Muzaffarnagar: War against Indian Muslims

Muzaffarnagar and its adjoining districts are limping back to normalcy after the August 27 riots. This is the message now flashed by the official media. Twenty-eight units of the army, requisitioned earlier to control the situation, have now been recalled, but more paramilitary companies have been inducted to assist the state government to maintain calm. Prime Minister Dr. Manmoham Singh visited the riot-hit areas and took stock of the situation. Officially it is said that 40,000 people, victimized and displaced, are languishing in 50 camps across the twin districts of Muzaffarnagar and Shamli. People from scores of villages have fled and taken refuge in mosques, madrasas and schools. They have left their cattle, homes and agricultural land. The violence has been widespread: as many as five districts such as Muzzafarnagar, Shamli, Meerut, Saharanpur and Baghapat have been hit. Even officially, it is being said that tension is still running high deep in rural areas.  The police did not allow a Mahapanchayat in Allahabad, and 600 students were detained and subsequently released by September 17.

The widespread riots and violence began as an isolated incident of a Muslim boy allegedly accosting a Hindu girl in the Kawaal village on August 27, and took an ugly turn as the girl’s two brothers killed the Muslim boy. In reaction, the local Muslims thrashed and killed the two Jat brothers. It was immediately seized upon by the right-wing fascist organizations as “Love Jehad” and then for 36 hours mayhem reigned. The Akhlesh Yadav government slept, and allowed the situation to go the Gujarat way when the violence has spread far and wide.

The media have unanimously pointed out that the RSS-BJP combine has played the key role, with Yadav politics acting as a facilitator. These riots against the Muslims are not just a reiteration of a phenomenon... They were not merely for political gain in the 2014 election but a full-scale ideological and existential war against the Muslim community in India.

Muzaffarnagar is a lush green sugarcane area merely 135 km from New Delhi.  But the violence spread fast to other districts covering a large area the size of the Kashmir Valley. All these districts have been sensitive areas. But the widespread nature of the violence has surprised analysts many of whom believe that it could not have happened without pre-planning and organization. This time, it is said that the violence travelled deep into villages. The noteworthy point is that contrary to past riots which usually remained confined to cities, this time the large theatre of violence was the rural scene of hundreds of villages.

For all practical purposes, so-called normalcy has solved nothing, and Muslims have suffered the most damage. An overwhelming number of the 50 killed are Muslims. Many missing persons are being counted as dead. Homes and properties destroyed, cattle stolen and agricultural land and produce being snatched.

The media have unanimously pointed out that the RSS-BJP combine has played the key role, with Yadav politics acting as a facilitator. These riots against the Muslims are not just a reiteration of a phenomenon but are markedly showing a new tendency with two main characteristics. These riots were not merely for political gains in the 2014 election but a full-scale ideological and existential war against the Muslim community in India. The face of the riots has changed since the 2002 anti-Muslim Modi-led pogrom in Gujarat.

The first point established since 2002 is that anti-Muslim violence is not a crime by criminals who then go into hiding, but instead by players who show it off, brag about it, get counted as khalnayaks and the local heroes of the fascist clan who reap the dividends in politics just as Modi did. Because of his most successful anti-Muslim pogrom, Modi not only won three successive state elections but is now the national icon. So the RSS-BJP combine has proved that anti-Muslim violence is not a crime but something to be proud of - something which enhances one’s social and political status. Thus, on those lines in UP, Amit Shah is emerging as the alter ego of Narendra Modi.

Another important point is that the violence has been a war of dispossession. Now, riots are not just aimed at causing physical harm but also, and mainly, to dispossess the Muslims. They are evicted from their villages, and from their land which is then taken over the attackers and distributed. It happened successfully in Gujarat where Muslims were killed in hundreds of villages and forced to leave, and the land was taken over. This time Muslims were killed and forced to leave from scores of villages in Muzaffarnagar and Shamli. Their homes have been burnt, and the victims languishing in distant camps have said that they will never return as nobody would rehabilitate them and restore their lands. For all practical purposes, the aid provided by the government in the camps is helping in the dispossession, because, after sometime these people shall never go back to their burnt homes in their ancestral lands but end up in shanty camps across the towns in UP. The RSS has already declared that it is going to open 40 newshakhas in each district of the UP. Communal violence is not now just violence. It is a war of dispossession.