'Wherever Muslims Live...': Text of Vajpayee's Controversial Goa Speech, April 2002
The speech generated a huge controversy in April 2002 not just because of its inflammatory contents but also because Vajpayee tried to mislead parliament by claiming an edited version issued by the PMO was the actual text.
'Wherever Muslims Live...': Text of Vajpayee's Controversial Goa Speech, April 2002
File photo of Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Credit: PTI
The Wire Staff
The Wire Staff
COMMUNALISMPOLITICS
17/AUG/2018
Speech delivered by Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Goa, April 12, 2002
I was in Cambodia just recently. It is the Kamboj state of the past, where magnificent temples that kissed the sky were built in the tenth and the eleventh centuries. It had Hindu states ruled by Hindu kings. There were others too among the citizens, but there was justice towards all. Sometimes the kings also used to fight among themselves. The wheel of victory and defeat rolled on. But during their centuries’ long history there isn’t a single instance of a Hindu king destroying temples or breaking idols when he attacked another Hindu king. The kings who were victorious used to build a new temple. If Vishnu was being worshipped there earlier, later Shiva began to be worshipped. If Shiva was being worshipped at one time, then other deities began to be worshipped later. Nevertheless, no king destroyed a temple or damaged the deities’ idols at the time of attacking another king. This is our culture. This is our outlook, which treats all faiths equally.
Yet, accusations are being hurled today that secularism is under threat. Who are these people accusing us? What is the meaning of secularism for these people? India was secular when Muslims hadn’t come here and Christians hadn’t set foot on this soil. It is not as if India became secular after they came. They came with their own modes of worship and they too were given a place of honour and respect. They had the freedom to worship God as per their wish and inclination. No one thought of converting them with force, because this is not practiced in our religion; and in our culture, there is no use for it.
Today the 100 crore people of India are engaged in creating their future on the basis of their own culture. Sometimes, minor incidents do take place here and there sometimes they take the form of major incidents. But if you go to the root of these incidents, you will find intolerance, you’ll find them to be a manifestation of growing intolerance. What happened in Gujarat? If a conspiracy had not been hatched to burn alive the innocent passengers of the Sabarmati Express, then the subsequent tragedy in Gujarat could have been averted. But this did not happen. People were torched alive. Who were those culprits? The government is investigating into this. Intelligence agencies are collecting all the information. But we should not forget how the tragedy of Gujarat started. The subsequent developments were no doubt condemnable, but who lit the fire? How did the fire spread? Ours is a multi-religious country, a multi-lingual country, we have many different modes of worship. We believed in peaceful and harmonious co-existence. We believe in equal respect for all faiths. Let no one challenge India’s secularism. I have read somewhere in newspapers that the Congress Party has decided not to try to topple my Government. Shall I thank them for this? Or shall I say that the ‘Grapes are sour’? How will the Government fall? Once they did topple it, but they couldn’t form one themselves. Then a fresh mandate from the people was called for, and the people once again gave us an opportunity to serve them.
For us the soil of India from Goa to Guwahati is the same, all the people living on this land are the same. We do not believe in religious extremism. Today the threat to our nation comes from terrorism. Wherever I went around the world, the heads of state or of elected governments complained to me that the militant Islam is sowing thorns along their paths. Islam has two facets. One is that which tolerate others, which teaches its adherents to follow the path of truth, which preaches compassion and sensitivity. But these days, militancy in the name of Islam leaves no room for tolerance. It has raised the slogan of Jehad. It is dreaming of recasting the entire world in its mould.
You will be surprised to hear this—indeed, I too was surprised—that some terrorists belonging to Al-Qaeda were arrested in Singapore. The rulers of Singapore couldn’t even have imagined that Al-Qaeda would be active in their country, too; that Al-Qaeda would hatch a conspiracy in Singapore too. Some fifteen or sixteen persons were arrested, an investigation is underway, which will reveal the truth. The same is happening in Indonesia. The same is happening in Malaysia.
Wherever Muslims live, they don’t like to live in co-existence with others, they don’t like to mingle with others; and instead of propagating their ideas in a peaceful manner, they want to spread their faith by resorting to terror and threats. The world has become alert to this danger.
