community is perhaps a result of their growing clout economically. The thriving meat export business has been helpful in this regard. Uttar Pradesh accounts for nearly half of total meat production in the country and western Uttar Pradesh has been the centre of meat export business. Buffalo meat export, which was less than $3 billion in 2011-12, is now in excess of $4 billion. Most of the slaughter houses in the state are  located in the western region, and the majority of them are owned by Muslims, according to reports.

Recently released census data also give some hints of how Muslims are recovering lost grounds vis-à-vis other communities. Only 33 per cent of Muslims work against the national work participation rate of 40 per cent. However, most of all those who work are outside of agriculture. While 52 per cent of them work in industry and services, 7 per cent of them work as artisans.

More specifically about western Uttar Pradesh, two specific data show that Muslims have done well in the last few years. National Sample Survey Organisation (NSSO) data shows that from 2004-05 to 2011-12, the decline in the incidence of poverty among Muslims was at 2.51 per cent in rural areas and 2.8 per cent in urban areas as against the overall average of 2.06 per cent and 1.81 per cent, respectively.

The decline was much sharper in urban areas thanks to the growing demand of artisans (carpenters, masons, electricians, et cetera) in recent times. Last year’s Teamlease report had revealed that salary growth of skilled workers has been at par with young engineers. What perhaps also helps skilled workers in western Uttar Pradesh is the region’s proximity to the National Capital Region.

What is more, decline in poverty among self-employed Muslims in the the non-agriculture category has been even sharper in Uttar Pradesh, according to NSSO data.

The growing radicalisation of Hindus is perhaps a reaction to the rise in clout of Muslims.

India: Riot in Kanpur and Kanpur police lodges FIRs against 2564 people (Two reports in The Times of India)

The Times of India

Riot rocks Kanpur over damaged religious poster
Faiz Rahman Siddiqui & Abhinav Malhotra,TNN | Oct 25, 2015, 03.40 AM IST

Eid festivities grip KanpurPolitical riots deadlier than communal ones: NCRBMake Muzaffarnagar riots report public: MayaCops stop SP march over 1993 riotsViolence marks second anniversary of Muzaffarnagar riots

KANPUR: A police inspector and a reserve inspector suffered bullet injuries following indiscriminate firing by rioters in an escalation of violence that had erupted in the Babupurwa area here over damage to a religious poster late Friday night.

"Two policemen, including station house officer of Badshahi Naka D K Singh and reserve inspector Yogesh Sharma, were hit by bullets fired by rioters in Chamanganj area." Said SSP Shalabh Mathur.

"They were rushed to a hospital. Some locals also suffered injuries in stone throwing by a mob, which also vandalized private and government property. Prohibitory orders have been clamped in the city and security has been stepped up," said Mathur added.

Police said clashes erupted on Friday night over tearing up of a religious poster. On Saturday afternoon, the situation turned ugly when agitators demanded action against the culprits and staged a protest. By the evening, the situation had worsened with groups of rioters taking to the streets and indulging in heavy brick-batting and firing. Several vehicles were torched by angry mob near Zarib Chowki area, police said.

READ ALSO: BSF conducts flag march after violence leaves 1 dead in Kannauj

The protesters later staged a road blockade where a 'tazia' procession was to be taken out, which further escalated tension in other parts of the city.

Senior officials including district magistrate (DM) Kaushal Raj Sharma, SSP Shalabh Mathur and others rushed to the spot and instructed the locals to remain indoor.

However, the mob again relented to brick-batting after which the police dispersed them using by resorting to lathi-charge and tear-gas shells.

Panic gripped and people locked themselves up in their houses and the shutters of the shops in the nearby markets such as Gumti, Darshanpurwa, Jarib Chowki had been pulled down.

Rumours did rounds and the officials appealed people to not to pay attention to the rumours and to maintain calm and peace.

The traffic movement had been suspended on the Kalpi road between Fazalganj and Jarib Chowki. The traffic movement therefore, remained diverted. The police had cordoned off the area. To avoid any kind of backlash, heavy force had been deployed in the lanes and the bylanes of the congested area having mixed population of the two communities.


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#2.

