Now that it is clear that terrorism has no religion, the saffron party is going through painful contortions. But why haven’t the Congress and other like-minded parties inculcated the secular ideal among the forces?
Nothing could have been more profoundly disturbing than the startling and belated revelations by the Maharashtra Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) about last September’s Malegaon bomb blast. Among those arrested in this connection are a Hindutva ‘guru’, a serving lt-colonel, a prominent sadhvi and several other activists belonging to the Sangh Parivar. Allegedly, lt-colonel Srikant Prasad Purohit had not only trained bomb throwers but also procured RDX for them. On Friday, the special public prosecutor told the court that the arrested colonel had secured the deadly explosive at the ‘orders’ of the Hindutva guru – with three aliases including Swami Amritanand – who was also in frequent touch with all the suspects taken into custody for the Malegaon blast. Sure enough, what is alleged has not yet been proved. But what has seen the light of day is chilling enough.
What lends a sharper edge to the shocking affair is that the powers that be paid not the slightest heed to plausible complaints that the Malegaon blast, like a previous one in Nanded (the ATS now says that the two are interlinked) was the handiwork of Hindutva extremists. With the chain of arrests beginning with that of Sadhvi Pragya Singh, belonging to an extremist Hindu outfit called Abhinav Bharat, the truth is apparently trickling out.
Of this there have been two inevitable consequences. First, that the BJP, which is expecting to regain power in the forthcoming Lok Sabha elections, finds itself in a very tight corner now that its closest allies in the Sangh Parivar have been thoroughly exposed in their true colours. It just does not know how to get out of the hole of its own making. Up to now
it had been merrily accusing the Congress-led United Progressive Alliance of being ‘soft’ on terror that, in its strident opinion was entirely jihadi. Now that it is established that terrorism has no religion, the saffron party is going through painful contortions. At first, it confined itself to declaring that ‘cultural nationalists’like the sadhvi could never be terrorists, though it conceded, for the record, that anyone proved guilty should be punished. But as the arrests by the ATS have multiplied and self-styled mahants and other saffron stalwarts have come into the net, several BJP leaders have got unhinged while several others remain tongue-tied. Party president Rajnath Singh has gone so far as to claim that all Hindutva votaries are lily-white innocents but the Congress, for crass electoral purposes, is ‘denigrating and framing’ not only Hindutva activists but also the entire Hindu society. He has threatened that his party would not stand idly by and watch this situation, whatever that might mean. LK Advani and other senior BJP leaders have not yet distanced themselves from Singh’s bellicosity. Nothing can be more absurd than obstructing the course of investigations and justice. But the BJP’s stance is best illustrated by the incredibly provocative statements of a party MP, duly saffron-clad, who has not even been questioned.
The second and even more alarming consequence of recent developments has been widespread apprehension that the army, the much-respected institution that is the nation’s weapon of last resort against divisive forces, might have become vulnerable to the communal virus. The matter is very serious, extremely sensitive and highly complex. It must be examined quietly, firmly and dispassionately. To say that it is a case of only one officer’s aberration would be as wrong as to assume that large sections of uniformed men have turned communal and abettors of
terrorists. If the experience of the last 61 years since Independence is a useful guide, it would establish two things. First that it is naïve to believe that men of the armed forces – the army, the largest and most important one, in particular – are never affected or influenced by the vile ideas prevalent in the society. To control post-Partition communal madness in the nation’s capital in 1947, Jawaharlal Nehru had to call in the Madras regiment. Exactly the same thing had to be repeated 37 years later during the disgraceful anti-Sikh riots in Delhi in the wake of Indira Gandhi’s assassination. Nehru was concerned also over the fact that retired Sikh generals were usually joining the Akali party and that military officers had started looking for political mentors even while in service. In respect of both the post-retirement political ambitions and affiliations of military men and their search for political godfathers, the situation has greatly worsened. Arguably the greatest challenge to the army and its discipline and traditions had come after Operation Blue Star in Punjab. Soldiers at the headquarters of the Sikh Regiment in distant Bihar had shot dead their own commander. There were also scattered mutinies, even if largely by raw recruits and junior jawans.
However, the second cardinal fact is that in all situations of extreme danger so far, the army’s ethos, discipline, collective good sense and traditions have, by and large, been preserved. Were it not so, could the army have ended so swiftly and smoothly the communal carnage in Gujarat evidently encouraged by those in power in the state? One should be inclined to accept the assurance of army spokespersons that there might be some more black sheep in the ranks of a force that is a million strong, but their number is not large. In any case, the army chief, general Deepak Kapoor, has announced that the army has reinforced its normal checks and vigil. There should therefore be no attempt to disparage the army, final guarantor of the country’s security and unity.
At the same time a clear and honest answer is needed to an agonizing question: why and how did the arrested colonel’s nefarious activities go unnoticed for so many years? Those responsible for neglecting their duties of vigilance or worse must also be brought to book.
A final point to be made rather briefly is of the utmost importance. At least from the time of the Ayodha agitation, the Advani rath yatra and demolition of the Babri Masjid, if not earlier, the Sangh Parivar has been spreading the cult of Hindutva with a vengeance, whether it has been in power or out of it. By contrast, the Congress and other secular parties have done precious little to inculcate the secular ideal at least among the armed forces, paramilitary organizations, the police and investigative agencies.