As far as we are concerned, we have been fighting against terrorism for the past 20 years. Terrorists have tried to grab Jammu and Kashmir through violence, but we have countered them. Jammu and Kashmir is an integral part of India, and will forever remain so. No other country’s dream will ever, come true. Now other nations in the world have started to realize what a great mistake they did by neglecting terrorism. Now they are waking up, and are organizing themselves. They are putting together an international consensus against terrorism.
We tell them through our own example that a large number of non-Hindus live in our country, but there has never ever been religious persecution here. We have never discriminated between ‘our people’ and ‘aliens’. The modes of worship may differ, but God is one. Only the paths to reach Him and realize Him can be different. It is for this reason that India’s prestige is growing, India’s reputation is rising. I have also had an occasion to visit many other countries. Everywhere Muslims live in large numbers. And the rulers in those countries are worried lest those Muslims embrace extremism, We told them that they should educate people on the true tenets of Islam, that they should also teach other subjects in madrasas. Islam too should be taught, but emphasise that people should live together and that it is necessary to accept that faith cannot be propagated on the strength of the sword.
Note: This is the English text of the speech delivered in Hindi, by Atal Bihari Vajpayee in Goa on April 12, 2002, checked against the audio original. This text was published in Gujarat: The Making of a Tragedy (Penguin, 2002), edited by Siddharth Varadarajan.
The official English version released by the PMO which added the word “such” after “Wherever” and before “Muslims” in the first sentence of the third last paragraph may be accessed here.
Let Us Not Forget the Glimpse We Got of the Real Vajpayee When the Mask Slipped
Like Rajiv Gandhi in November 1984, Vajpayee will go down in history as a prime minister who preached the virtues of tolerance even as he turned a blind eye to the massacre of innocent citizens.
Let Us Not Forget the Glimpse We Got of the Real Vajpayee When the Mask Slipped
File photo from 2002 of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Narendra Modi, chief minister of Gujarat at the time. Credit: YouTube
Siddharth Varadarajan
Siddharth Varadarajan
POLITICS
18/AUG/2018
Perhaps the most significant elaboration of the Golwalkar-Savarkar thesis of India as a Hindu nation beset by Muslim trouble-makers in recent times was that provided by Atal Bihari Vajpayee in his speech to the BJP national executive meeting in Goa on 12 April 2002. The speech is remarkable for the manner in which a prime minister attempts to justify the murder of Muslim citizens in Gujarat by referring to Godhra and contrasting the supposed ‘traditional tolerance’ of Hindus with the alleged ‘intolerance’ of Muslims.
Like Golwalkar, who believed only Hindus were true Indians, Vajpayee uses ‘us’, ‘our’, ‘Hindus’ and ‘Indians’ interchangeably throughout his speech. He begins by making an observation about Hindu kingdoms in ancient Cambodia.
“No king destroyed a temple or damaged the deities’ idols at the time of attacking another king. This is our culture. This is our outlook, which treats all faiths equally.’ India, he said, was secular before Muslims and Christians set foot on her soil. Once they came, they had freedom of worship. ‘No one thought of converting them with force, because this is not practiced in our religion; and in our culture, there is no use for it.”
Here, Vajpayee was trying to contrast the ‘tolerance’ of Hindus and Hinduism, which he described as ‘our religion’, with the supposed intolerance of Muslims and Christians. The reference to the destruction of idols and conversion ‘with force’ is a standard part of the RSS arsenal. At the root of major incidents of violence, he said, was ‘growing intolerance’. Since Hindus are, by definition, tolerant, the obvious inference is that this ‘growing intolerance’ is on the part of the Muslims. Turning immediately to the burning issue of the day, he asked:
“What happened in Gujarat? If a conspiracy had not been hatched to burn alive the innocent passengers of the Sabarmati Express, then the subsequent tragedy in Gujarat could have been averted. But this did not happen. People were torched alive. Who were those culprits? The government is investigating into this. Intelligence agencies are collecting all the information. But we should not forget how the tragedy of Gujarat started. The subsequent developments were no doubt condemnable, but who lit the fire? How did the fire spread?”