The Times of India

Kanpur police lodges FIRs against 2564 people after Saturday's violence
Abhinav Malhotra,TNN | Oct 26, 2015, 02.00 AM IST

Kanpur police lodges FIRs against 2564 people after Saturday's violence
Police in action after a communal violence occurrence in Kanpur on Saturday. (PTI Photo)
KANPUR: Taking stern action against the miscreants belonging to the two communities who had indulged in stone pelting, arson and firing, police have lodged FIRs against a whopping 2,564 people including women.

These FIRs have been lodged in four police stations of the city including Chamanganj, Sisamau, Fazalganj and Naubasta where disturbance and unrest had been caused. Also 50 more people have been identified who were involved in Saturday's violence and arson. The police have taken into custody about eight people with whom thorough investigations are underway.

The police is now gearing up to slap NSA against the main culprits who incited the mob and led to the massive unrest. The senior police officials have constituted a team which would identify the people against whom unnamed FIR has been lodged. The riot control scheme had been implemented in the affected areas.

Talking to the newsmen Senior Superintendent of Police Shalabh Mathur informed that FIRs have been lodged against 2564 people of which named FIR has been lodged against 14 people. He said that FIR include women also. "In Chamanganj police station FIR against 1000 people and in Sisamau, FIR against 800 people stands registered. In Fazalganj, FIR against 600 people and in Naubasta, FIR against 150 people has been lodged.

Also named FIR against 14 people stands registered. These FIRs have been mentioned under different sections including 147, 148, 149, 295, 353, 307, 427, 336, 188 IPC. 7 Criminal Amendment Act (CLA) has been slapped against the culrpits. Further, NSA would be slapped against them", said SSP while giving a break-up of the FIRs launched and action taken so far. He added that Damage to Property Act has also been slapped and recovery cost of damaged vehicles would be taken from the miscreants.

Giving break up of the force provided to the city to deal with the current situation, SSP said that nine companies of PAC, two companies each of CISF and BSF and one company of RAF are assisting police in tackling the situation. Also 40 commandos of Anti-Terrorist Squad have been provided who are conducting flag march, he said.

The original sin of November 1984 - Editorial The Hindu (1 Nov 2012)

Source: The Hindu, November 1, 2012


Twenty-eight years ago in New Delhi, Kanpur and Bokaro, a murderous attack was launched against Indians of the Sikh faith by mobs organised and instigated by Congress politicians bent upon using the tragic assassination of Indira Gandhi as an occasion for political manipulation and gain.

Twenty-eight years ago in New Delhi, Kanpur and Bokaro, a murderous attack was launched against Indians of the Sikh faith by mobs organised and instigated by Congress politicians bent upon using the tragic assassination of Indira Gandhi as an occasion for political manipulation and gain. In the capital, the police stood mute witness to the killing of 2,733 Sikhs. That inaction and the failure to register cases or properly investigate those that were eventually filed are testimony to the official patronage the killings enjoyed. Rajiv Gandhi, who was Prime Minister at the time, made light of the pogrom, describing them as a reaction — “the earth always trembles when a big tree falls” — to the killing of his mother. Senior Congress leaders like H.K.L. Bhagat who were identified by survivors and eyewitnesses as instigators of the violence were rewarded with ministerial berths. A Commission of Inquiry headed by Justice Ranganath Mishra concluded, astonishingly, that the organised massacre was a spontaneous and “involuntary reaction” by ordinary citizens stricken by grief at Mrs Gandhi’s assassination. Subsequent commissions indicted the police for acts of commission and omission but the bitter reality is that the victims of the massacre are no closer to justice today than they were in 1984.

The issue at stake is not simply a moral one. The fact that the politicians and police officers responsible for 1984 not only escaped indictment but actually prospered had grave implications for minorities elsewhere in India. The riot system perfected by the Congress on the streets of Delhi was unveiled again in Bombay in 1993 and, finally, by the Bharatiya Janata Party government of Gujarat in 2002. The parallels between 1984 and 2002 are striking. Like Rajiv Gandhi’s ‘Newtonian’ logic, Chief Minister Narendra Modi described the killing of innocent Muslims in his State as a spontaneous reaction to the burning of Hindu train passengers at Godhra. BJP and sangh parivar activists led the mobs in various places and were rewarded, like Maya Kodnani, with plum jobs. The Gujarat police used the same tactics as their Delhi counterparts to ensure the criminal investigation of major riot cases went nowhere. The big difference between now and then, of course, is the vigilance of the Supreme Court, which intervened when it became apparent that Mr. Modi’s government was not going to provide justice. Difficult though it seems, therefore, judicial intervention is needed even at this late stage to punish the guilty. In the absence of justice, the least the country can do is build a fitting monument in Delhi to honour the memory of the victims. The government may frown on such an act of remembrance but future generations of Indians must never forget there was a time the state looked away while innocent citizens were killed in the very Capital of the Republic simply because of their religion.

