Amir Ullah Khan, Anjana Divakar and Samia Farheen
Ashish Khetan is one of our finest intellectuals. He has written prodigiously, fought many legal battles in his career as a lawyer and run for Parliament. He was in Hyderabad to discuss, with other eminent academics, his tryst with Godhra, the riots and the events that unfolded, all of which have been captured by him in his book ‘Undercover: My Journey into the Darkness of Hindutva’.
Kancha Ilaiah, an Indian political theorist, writer, and activist, who began the deliberations described the book as “The most exhaustive account on the whole Gujarat Riots.” The book, Ilaiah said, highlighted the pre-planned systematic attack on Muslims of Gujarat and addressed the role of the state machinery in it. He further commented on the “uni- party emergence” of BJP as was Congress in the pre-coalition era and called the Gujarat riots as a catalyst for the changing ideas of secularism, democracy, and role of minorities in the country. The identity politics in the Gujarat Model, is brought out in the book as well.
Khetan then shared his intimate experience as a journalist, an undercover reporter and as a citizen in the court of law in India. Khetan mentions “There are very few instances in journalism where a journalistic report was used to mass convict people”. He shares his story as a reporter who testified in the court and faced the animosity and prejudice of the judges at the very mention of the riots. As a persecution witness in the case, Khetan in his book has attempted to bring out what happens in the court rooms and how difficult it is to get justice. The flaws and loopholes in the judicial system and the ability of the State to bully the judicial system.
He expressed his frustration arising out of the corrupted system that buries cases and constantly and systematically fabricates evidence against young activists and boys. He identifies this as a systematic pattern that appears and reappears in the Muzaffarnagar Riots of 2013 and the Delhi riots of 2020. He further expressed his sadness over a morally bankrupt local community that helped along in the whole process, a process he calls as a “Deliberate Subversion” by the state. He questions the lack of accountability in the case and reiterates his belief in facts and his work in bringing them out through the book. However, Khetan remains optimistic, and hopes for the rise of a charismatic leader to bring back liberal, secular values. He ends his speech by reminding us all that “history has shown us that divided societies don’t progress, both materially and socially.”
Khetan’s speech was followed by Professor Manisha Sethi who eloquently expressed her predicament and congratulated Khetan for the book, that she says, brings out our collective failure as a society and polity. She declared that the book “is a document of public record, this book will serve us for many years to come”. Puzzling and intriguing is the psychological anthropology of the brewing hatred and the silent insidious processes that contribute to it. She provides her analytical understanding of the book and remarks on the success of the Hindutva movement in including and radicalizing the subaltern castes. She comments on the emergence of “Institutionalized Prejudice” that according to her, is a gradual process to juxtapose India as Hinduism and normalize the Idea of India as essentially Hindu. She calls for a greater movement for collectivity that focuses on civil liberties and human rights.
Professor Faizaan Mustafa, Vice Chancellor of NALSAR, points out strongly the institutional decay in our society. Mustafa is rather grim about the future and laments the flailing rule of law. He questions democratic societies without law and order and compares them to dictatorial societies that lack human rights yet have strong legal bodies. He comments, “We are now living in a world where no law or justice system will work”. He observes a global phenomenon where democracies are dying and turning authoritarian. Quoting him, “The danger is not from the bullet, but from the ballot”. As an end note, he reminds us that the foot soldiers of Hindutva will never be satisfied by anything lesser than a Hindu nation.” He puts the burden of resisting this on the majority community that will get harmed the most with any such development.
Professor G Haragopal, a very well know Political Economist, also points out that Hindu outfits are very clear about their vision of India and it is the rest of us who need to figure out what we want India to be. He calls the book “a manifestation of moral courage to project to the society its truth”. As a political economist, Professor Haragopal sees a relation between increasing communalization and economic trends. He blames the radicalization of society on the failing economy and is deeply disturbed by the increasing hatred that “makes one start getting fundamental doubts about human nature”, as he says. He confides his hope in the Farmers agitation movement that he calls secular and nationalistic. As he says, “The confidence and collective mobilization of people on economic and human rights ground is the way out.”
Professor Harsh Mandar, the last of the speakers in the panel, began by announcing his disappointment in the absence of outrage. According to him, a larger political, social, and ethical response is missing. The Gujarat riots is characterized by violence and cruelty. He praises Khetan’s work and bravery as he recalls the terrifying and cruel incidents of horror mentioned in the book. These incidents, he says, reflects the complete breakdown of empathy and solidarity. Khetan’s book, he says, points out the frightening picture of conversations we have in our living rooms and the pride in bigotry. He hopes we place constitutional morality over religious morality and calls for the values of fraternity and brotherhood. He says, “Ashish’s book should remind us how far into the darkness we have stepped”. The CAA protest, he says was a success in showcasing that the soul of India is still alive and that we can still live with peace and harmony.
Khetan’s sheer courage and grit is reflected in his work which is helping to bring out these realities. Often such work is met with cynicism, hounded by questions for the answers to these complex actualities. Now that the truth is out there, the onus is on us, the people to unite, question and be angered to act. Khetan hopes through this documentation to bring forth a conversation, an outrage, a shift having experienced it all is still optimistic and hopes for change.
The authors Amir Ullah Khan, Anjana Divakar and Samia Farheen are Researchers at the CDPP