Here, in as unsophisticated a fashion as Narendra Modi had stated it earlier, we find Vajpayee presenting his own version of Newton’s Third Law. There is no remorse about the killing of hundreds of innocent people, no apologies for the failure of the government to protect its citizens. He makes no attempt to distinguish between the criminal perpetrators of the Godhra attack and the innocent victims of the ‘subsequent tragedy in Gujarat’. For him, Muslims are an amorphous, undifferentiated lot who collectively ‘lit the fire’. They were to blame, not his party men who took part in the ‘subsequent developments’.
Going from the specific to the general, Vajpayee then launched a frontal attack on Muslims. He asserts that ‘For us, the soil of India from Goa to Guwahati is the same, all the people living on this land are the same. We do not believe in religious extremism. Today, the threat to our nation comes from terrorism’.
Who is this we and where exactly does this ‘threat to our nation’ come from? The Hindi text provides a clue. Vajpayee deliberately uses the Urdu word mazhabi for ‘religious’ (rather than the Hindi word dharmik) when he says ‘religious extremism’. We do not believe in religious extremism; it is the Muslims. His exact words were ‘Hum mazhabi kattarta mein vishwas nahin karte’. The fact that mazhabi is the only Urdu word used in the sentence is not accidental. In Sangh parivar literature and propaganda, whenever a positive reference to religion is made, the word used tends to be dharm, implying Hinduism; when the reference is negative, the word used tends to be mazhab. And terrorism, of course, is synonymous with Islam, or ‘militant Islam’, as Vajpayee chose to put it. But having first made a distinction between militant Islam and tolerant Islam, he then makes a sweeping generalisation about all Muslims:
“Wherever Muslims live, they don’t like to live in co-existence with others, they don’t like to mingle with others; and instead of propagating their ideas in a peaceful manner, they want to spread their faith by resorting to terror and threats. The world has become alert to this danger.”
The statement is classic hate speech, but after it generated a huge controversy, Vajpayee claimed his remarks were aimed not at all Muslims but only ‘militant Muslims’.
The Prime Minister’s Office subsequently issued a doctored version of the speech in which the word ‘such’ was inserted between ‘Wherever’ and ‘Muslims live’. Many newspapers subsequently printed this version. It was not until a privilege motion was raised in Parliament — for Vajpayee had made the mistake of claiming on the floor of the House on May 1, 2002 that the doctored version of the speech was the true version — that he was forced to admit the word ‘such’ had been deliberately interpolated. However, he reiterated that ‘no one who reads my entire speech and takes note of the tribute I have paid to the tolerant and compassionate teachings of Islam, can be in any doubt that my reference . . . is only to the followers of militant Islam’.
The allegation of Muslims not living in co-existence with others and not mingling with others is such a standard trope in RSS propaganda that Vajpayee’s claim of intending to refer only to militant Muslims does not seem very convincing. Earlier in his speech, he had equated militant Islam with terrorism. ‘Not mingling with others’ is a peculiar charge to level against terrorists. In any case, it was a bit odd for the prime minister to talk about terrorism and militancy as if they were the preserve of the adherents of Islam— especially at a time when his own Sangh parivar was heavily involved in acts of terror in Gujarat. But there was a deeper level of dishonesty in the charge against Muslims, for it is precisely the policy of the RSS to ghettoise and isolate the Muslim community. As sociologist Dhirubhai Sheth has argued, it was not accidental that the Muslims who bore the brunt of the Sangh parivar’s violence in Gujarat were those who chose to live in Hindu-majority areas. The communal killings in the state, he says, have exposed the dishonesty of the ‘Hindutvavadis’ who reproach Muslims for not entering the ‘national mainstream’ but then beat them back into their ghettos whenever they do emerge.
In another attempt to soften the impact of his Goa remarks, Vajpayee told parliament that he was as opposed to militant Hinduism as he was to militant Islam. ‘I accept the Hindutva of Swami Vivekananda but the type of Hindutva being propagated now is wrong and one should be wary of it.’ Having said this, however, he went back to square one by adding that although there were laws to deal with such an eventuality, he was confident no Hindu organisation would become a danger to the country’s unity. In other words, only Muslim (or Christian or Sikh) organisations have the potential of endangering the country’s unity. After maligning Vivekananda — who never spoke of Hindutva but of Hinduism — Vajpayee went straight back to the teachings of Golwalkar and Savarkar.