Resurgent Hindutva Terror in India - Whether The Goa Bomb Blasts Investigations Would Also Go The Kanpur (or Nanded) Way?

Kanpur Bajrang Dal recruits wrestlers for hindi heartland

Daily News and Analysis

Bajrang Dal hires musclemen

by Aditya Kaul
Thursday, October 23, 2008 02:24 IST


Pehelwans available on hire make rallies easier for many outfits in Hindi heartland

KANPUR: Besides its dedicated cadre in Kanpur and recruitments through its network, the Bajrang Dal recruits pehelwans (wrestlers) from local akharas when the need arises.

One such akhara, the Azad Hind Vyayamshala, is located on Bhagwat Das ghat. There are about 20 pehelwans who come daily for exercises here. Says Ashok Pehelwan, manager of the akhara, “If you want pehelwans anywhere in Uttar Pradesh we can arrange them for you.”

The akhara supplies wrestlers to the Bajrang Dal. “Yeh dharm-varam kuch nahi mante. Yeh to dhanda karte hain. Yahan se kai baar ladke le gaye hain (These people don’t know any religion. They just do business. They have taken several people from here),” said a wrestler..

What’s the cost? “There is no fixed rate. But the diet of the pehelwans has to be taken care of,” he added.

Another wrestler from Kannauj said, “Today morning itself I was with Bajrang Dal men. I have accompanied them on several occasions on protests and demonstrations.”

Stretched on a charpoy in a small hutment, Hemraj, one of Kanpur’s most prominent wrestlers, is enjoying his afternoon siesta. A short but stoutly built man with a bushy moustache, Hemraj appeared straight out of a Bollywood film. Asked about the price, he asked, “Do you want them? Tell me how many and where. I can supply them and you can take them anywhere . The daily charges are Rs 2000 besides expenses incurred on the food and upkeep of the wrestlers.”

So what sort of work do they do? “We can go to any rally or even to threaten somebody…you tell us tand we will do it.”

Can they beat up somebody? He laughs, “Arre bhai, tod-fod karna hi to hamara kaam hai. (Breaking things is our work).”

It isn’t just the publications, false histories, dedicated cadres, religious functionaries, intimidations, mysterious blasts and wrestlers that make up the entire Sangh Parivar, especially its deadly youth wing, Bajrang Dal.

It is probably something else nobody talks in public about and what a senior Bajrang Dal functionary said at the Sangh office in Govind Nagar — the Bajrang Dal trains its youths in what they call Bal Upasana Kendras.

We ask a lot of people, but nobody seemed to know much. So we asked the Bajrang Dal’s national convenor Prakash Sharma, in Ayodhya, over phone. He sounded surprised. “Who told you about this?” After a moment of silence, he added, “I cannot tell you anything.” And he hung up.
aditya_k@dnaindia.net

On Kanpur's Saffron Vishwa Samwad Kendra and UP network

Daily News and Analysis, October 22, 2008

In Kanpur, you can’t ignore the Saffron shine
Aditya Kaul


A parasite of VHP and RSS, Bajrang Dal claims to be involved in ‘awakening people’ but dismisses questions on attacks on minorities

NEW DELHI: Bajrang Dal, the youth wing of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, doesn’t have an office of its own. It operates from the offices of the VHP and RSS. In Kanpur, there are dozens of offices of the two outfits providing ideological support to the Bajrang Dal.

At an RSS office in Gandhi Nagar, called the Vishwa Samwad Kendra that is the communication centre for the Kanpur region, one gets an idea of the sophistication and intricate nature of the operations of Sangh parivar.

As Arvind Kumar, the manager of the centre shows us around, we notice the office was littered with publications from various Vishwa Samvad Kendras across the state. In UP, there are seven such centres including those at Kanpur, Agra, Meerut, Uttaranchal, Gorakhpur, Awadh-Lucknow and Benaras.

Kumar says, “Our job here is to dispatch publications and other organisational communication to workers and other centres across the country.

