Indians killing Indians. There is no other way of describing the wave ofjihadi terrorist strikes spreading death and destruction across India sinceJuly, 2006, and the wave of anti-Christian violence being seen in Orissa andKarnataka since August, 2008.
The wave of jihadi terrorist strikes has affected many states-- ruled by theCongress (I), the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the Communist Party of India(Marxist) and others.
Anger against certain aggressive groups of evangelists indulging in a scurrilouscampaign against the Hindu religion and converting the impoverished tribals ofCentral India into Christianty through the allurement of money has beenwidespread in many states of India, but this anger has been expressed in acivilized manner in most states. Only in the BJP ruled Karnataka and in Orissaruled by an electoral ally of the BJP has this anger taken an ugly, uncivilizedturn in the form of orchestrated attacks on Christians and their places ofworship and even the alleged rape of a helpless nun. Large sections of publicopinion in India and abroad cannot be blamed if they attribute this to theinaction of the local governments in the face of the violence and view this asamounting to culpable complicity.
These two waves have given rise to antagonistic reflexes which should be ofconcern to any Indian interested in the unity, prosperity and strength of thisnation. There is a disturbing denial mode in sections of both the Muslim and theHindu communities. Sections of the Muslim community are not prepared to acceptthat their co-religionists are behind this wave of jihadi terrorism. An attemptis being made by these sections, supported by sections of the so-called secularcommunity, either to deny the involvement of some Muslims in jihadi terrorism orto rationalise their involvement through various arguments. There is asimultaneous attempt to denigrate and demonise the police and otherlaw-enforcing agencies by debunking their version of the terrorist strikes andby coming in the way of their investigation.
Sections of the Hindu community owing allegiance to the so-called Hindutvagroups are not prepared to accept any blame on their community and tend toproject the anti-Christian violence as an outcome of spontaneous tribal angeragainst Christian missionaries with which, according to them, the Hindutvaorganizations have nothing to do. The perceived inaction of the law-enforcingagencies in the face of the anti-Christian violence is sought to be rationalizedand explained through various arguments such as the lack of road and other meansof communications in the affected areas which rendered prompt police actiondifficult.
The history of Islam is replete with thousands of instances of destruction ofplaces of worship of other religions. The Hindus used to be proud of the factthat their religion respected the places of worship of other religions and didnot damage or destroy them. But, this is no longer so since 1992 when someHindutva elements carried out a wanton destruction of the Babri Masjid inAyodhya.
Hopes entertained by many that this was a one-time aberration caused by historicanger over the alleged demolition of a Ram temple in the same place for theerection of a masjid have been belied by reports of wanton destruction ofChristian places of worship in Karnataka and Orissa. India has already beenpaying a heavy price for the Hindu anger caused by perceptions of theappeasement policies of the so-called secular elements towards the religiousminorities and the Muslim anger due to perceptions of the failure of the stateto protect them and to be fair to them.
To this will now be added pockets of Christian anger over the death, destructionand humiliation inflicted on their community by the Hindutva elements, with thestate allegedly remaining a silent spectator. The Christians will be renderedeven more angry by the attempts being made by some intellectuals and othersclose to the Hindutva groups to play down the enormous gravity of theanti-Christian violence.
Do the orchestrated acts of violence against the Christians and their places ofworship amount to acts of terrorism similar to the ruthless killing of innocentcivilians of various communities by the jihadi terrorists of the indigenous aswell Pakistani and Bangladeshi kinds? Is the Hindutva Bajrang Dal, which isallegedly behind the attacks on Christians, a terrorist organization similar tothe Students’ Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) and the so-called IndianMujahideen? These questions are increasingly occupying the centre of the debate.Instead of maintaining a laser-sharp focus on our fight against jihaditerrorism, we find ourselves spending more and more time in countering andremoving suspicions of acts of terrorism against the Christians.
There is no universally accepted definition of terrorism and what is a terroristorganization, but most definitions in common currency accept that there are someimportant components of terrorism--repeated attacks of a pre-meditated nature oninnocent civilians and their property to achieve an objective, which may bepolitical, economic, social or religious. Spontaneous and isolated attacks inthe heat of the moment, which are not repeated in an orchestrated manner, arecrimes not amounting to terrorism.
The anti-Christian violence started as spontaneous, isolated attacks in the heatof the moment following the murder of a respected Hindu leader and some of hisdisciples in Orissa and the circulation of scurrilous pamphlets denigrating theHindu religion by a Christian organization in Karnataka. Law does not excuseeven such isolated attacks in the heat of the moment, but views the heat of themoment argument as a mitigating circumstance while deciding the quantum ofpunishment. But repeated pre-meditated attacks of an orchestrated nature longafter the heat of the moment has passed dangerously degenerate into the zone ofterrorism.
If the Hindutva forces are not able to control the Frankenstein’s monsterscreated by them in the form of the Bajrang Dal, it is only a question of timebefore it comes under the scanner of the terrorism experts of the Westerncountries. In the early 1990s, a US-based organization called theJammat-ul-Fuqra, headed by a Pakistani cleric and with a large number ofAfro-American Muslims as members, carried out a wave of arson attacks on Hinduand Jewish places of worship in the US and Canada and there were some attacks onthe members of these religions too.
The Counter-Terrorism Division of the US State Department placed it in the listof terrorist organizations to be watched and included a brief note on itsactivities in its annual reports to the US Congress. This cleric has sincereturned to Pakistan and its activities in the US have ceased. It no longerfigures in the list of terrorist organizations.
If repeated and pre-meditated attacks on Hindu and Jewish places of worship andon Hindus and Jews in the US can be viewed as amounting to terrorism, how can weargue that similar attacks on Christians and their places of worship in India donot amount to terrorism?
The Hindutva organizations should read the writing on the wall and mendthemselves lest they come to be viewed by the international community asorganizations of concern. If the Bajrang Dal comes to be viewed as a suspectedterrorist organization, the first to feel the pressure and adverse effect willbe the supporters of the organization in the Hindu diaspora abroad. It is intheir interest to exercise pressure on the Bajrang Dal and drive some sense intoit.
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B. Raman is Additional Secretary (retd), Cabinet Secretariat, Govt. ofIndia, New Delhi, and, presently, Director, Institute For Topical studies,Chennai.
