Gujarat offers and occasion once again, to India at home and broad, to all those desiring peace in the subcontinent, to do some serious introspection on the situation of the minorities as also of the Dalits and the backward communities in the country.

Consider the facts:

1. There has been perceptible and systematic breakdown in the rule of law, culpability and responsibility of the instruments of state, including the administration (incorporating the armya and the police) and not excluding the judiciary. Police reforms have been aborted and police and military brutality is on the rise. The judiciary, bereft of even marginal representation of the subaltern groups, is increasingly under suspicion for emerging biases.

2. Rapid erosion in the safeguards, affirmative action and cultural guarantees of the constitution as far as the minorities and dalits are concerned. The government position on the Supreme Court hearings on Article Thirty 30, in which the Union Cabinet has decided that minorities deserve no special consideration, is an alarming development.

3. Alarming decline in the share of the minorities and the dalits in the development process, and more so, in the governance and administrative apparatus. The process of making the Tenth five-year plan has shown that funds are still not available to Muslims and dalits for viable economic growth.

4. There has been a conspiracy to subjugate and coerce the minorities, with violence when required, with the view of dividing the leadership, silencing the spokesmen and dissident voices, using fake dialogues as instruments of blackmail against fragile leaderships and clerical hierarchies embattled in internecine war or susceptible to such blackmail for other reasons. The plight of the Christians, who were victims even in the current anti Muslim violence in Gujarat, is all too well known internationally. The state complicity in the Gujarat violence has been proved by independent enquiries.

5. The utter cynicism, criminal cynicism if I may call it, of the ruling elite in general, the Bharatiya Janata party, NDA and the Rastryia Swayamsevak Sangh specifically, and Prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee and deputy prime minister Lal Krishna Advani individually. {This sequence of events will explain this more than anything. Even as the violence against Christians makes global news and the anti Muslim massacres in Gujarat stun world audiences despite the September 11biases if any, the ruling group instead of confidence building measures takes the following actions. The RSS, the ideological political master of the government, announces that Muslims and Christians must know that they survive at the mercy of the majority community, and they must forthwith purge their holy books and scriptures of all that is offensive to the majority community, the national meeting of the BJP at Goa attended by the Prime minister and his deputy, in affect endorses it as its own voice, Narendra Modi has already been posted in Gujarat with a charter to violently polarize the state – in which he succeeds beyond the expectations of his gurus – his ideological twin, Vinay Katyar, a mastermind of the demolition of the Babri mosque as head of the Bajrang Dal, is posted to Uttar Pradesh to head the BJP in another exercise in religious polarization. In a final irony, prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee, shedding for ever whatever mask he has worn of justice and moderation, appoints as deputy prime minister Home minister Lal Krishna Advani who faces indictment for his role in the demolition of the mosque and the subsequent violence, and seen as the brutal anti minority face of Hindutva in the government. The prospects of Advani succeeding Vajpayee as prime minister sooner than later are a nightmare for all minorities and dalits.}

TOWARDS A SOLUTION

• Restore rule of law. Towards this, ensure adequate representation of minorities and dalits in the police, administration, judiciary and financial sectors

• Respect human rights, and restore human rights in Kashmir, Nagaland and other states by open investigation of previous violations, special courts, punitive action against the guilty and adequate and exemplary compensation for the victims of human rights violations by the state apparatus (including police and armed forces), as well as for other Muslim, Dalit and Christian victims of communal and caste violence

• Postpone elections in Gujarat where terrorized minorities cannot exercise their franchise.

• Devolution of development resources towards Minorities and Dalits who today are landless, without the potential of self-employment and entrepreneurship, and absolutely without a safety net.

• Act to end hate campaigns and demonisation of Muslim and Christian communities with all consequent ramifications.

• Take transparent steps to separate church (majority religion) from the State.

• Bring the law to act upon all actions, groups, ideologies, and organisations with a neo fascist, racist, supremacist, communal and casteist agenda.

• Use legal machinery to stop armed training of cadres of neo fascist groups

• Restore full freedom of the media

What the International Community, including expatriate Indians, can do.

• Urge and international enquiry of the neo fascist and neo-nazi groups, including the members of the Sangh Parivar. This is urgently required as the Vishwa Hindu parisshad and other sister orgasnisations are seeking international accreditation and are setting up groups within the

Indian community in Europe and North America

• Urge international investigation of all funds sourced from North America and W Europe to organisations which are found or suspected to be involved in anti Christian, anti Muslim and anti dalit violence and in hate camapaigns

• Urge transparent enquiry in violation of human rights in India by state apparatus, including Police, and the armed forces.

• Encourage the Human rights movement in India by setting up support groups in Europe and the Americas. Protect the Human rights movement from the influence and coercion of the state.

• Advocacy in Europe and North America to put pressure on the government in India to encourage and nurture a plural cultural society in keeping with the diversity and plurality of Indian civilization.