Most of the communication is sent via e-mail.” Kumar is a full-time employee of the RSS and though he doesn’t get salary, all his expenses including housing, food and travel are borne by the RSS.

“We have a major presence in this city. There are around 60 RSS-supported schools run under the banner of Saraswati Vidyalayas and Deen Dayal Vidyalayas in the city,” says Kumar. The RSS is running 300 shakhas in Kanpur city alone and a total of 1,500 shakhas in Kanpur region. “The shakhas are normally held early in the morning because we face no disturbance at that time as it is not easy for our adversaries to get up that early,” he points out, adding that the Bajrang Dal conducts camps for students on a regular basis.

The RSS and VHP offices of Govind Nagar locality are situated inside a Saraswati Vidyalaya. A big RSS shakha was underway when we entered the compound. An RSS pracharak says a week-long annual camp was in progress, which was attended every day by about 120-130 students in the age group of 7-14 years from various RSS schools and other youths associated with the organisation.

Adjoining the RSS office is the VHP office where one Umesh Chandra Porwal tells us that he looks after the “cow protection wing” of the VHP. “We have cadre here in Kanpur to ensure no cows are slaughtered. We rescue hapless cows from butchers and send them to gaushalas (cowsheds).”

He then hands over to us a document on “cow therapy” and a small neatly packaged bottle containing a transparent liquid. “That is cow urine. It is very good for health. We also do research on cow therapy.”

During Dussera festivities in Kanpur on Parade Ground, the Sangh parivar’s sway over the city could not be overlooked. The only prominent tent at the entrance of the Ramlila-Parade ground was that of the Bajrang Dal. The place was swarming with Bajrang Dal members. The ramlila rath procession had a massive presence of men in saffron who accompanied the local policemen. The state police had also summoned the
Rapid Action Force personnel as a preemptive measure in case of a communal flare-up.
Inside the Bajrang Dal camp, Kamal Kumar, a long-time RSS pracharak in his 60’s, says that most of the members in the Ramlila organising committee are Sangh parivar sympathisers.

On the table in front of him lay pamphlets giving historical background of Ram Setu and how the struggle for protection of Ram Setu has to be taken forward. Kamal Kumar says, “Why do you think Mughals were able to invade this country and convert people to Islam? That is because several hundreds of years back Buddhism had spoilt the culture of Hindu civilisation by ingraining non-violence. We lost the culture of fighting.”
Kamal Kumar told us the Bajrang Dal has a strong force of about 12,000 active members and many part timers.

Bajrang Dal’s national convener Prakash Sharma stays on Shiwala road in Kanpur. He distances himself from the blast episode. “This is politics. People are opposing us to please vote banks. The Muslims are standing out there as vote banks. We have got no connection with the blast episode…. Let the government ban Bajrang Dal. If they think it should be banned, it will be the most undemocratic thing to do in independent India.”
Referring to the Christian killings in Orissa and Karnataka he said. “Aaj pure desh mein hinduon pe atyachar ho raha hai. Assam mein Bodo wale maar rahe. Orissa mein Christians ko char thappad kya mar diye to chillane lage.”

Sangh Parivar's bomb making activists: two recent reports

(See Two Reports in Mail Today pasted below)

BAJRANG DAL BOMBERS
Sangh activists blow themselves up planning revenge attacks

by Piyush Srivastava in Lucknow
Mail Today, 26 August 2008
mailtoday.in

IT'S OFFICIAL. The Sangh Parivar members have now joined in plotting terrorist attacks. On Sunday afternoon, a bomb accidentally went off in Kanpur killing a former Kanpur city convener of the Bajrang Dal and his associate while they were assembling a bomb in a private hostel room.

The police suspect that the two were planning retaliatory attacks in the aftermath of the bomb blasts in Ahmedabad and could be part of a larger conspiracy. They were reportedly making six to seven bombs to trigger off a serial blast in the Muslimdominated areas of Ahmedabad.

The hostel room was badly damaged in the explosion. The police stumbled on substantial quantity of bombmaking material from the spot. They recovered three kg of lead oxide, 500 gm of red lead, one kg of ammonium and potassium nitrate, 11 hand grenades, seven timers, over two kg of bomb pins and pellets, seven batteries, 12 bulbs and about 50 m of wires. Two of the timers found at the spot were attached to batteries with wires.