Apart from reverting to the usual chauvinist line of the Sangh parivar, Vajpayee was also diverting the debate into a dead end. The issue is not whether he personally opposes militant Islam or Hinduism but whether, as prime minister, he is prepared to defend the constitutional rights of all Indians. Regardless of his own views and beliefs, a prime minister cannot speak for only a section of citizens. Do the Muslims of Gujarat have the right to physical security? Is he prepared to punish those who have committed crimes regardless of their political or ideological affiliation? Rather than dealing with these questions, Vajpayee is trying to cover up his own political failure and culpability.
Survivors of the Gulberg Society visit their building. Credit: Reuters/Ahmad Masood/Files
Survivors of the Gulberg Society visit their building. Credit: Reuters/Ahmad Masood/Files
It is remarkable that Vajpayee’s first televised address to the country was only on March 2, 2002 — after the seventy-two hours of apparent freedom enjoyed by the Sangh parivar in Gujarat expired — and even then, all he could do was appeal for calm and tolerance. In fact, his attempt to blame the ordinary people of Gujarat — and their supposed lack of ‘harmony ’— for the mass killings in their state was a disingenuous manoeuvre aimed at absolving himself, his party colleagues and the state machinery they control, of any responsibility for the crimes. Like Rajiv Gandhi in November 1984 and Narasimha Rao in January 1993, Vajpayee will go down in history as a prime minister who preached the virtues of tolerance even as he turned a blind eye to the massacre of innocent citizens. Instead of using national television to tell the people of Gujarat that the genocidal mobs would be put down with a firm hand — and that policemen failing to protect the life and liberty of all would be punished — Vajpayee delivered a sermon on the need for religious sadbhavna.
There was little passion or feeling in what he said, no words of succour for the victims, no anger or opprobrium for the killers. He said the violence was a ‘black mark on the nation’s forehead’ but he couldn’t bring himself to say that retaliatory attacks on Muslims for what happened at Godhra would attract the same punishment as the burning of the train. Here was a violent disturbance that had made a mockery of state power as it is supposed to operate, yet the prime minister issued no dire warnings to those who were challenging his authority and power as chief executive. In the US, President George W. Bush and his senior aides publicly warned citizens against attacking Muslims, Arabs and other immigrants following the World Trade Centre terrorist strike. In less than a year since 9/11, a man in Texas was sentenced to death for the ‘retaliatory’ murder of a Sikh immigrant. To date, however, Vajpayee has yet to even publicly acknowledge that Muslim citizens of India were victimised in Gujarat or to threaten the attackers with the severest consequences.
Indeed, Vajpayee was later to demonstrate that he was so loyal to his party and parivar that he didn’t mind undermining the majesty of the state and his own office. On April 17, 2002, he said that if only parliament had condemned Godhra, the subsequent massacres would not have happened. The fact is that he is leader of the House and could have ordered a discussion and condemnation of Godhra on the day it happened — instead of the scheduled presentation of the budget.
In early May, he made another curious statement, this time on the floor of the Rajya Sabha: That he had decided to remove Modi in April but didn’t act fearing a backlash in Gujarat. ‘I had gone to Goa making up my mind on changing the ruler in Gujarat but according to my own assessment, I felt that the change in leadership will only worsen the situation.’ At the time, the only people opposed to a change in leadership were the RSS and VHP. Removing Modi may or may not have provided temporary relief for Gujarat’s beleaguered Muslims but it was odd for the prime minister to admit being held hostage to the threats of criminals and goons. “Vajpayee,” wrote B.G. Verghese, “placed the diktat of the mob above his oath of office . . . the emperor has no clothes, stripped of the last shred of moral authority.”