The dead men have been identified as 25- year-old Rajeev Mishra and 31-year-old Bhupendra Singh Chopra. The explosion was so intense that both the legs of Chopra and Mishra were blown off and they died within minutes. Two other youths, who were in the adjoining room, sustained serious injuries when the room's wall collapsed due to the explosion.

Identifying the slain bombers as part of the Sangh Parivar, Kanpur senior superintendent of police (SSP) Ashok Kumar Singh told MAIL TODAY, "I am told Bhupendra Singh Chopra was a Bajrang Dal member. Even earlier, Bajrang Dal activists were found to be indulging in antisocial activities in Kanpur." A resident of Shastri Nagar in the city, Chopra was the convener of the Bajrang Dal in Kanpur city between 1998 and 2000.
Prakash Sharma, the national convener of Bajrang Dal, is from Kanpur and knew the duo pretty well. Talking to MAIL TODAY, Sharma said Chopra and Mishra were members of his organisation. "I don't deny they were active in the Bajrang Dal a few years ago. But, they were inactive these days," he said.

The injured have been identified as Vikas Singh, 21, of Fatehpur and Bupendar, 20, of Chitrakoot. They are students of a Kanpur polytechnic institute. The condition of the two was said to be serious.

Sharma feigned ignorance of the activities Chopra and Mishra were involved in. About the explosives Sharma claimed, "Such things can be bought from the market any day during Dussehra and Diwali. Though both Bhupendra and Rajeev used to meet me, I didn't know what they were planning to do."

Kanpur range inspector general of police S.N. Singh pointed towards the possibility of serial blasts. "It was meant for a larger conspiracy. Most probably these people had planned serial blasts. We are investigating their links."

Another officer said the police had information about more explosives that had been dumped by the two Bajrang Dal members and hoped to recover them soon.

Mithilesh Kumar Pandey, the officer in charge of the bomb disposal squad of Kanpur said he found enough material at the blast site for assembling seven bombs of high intensity. They had used bulb filaments in place of detonators to ignite the explosives. The hand grenades recovered from the spot were improvised and could be opened from both sides on which iron panels were fixed. The scene suggested that the bombmakers were well trained in their job.

The incident took place around 3 pm in the room of a private hostel in Rajiv Nagar colony of Shardanagar area in Kanpur city. The hostel is run by Shiv Saran Mishra, Rajeev's father. A retired employee of Kanpur Electric Supply Company (KESCO), he had reportedly severed his links with his son two years ago and was living in his ancestral village of Nankari on the outskirts of the city. Shiv Saran had rented out six hostel rooms to students of a polytechnic but Rajeev, an executive with a private firm in Lucknow, had forcibly occupied one of the rooms two months ago, apparently against his father's wishes.

Shiv Saran said Bhupendra and his son had attended a Bajrang Dal training camp in Lucknow on June 13, 2001 in which they were taught martial arts and the use of arms and ammunitions.

Police officers said Bhupendra and Rajeev were upset after the Ahmedabad serial blasts and would talk about their plans for visiting Gujarat to take revenge. "Both the men had left their parents' homes. Their relatives knew they were involved in serious criminal activities since 2001," an officer said.

SSP Singh said Rajeev, who was a bachelor, used to visit Kanpur every Sunday and used to spend a few hours in the hostel room with his friends. This Sunday, he arrived at around 2:30 pm. Bhupendra reached there 15 minutes later. The explosion was heard around 3 pm.

Vinay Katiyar, a Rajya Sabha member, national general secretary of the BJP and founder of the Bajrang Dal, said, "I have no connection with the organisation (Bajrang Dal) since 1996. They do not report to me and I do not chalk out their programmes."

piyush.srivastava@mailtoday.in

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'COPS & GOVT IGNORE HINDU TERROR IN NANDED'

by Krishna Kumar in Mumbai
Mail Today, 26 August 2008
mailtoday.in

SINCE 2006, at 1.30 am on April 6, Bajrang Dal cadre celebrate 'Shahid Diwas' in Nanded by bursting crackers. They observe the 'martyrdom' of two colleagues, who died while making bombs meant to be planted outside a mosque in Maharashtra.

Besides the Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI), Bajrang Dal workers, too, have been involved in perpetrating terror, said Feroze Khan Gazi, a functionary of the Movement of Justice and Peace in Nanded. But, he adds, Bajrang Dal workers do not get charged with the blasts and when they do, as in the Nanded case, they get bail.

The Anti-Terrorist Squad in Maharashtra was puzzled when a low-intensity bomb went off in a theatre screening Jodha Akbar in Panvel on February 20 this year. On May 31, a blast took place at the Vishnudas Bhave auditorium in Vashi and on June 4, a bomb exploded at the Gadkari Rangayatan auditorium in Thane. Both auditoriums were screening the controversial Marathi play Amhi Panchpute, which allegedly mocked Hindu gods and goddesses.

It was only after the arrest of two men from the Sanathan Sanstha (an organisation which claims to be working for the uplift of Hindus) that the police realised it was the work of people who wanted to 'market their own brand of Hindu terror'.

In the Nanded incident, cadres of the Bajrang Dal were planning a blast outside an Aurangabad mosque when one of the bombs exploded, killing two men (Naresh Lakshman Rajkondawar and Himanshu Venkatesh Panse) and injuring four others. All six were Bajrang Dal workers who had formed a hit-list of mosques to be targeted.

Shankar Gaikar, state convener of Bajrang Dal, however, claims the men were not part of his organisation. "The police can say anything but they were not our members," he said even though RSS and Bajrang Dal literature was seized from Rajkondwar's house, where the blast took place.

The police initially tried to dilly dally but had to arrest the accused after intense pressure. "We hoped with the CBI probing the case, we could get justice. But the accused are out on bail," said Gazi.

Maharashtra DGP A.N. Roy defended his men, saying "The chargesheet has been filed. What more do you expect us to do?"

Gazi said, "There was another blast in a go-down in Shastri Nagar near Nanded. Two people died in the incident. The police initially told us there was a short circuit but the go-down did not have any electricity connection."

Gazi accused the police of shielding the accused and said the state and Centre let the accused go scot free.
"They only want to portray Islamic terrorism. What about what is happening in Nanded?" he asked.

Fine Tuning the Bomb - Bajarang Dal's Men in UP

Bomb Makers of Hindutva
Die In Explosion

by Subhash Gatade

25 August, 2008

Two bajarangdal leaders were killed while 2 others injured on 24 August when they were making bombs in Kanpur in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh (UP) as reported by Urdu daily Rashtriya Sahara in its front page. According to Sahara, the blast was so strong that the wall of the room in which the blast occurred collapsed. In other rooms, the walls were damaged. Pieces of glass were strewn everywhere.

The bomb blasted in a house in Rajeev Nagar area on Sunday afternoon. According to the report, the police recovered 3 kg lead oxide, 500 g red lead, 1 kg potassium nitrate, 11 country made grenades, several bomb pins, seven timers and batteries from the spot. According to the IG, “The recovery shows that a massive explosion was on the cards.

The deceased have been identified as Rajeev Mishra and Bhupinder Singh. While Rajeev is the son of S S Mishra, the landlord of the house, Bhupinder was a resident of Shastri Nagar. Mishra, a retired Kanpur Electric Supply Company employee, lives in the nearby Nankari village. He had rented a few rooms of his house to several students.

Rajeev's occupied the room in which the blast took place. As he works in Lucknow, he used to visit the place on Sundays.

According to the police, while Bhupinder died on the spot, Rajeev died on his way to hospital.

According to a senior police officer, the material found could have been used for several explosions. Of the seven timers recovered, two were attached with batteries with the help of wires.

The country made hand grenades recovered were similar to those used by the defence forces.

The Urdu daily claimed that Bhupinder singh was a Bajarangdal leader, according to the National convenor of Bajarangdal, Bhupinder Singh was Ex convenor of Bajarangdal but now he was working as activist.

It is reported that Piyush, who used to work as a complaint officer in a mobile company in Lucknow, came home with Bhupinder and asked the residents of the hostel to vacate the rooms on the pretext of checking the electric wiring. Shiv Sharan Mishra, Rajiv's father, a retired employee of Kesko had built this private hostel, which had nine rooms and 14 students stayed in the hostel and Rajiv had kept one room for himself. As soon as the occupants left the hostel, a massive blast took place. Recovery of a timer device and prohibited explosive raw materials show that a major terror plot was being hatched there. Bhupinder used to run a photo studio in the Sarvoday Nagar locality of Kanpur and his shop was close to the city's popular J.K. temple, police said. According to the police the explosives were meant to be spread during Sunday's celebrations. On monday police recovered some crude hand grenades, lead oxide, red lead, potassium nitrate, bomb pins, timers and batterires from the spot. The police felt that the quantity of explosives stored there was enough to destroy half of Kanpur.