Excerpted from the the author’s Introduction to the book, Gujarat: The Making of a Tragedy (Penguin, 2002). Edited by Siddharth Varadarajan
The speech generated a huge controversy in April 2002 not just because of its inflammatory contents but also because Vajpayee tried to mislead parliament by claiming an edited version issued by the PMO was the actual text.
'Wherever Muslims Live...': Text of Vajpayee's Controversial Goa Speech, April 2002
File photo of Atal Bihari Vajpayee. Credit: PTI
The Wire Staff
The Wire Staff
COMMUNALISMPOLITICS
17/AUG/2018
Speech delivered by Atal Bihari Vajpayee, Goa, April 12, 2002
I was in Cambodia just recently. It is the Kamboj state of the past, where magnificent temples that kissed the sky were built in the tenth and the eleventh centuries. It had Hindu states ruled by Hindu kings. There were others too among the citizens, but there was justice towards all. Sometimes the kings also used to fight among themselves. The wheel of victory and defeat rolled on. But during their centuries’ long history there isn’t a single instance of a Hindu king destroying temples or breaking idols when he attacked another Hindu king. The kings who were victorious used to build a new temple. If Vishnu was being worshipped there earlier, later Shiva began to be worshipped. If Shiva was being worshipped at one time, then other deities began to be worshipped later. Nevertheless, no king destroyed a temple or damaged the deities’ idols at the time of attacking another king. This is our culture. This is our outlook, which treats all faiths equally.
Yet, accusations are being hurled today that secularism is under threat. Who are these people accusing us? What is the meaning of secularism for these people? India was secular when Muslims hadn’t come here and Christians hadn’t set foot on this soil. It is not as if India became secular after they came. They came with their own modes of worship and they too were given a place of honour and respect. They had the freedom to worship God as per their wish and inclination. No one thought of converting them with force, because this is not practiced in our religion; and in our culture, there is no use for it.
Today the 100 crore people of India are engaged in creating their future on the basis of their own culture. Sometimes, minor incidents do take place here and there sometimes they take the form of major incidents. But if you go to the root of these incidents, you will find intolerance, you’ll find them to be a manifestation of growing intolerance. What happened in Gujarat? If a conspiracy had not been hatched to burn alive the innocent passengers of the Sabarmati Express, then the subsequent tragedy in Gujarat could have been averted. But this did not happen. People were torched alive. Who were those culprits? The government is investigating into this. Intelligence agencies are collecting all the information. But we should not forget how the tragedy of Gujarat started. The subsequent developments were no doubt condemnable, but who lit the fire? How did the fire spread? Ours is a multi-religious country, a multi-lingual country, we have many different modes of worship. We believed in peaceful and harmonious co-existence. We believe in equal respect for all faiths. Let no one challenge India’s secularism. I have read somewhere in newspapers that the Congress Party has decided not to try to topple my Government. Shall I thank them for this? Or shall I say that the ‘Grapes are sour’? How will the Government fall? Once they did topple it, but they couldn’t form one themselves. Then a fresh mandate from the people was called for, and the people once again gave us an opportunity to serve them.
For us the soil of India from Goa to Guwahati is the same, all the people living on this land are the same. We do not believe in religious extremism. Today the threat to our nation comes from terrorism. Wherever I went around the world, the heads of state or of elected governments complained to me that the militant Islam is sowing thorns along their paths. Islam has two facets. One is that which tolerate others, which teaches its adherents to follow the path of truth, which preaches compassion and sensitivity. But these days, militancy in the name of Islam leaves no room for tolerance. It has raised the slogan of Jehad. It is dreaming of recasting the entire world in its mould.
You will be surprised to hear this—indeed, I too was surprised—that some terrorists belonging to Al-Qaeda were arrested in Singapore. The rulers of Singapore couldn’t even have imagined that Al-Qaeda would be active in their country, too; that Al-Qaeda would hatch a conspiracy in Singapore too. Some fifteen or sixteen persons were arrested, an investigation is underway, which will reveal the truth. The same is happening in Indonesia. The same is happening in Malaysia.
Wherever Muslims live, they don’t like to live in co-existence with others, they don’t like to mingle with others; and instead of propagating their ideas in a peaceful manner, they want to spread their faith by resorting to terror and threats. The world has become alert to this danger.
As far as we are concerned, we have been fighting against terrorism for the past 20 years. Terrorists have tried to grab Jammu and Kashmir through violence, but we have countered them. Jammu and Kashmir is an integral part of India, and will forever remain so. No other country’s dream will ever, come true. Now other nations in the world have started to realize what a great mistake they did by neglecting terrorism. Now they are waking up, and are organizing themselves. They are putting together an international consensus against terrorism.
We tell them through our own example that a large number of non-Hindus live in our country, but there has never ever been religious persecution here. We have never discriminated between ‘our people’ and ‘aliens’. The modes of worship may differ, but God is one. Only the paths to reach Him and realize Him can be different. It is for this reason that India’s prestige is growing, India’s reputation is rising. I have also had an occasion to visit many other countries. Everywhere Muslims live in large numbers. And the rulers in those countries are worried lest those Muslims embrace extremism, We told them that they should educate people on the true tenets of Islam, that they should also teach other subjects in madrasas. Islam too should be taught, but emphasise that people should live together and that it is necessary to accept that faith cannot be propagated on the strength of the sword.
Note: This is the English text of the speech delivered in Hindi, by Atal Bihari Vajpayee in Goa on April 12, 2002, checked against the audio original. This text was published in Gujarat: The Making of a Tragedy (Penguin, 2002), edited by Siddharth Varadarajan.
The official English version released by the PMO which added the word “such” after “Wherever” and before “Muslims” in the first sentence of the third last paragraph may be accessed here.
Let Us Not Forget the Glimpse We Got of the Real Vajpayee When the Mask Slipped
Like Rajiv Gandhi in November 1984, Vajpayee will go down in history as a prime minister who preached the virtues of tolerance even as he turned a blind eye to the massacre of innocent citizens.
Let Us Not Forget the Glimpse We Got of the Real Vajpayee When the Mask Slipped
File photo from 2002 of Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Narendra Modi, chief minister of Gujarat at the time. Credit: YouTube
Siddharth Varadarajan
Siddharth Varadarajan
POLITICS
18/AUG/2018
Perhaps the most significant elaboration of the Golwalkar-Savarkar thesis of India as a Hindu nation beset by Muslim trouble-makers in recent times was that provided by Atal Bihari Vajpayee in his speech to the BJP national executive meeting in Goa on 12 April 2002. The speech is remarkable for the manner in which a prime minister attempts to justify the murder of Muslim citizens in Gujarat by referring to Godhra and contrasting the supposed ‘traditional tolerance’ of Hindus with the alleged ‘intolerance’ of Muslims.
Like Golwalkar, who believed only Hindus were true Indians, Vajpayee uses ‘us’, ‘our’, ‘Hindus’ and ‘Indians’ interchangeably throughout his speech. He begins by making an observation about Hindu kingdoms in ancient Cambodia.
“No king destroyed a temple or damaged the deities’ idols at the time of attacking another king. This is our culture. This is our outlook, which treats all faiths equally.’ India, he said, was secular before Muslims and Christians set foot on her soil. Once they came, they had freedom of worship. ‘No one thought of converting them with force, because this is not practiced in our religion; and in our culture, there is no use for it.”
Here, Vajpayee was trying to contrast the ‘tolerance’ of Hindus and Hinduism, which he described as ‘our religion’, with the supposed intolerance of Muslims and Christians. The reference to the destruction of idols and conversion ‘with force’ is a standard part of the RSS arsenal. At the root of major incidents of violence, he said, was ‘growing intolerance’. Since Hindus are, by definition, tolerant, the obvious inference is that this ‘growing intolerance’ is on the part of the Muslims. Turning immediately to the burning issue of the day, he asked:
“What happened in Gujarat? If a conspiracy had not been hatched to burn alive the innocent passengers of the Sabarmati Express, then the subsequent tragedy in Gujarat could have been averted. But this did not happen. People were torched alive. Who were those culprits? The government is investigating into this. Intelligence agencies are collecting all the information. But we should not forget how the tragedy of Gujarat started. The subsequent developments were no doubt condemnable, but who lit the fire? How did the fire spread?”