The most notable fact about the perpetrators of this conspiracy, who died during this explosion, is that both of them belonged to Bajrang Dal, the 'storm troopper' wing of Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). The leaders of the Bajrang Dal have conceded that they 'worked with the organisation' some time back and one of them happened to be the convenor of the city wing.

Looking at the nature of the crime, and the fact that a major tragedy could be averted, it is expected that the state government with necessary help from the central government would try to unearth the real conspirators who were behind the plan. It is a positive sign that the police have recovered mobiles of both of them and now if they wish they can take the case to its logical end.

After the blast in Bangalore and Ahmedabad, all fingers were pointed towards Muslims. Intelligence along with Media would hide all reports and facts that would point fingers towards the non Muslim communities.Now this explosion may point the finger the other day. Senior congress leader Dig Vijay Singh had said in an interview with Tehelka that he had evidence of Of RSS and VHP making bombs. Now, this explosion may prove that Dig Vijay may be right.

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See related content on the web:

Kanpur blast: Special team begins probe (Zee News, August 25, 2008)

Book Review: The Communal Problem, Report of the Kanpur Riots Enquiry Committee

Deccan Herald
May 21, 2006

Book Reviews

Mediating communalism

by Parsa Venkateshwar Rao Jr

A rare indictment of the Congress by Congressmen.

The Communal Problem, Report of the Kanpur Riots Enquiry Committee
National Book Trust, pp , Rs 85, pp 211

It is curious that Left historian — though Leftists no longer consider him to be sufficiently Leftist — Bipin Chandra, who is now chairman, National Book Trust, should have decided to issue in a book-form parts of the report of the committee appointed by the Indian National Congress Karachi Session of 1931 to enquire into the Kanpur riots of March, 1931.

There are two important aspects of this Kanpur riot. It comes at the end of a series of communal riots that had started in Malabar in 1921, and continued sporadically through the 1920s in different parts of India. Also, the then United Provinces Congress Committee chairman, Ganesh Shankar Vidyarthi is killed in the riots, and in the depositions before the committee, witnesses acknowledge him as the only non-communal Congressman in the province.

The committee comprised Bhagwan Das, who was the chairman, Sunderlal, secretary, Purushottam Das Tandon, Manzar Ali Sokhta, Abdul Latif Bijnori and Zafarul-Mulk. It is interesting that none of them represent the socialist or communist view of communalism. Bhagwan Das, Sunderlal and Purshottma Das Tandon are more to the centre and right, especially Tandon. And of the six, three added supplements — Bhagwan Das and Sunderlal wrote one, Tandon the second. Zafarul-Mulk wrote a dissenting note.

The communal problem still haunts us, and the analysis has not moved forward a whit in the last 75 years. There is rare honesty and passion, and there was a willingness to listen to each other even when they differed with each other. Zafar-ul Mulk not only wrote a dissent note, but he also provided dissent footnotes to the report. And they were carried scrupulously. There was no false consensus. There was also the fact that members of the committee displayed a high intellectual calibre that does not exist in the Congress of today.

Bipin Chandra has reproduced only the historical analysis and the remedies suggested by the committee and omitted the details of the riot. Perhaps he is right. The arguments still remain relevant in many ways.

It is difficult to sympathise with the historical analysis of the communal problem completely. The committee members have tried to overcome the communal issue by showing that the colonial historiography has misrepresented facts and issues. And they tried to provide an idealistic-spiritual nationalist mission as a solution that will make India a moral super-power, where the four-caste system is revamped into a guild framework based on aptitude rather than on birth. But the committee is not steeped in mere woolly-headed idealism. They said in the section on remedies that there should be no ban on cow slaughter in the absence of similar provisions for other animals. Most importantly, they said that the district magistrate and the police superintendent should be held responsible if a riot breaks out as they ought to know the mischievous elements behind the violence.

The committee has summed up brilliantly the weakness of the Congress Party’s approach to the communal issue: “The position which the Congress occupied in these efforts was that of an intermediary, and by implication it accepted the extreme communalists of both sides as true representatives of the interests of their respective communities. The more it clung to them for settlement, the more it abdicated its own undoubted right to arrive at final conclusion... The result was that the Congress... invested communalists with greater importance and prestige.” This indictment of the Congress Party holds good today as it did in 1931.