Here, in as unsophisticated a fashion as Narendra Modi had stated it earlier, we find Vajpayee presenting his own version of Newton’s Third Law. There is no remorse about the killing of hundreds of innocent people, no apologies for the failure of the government to protect its citizens. He makes no attempt to distinguish between the criminal perpetrators of the Godhra attack and the innocent victims of the ‘subsequent tragedy in Gujarat’. For him, Muslims are an amorphous, undifferentiated lot who collectively ‘lit the fire’. They were to blame, not his party men who took part in the ‘subsequent developments’.
Going from the specific to the general, Vajpayee then launched a frontal attack on Muslims. He asserts that ‘For us, the soil of India from Goa to Guwahati is the same, all the people living on this land are the same. We do not believe in religious extremism. Today, the threat to our nation comes from terrorism’.
Who is this we and where exactly does this ‘threat to our nation’ come from? The Hindi text provides a clue. Vajpayee deliberately uses the Urdu word mazhabi for ‘religious’ (rather than the Hindi word dharmik) when he says ‘religious extremism’. We do not believe in religious extremism; it is the Muslims. His exact words were ‘Hum mazhabi kattarta mein vishwas nahin karte’. The fact that mazhabi is the only Urdu word used in the sentence is not accidental. In Sangh parivar literature and propaganda, whenever a positive reference to religion is made, the word used tends to be dharm, implying Hinduism; when the reference is negative, the word used tends to be mazhab. And terrorism, of course, is synonymous with Islam, or ‘militant Islam’, as Vajpayee chose to put it. But having first made a distinction between militant Islam and tolerant Islam, he then makes a sweeping generalisation about all Muslims:
“Wherever Muslims live, they don’t like to live in co-existence with others, they don’t like to mingle with others; and instead of propagating their ideas in a peaceful manner, they want to spread their faith by resorting to terror and threats. The world has become alert to this danger.”
The statement is classic hate speech, but after it generated a huge controversy, Vajpayee claimed his remarks were aimed not at all Muslims but only ‘militant Muslims’.
The Prime Minister’s Office subsequently issued a doctored version of the speech in which the word ‘such’ was inserted between ‘Wherever’ and ‘Muslims live’. Many newspapers subsequently printed this version. It was not until a privilege motion was raised in Parliament — for Vajpayee had made the mistake of claiming on the floor of the House on May 1, 2002 that the doctored version of the speech was the true version — that he was forced to admit the word ‘such’ had been deliberately interpolated. However, he reiterated that ‘no one who reads my entire speech and takes note of the tribute I have paid to the tolerant and compassionate teachings of Islam, can be in any doubt that my reference . . . is only to the followers of militant Islam’.
The allegation of Muslims not living in co-existence with others and not mingling with others is such a standard trope in RSS propaganda that Vajpayee’s claim of intending to refer only to militant Muslims does not seem very convincing. Earlier in his speech, he had equated militant Islam with terrorism. ‘Not mingling with others’ is a peculiar charge to level against terrorists. In any case, it was a bit odd for the prime minister to talk about terrorism and militancy as if they were the preserve of the adherents of Islam— especially at a time when his own Sangh parivar was heavily involved in acts of terror in Gujarat. But there was a deeper level of dishonesty in the charge against Muslims, for it is precisely the policy of the RSS to ghettoise and isolate the Muslim community. As sociologist Dhirubhai Sheth has argued, it was not accidental that the Muslims who bore the brunt of the Sangh parivar’s violence in Gujarat were those who chose to live in Hindu-majority areas. The communal killings in the state, he says, have exposed the dishonesty of the ‘Hindutvavadis’ who reproach Muslims for not entering the ‘national mainstream’ but then beat them back into their ghettos whenever they do emerge.
In another attempt to soften the impact of his Goa remarks, Vajpayee told parliament that he was as opposed to militant Hinduism as he was to militant Islam. ‘I accept the Hindutva of Swami Vivekananda but the type of Hindutva being propagated now is wrong and one should be wary of it.’ Having said this, however, he went back to square one by adding that although there were laws to deal with such an eventuality, he was confident no Hindu organisation would become a danger to the country’s unity. In other words, only Muslim (or Christian or Sikh) organisations have the potential of endangering the country’s unity. After maligning Vivekananda — who never spoke of Hindutva but of Hinduism — Vajpayee went straight back to the teachings of Golwalkar and Savarkar.
Apart from reverting to the usual chauvinist line of the Sangh parivar, Vajpayee was also diverting the debate into a dead end. The issue is not whether he personally opposes militant Islam or Hinduism but whether, as prime minister, he is prepared to defend the constitutional rights of all Indians. Regardless of his own views and beliefs, a prime minister cannot speak for only a section of citizens. Do the Muslims of Gujarat have the right to physical security? Is he prepared to punish those who have committed crimes regardless of their political or ideological affiliation? Rather than dealing with these questions, Vajpayee is trying to cover up his own political failure and culpability.
Survivors of the Gulberg Society visit their building. Credit: Reuters/Ahmad Masood/Files
Survivors of the Gulberg Society visit their building. Credit: Reuters/Ahmad Masood/Files
It is remarkable that Vajpayee’s first televised address to the country was only on March 2, 2002 — after the seventy-two hours of apparent freedom enjoyed by the Sangh parivar in Gujarat expired — and even then, all he could do was appeal for calm and tolerance. In fact, his attempt to blame the ordinary people of Gujarat — and their supposed lack of ‘harmony ’— for the mass killings in their state was a disingenuous manoeuvre aimed at absolving himself, his party colleagues and the state machinery they control, of any responsibility for the crimes. Like Rajiv Gandhi in November 1984 and Narasimha Rao in January 1993, Vajpayee will go down in history as a prime minister who preached the virtues of tolerance even as he turned a blind eye to the massacre of innocent citizens. Instead of using national television to tell the people of Gujarat that the genocidal mobs would be put down with a firm hand — and that policemen failing to protect the life and liberty of all would be punished — Vajpayee delivered a sermon on the need for religious sadbhavna.
There was little passion or feeling in what he said, no words of succour for the victims, no anger or opprobrium for the killers. He said the violence was a ‘black mark on the nation’s forehead’ but he couldn’t bring himself to say that retaliatory attacks on Muslims for what happened at Godhra would attract the same punishment as the burning of the train. Here was a violent disturbance that had made a mockery of state power as it is supposed to operate, yet the prime minister issued no dire warnings to those who were challenging his authority and power as chief executive. In the US, President George W. Bush and his senior aides publicly warned citizens against attacking Muslims, Arabs and other immigrants following the World Trade Centre terrorist strike. In less than a year since 9/11, a man in Texas was sentenced to death for the ‘retaliatory’ murder of a Sikh immigrant. To date, however, Vajpayee has yet to even publicly acknowledge that Muslim citizens of India were victimised in Gujarat or to threaten the attackers with the severest consequences.
Indeed, Vajpayee was later to demonstrate that he was so loyal to his party and parivar that he didn’t mind undermining the majesty of the state and his own office. On April 17, 2002, he said that if only parliament had condemned Godhra, the subsequent massacres would not have happened. The fact is that he is leader of the House and could have ordered a discussion and condemnation of Godhra on the day it happened — instead of the scheduled presentation of the budget.
In early May, he made another curious statement, this time on the floor of the Rajya Sabha: That he had decided to remove Modi in April but didn’t act fearing a backlash in Gujarat. ‘I had gone to Goa making up my mind on changing the ruler in Gujarat but according to my own assessment, I felt that the change in leadership will only worsen the situation.’ At the time, the only people opposed to a change in leadership were the RSS and VHP. Removing Modi may or may not have provided temporary relief for Gujarat’s beleaguered Muslims but it was odd for the prime minister to admit being held hostage to the threats of criminals and goons. “Vajpayee,” wrote B.G. Verghese, “placed the diktat of the mob above his oath of office . . . the emperor has no clothes, stripped of the last shred of moral authority.”
Excerpted from the the author’s Introduction to the book, Gujarat: The Making of a Tragedy (Penguin, 2002). Edited by Siddharth Varadarajan