Elections 1999: Kala Bachcha as weather vane

(The Times of India
16 September 1999)

Kala Bachcha as a Weather Vane

By SIDDHARTH VARADARAJAN

KANPUR: Its not often that a journalist sets out in search of a dead man in order to discern how people are going to vote.

When I first encountered Kala Bachcha on the pages of Theft of an Idol, a book about collective violence by the American political scientist, Paul Brass, he had already been dead five years. Kala Bachcha -- literally `black child' -- was the nom de guerre of Munna Sonkar, a small-time slumlord and politician from Babupurwa, south Kanpur. Hero to his scheduled caste community of Khatiks and villain for others, Kala Bachcha was allegedly involved in the anti-Muslim riots which convulsed this dying industrial city after the demolition of the Babri Masjid.

In the marketplace of combustible rumours that all cities become during and after riots, Kala Bachcha was variously said to have killed Muslims and moved from mohalla to mohalla protecting Hindus but also to have saved his Muslim tenants. Though nothing was finally proved the myth of Kala Bachcha being a `protector of Hindus' was an attractive one for those who claimed the main victims of the violence had been Hindus, not Muslims. The BJP decided to make a leader out of him. Amidst much fanfare, he was nominated for a reserved seat in the November 1993 assembly elections.

Calamitous Cycle

Even though Kanpur is a BJP fortress Kala Bachcha lost by a few hundred votes. Three months later, some bombs were hurled at him by `unknown assailants', killing him instantly. The BJP tried to use his funeral to whip up support but the city administration, then in the hands of the Samajwadi Party, denied them this opportunity. It was said that `Muslims' had killed Kala Bachcha so two Muslims were murdered in revenge. However, riots did not break out, mainly because the normally calamitous cycle of retaliation and counter-retaliation ended there.

Since then, much has changed in Kanpur. Popular disenchantment with the Kalyan Singh government and the sitting BJP MP is running extraordinarily high; civic services are nonexistent, roads are a nightmare to negotiate. As commonplace concerns come to the fore, communal tension has receded. And with that, the myth of Kala Bachcha has undergone a curious transformation. Today, in Babupurwa and other areas where Khatiks live, the man who in life was a BJP hero has re-emerged, in death, as an anti-BJP icon.

What kind of person was he, I asked a family in the Khatkiyana of Babupurwa. ``He was a gem (heera)'' a man answered. ``That is why the BJP killed him off''. But why would the BJP kill one of its own? ``He was not one of them'', a woman said animatedly. ``They used him. During the riots, he didn't lift even his finger against anyone. He saved so many Muslims''. ``And what has
BJP done for us anyway? Our men have no jobs. And look at the state of the roads'', said another woman. One man said Kala Bachcha was such a great figure that a 'vilayati babu' had written a whole book about him.

In the Muslim mohallas nearby, I asked people what they thought of Kala Bachcha. People were circumspect. "He had earned a name for himself'', said one man at a tea stall, who identified himself as Ilyas. But one can earn a name through good deeds as well as bad, I said. Everyone laughed. "You have answered your own question'', Ilyas said smilingly.

In Colonelganj, where Dalits live side-by-side with Muslims, a Khatik said that local RSS activists had blamed the Muslims for the murder in order to start a riot. "But Kala Bachcha saved Muslims so we know they would never kill him''. The myth of Kala Bachcha, it seems, has come full circle. From a man whose 'anti-Muslim' credentials had led the BJP to co-opt him, he has become a 'pro-Muslim' leader that the BJP deliberately decided to abandon.

Rumours and Myths

Mr S K Mehra, an acerbic 88-year-old former journalist, chronicler of the city and collaborator of Paul Brass, dismissed the allegation of BJP involvement in Kala Bachcha's murder. So did the CPM activists I spoke to. It seems a member of the Kanpur underworld whose sister had apparently been raped by Kala Bachcha had done the killing.

And yet, as with so many other rumours and myths, it is not the question of their veracity that is interesting but the reasons for their circulation. Perhaps the charge of BJP complicity in the murder of a revered figure from the community is the Khatik's way of squaring his decision to turn against the BJP in this election with the fact that Kala Bachcha had been a BJP leader.
Or perhaps not.

Either way, it is probably time the vilayati babu returned to Kanpur to write another book.