A systematic and brutal targeting of the minority Muslim community has been under way in Gujarat since March this year, claiming over a thousand Muslim lives including those of women and children. The nature and extent of the violence in the state have been horrific, as attested to by the eye-witness accounts recorded by the National Human Rights Commission, citizens' groups as well as the internal report of the British High Commission in India. The attacks on the community have not stopped and the fate of over a hundred thousand refugees in temporary camps, now threatened with closure, hangs in the balance. The Central Government, in flagrant disregard of all norms of governance, continues to support the Gujarat administration and its Chief Minister Narendra Modi despite their culpable role in the events.

We believe that a strong commitment to the protection of the lives of minorities and the defence of their rights is urgently called for. To this end, we have joined efforts with those working in India to bring

about the following:

- the dismissal and legal indictment of the Chief Minister of Gujarat;

- the identification and initiation of criminal proceedings against the perpetrators of crimes;

- the safety of the survivors living in the camps as well as those who return to their homes, and their adequate rehabilitation;

- the monitoring of the situation in Gujarat, upto and including the coming elections, by international human rights observers.

These genocidal events must not be passed over in silence by the international community. We ask that the initiatives for the defence of human rights be supported worldwide. We urge the British government to consider declaring Mr. Modi and his cabinet members persona non grata, and to send a strong signal by refusing to host Indian Home Minister, Mr. L. K. Advani, now or in the future.

To contribute to relief operations, please visit: http://www.onlinevolunteers.org/gujarat/action/donate/index.htm

Signed by:

1. Mr. Burjor Avari MBE
Multicultural Studies Co-ordinator
Academic Division
Manchester Metropolitan University
All Saints
Manchester M15 6BH

2. Dr. Mukulika Banerjee
Dept. of Anthropology
University College London
Gower Street
London WC1E 6BT

3. Professor Upendra Baxi,
School of Law
Warwick University

4. Dr. Shailendra Bhandare,
Asst. Keeper, South Asian Numismatics
Heberden Coin Room
Ashmolean Museum
Oxford University

5. Dr. Chetan Bhatt
Senior Lecturer
Department of Sociology
Goldsmiths College
University of London

6. Dr. Anuj.Dawar,
Robinson College, Cambridge

7. Lord Meghnad Desai,
London School of Economics,

8. Dr. Meena Dhanda,
University of Wolverhampton

9. Dr. Priyamvada Gopal,
English faculty,
University of Cambridge

10. Dr. Sudeshna Guha
Research Associate
Photographic Collections
Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology
University of Cambridge

11. Dr. Suman Gupta
Senior Lecturer in Literature, The Open University U.K.
Charter Fellow, Wolfson College Oxford

12. Dr. David Hardiman
Senior Research Fellow,
Department of History,
University of Warwick

13. Professor Barbara Harriss-White
Queen Elizabeth House
University of Oxford,

14. Dr. Ananya Jahanara Kabir
Centre for History and Economics, King's College, Cambridge CB2 1ST
Clare Hall, Cambridge

15. Dr. Eivind Kahrs,
Faculty of Oriental Studies,
University of Cambridge

16. Dr. Sudipta Kaviraj,
Professor, Political Science,
SOAS,
London.

17. Professor Sunil Khilnani
Professor of Politics, Birkbeck College, University of London
and Fellow, Woodrow Wilson Center, Washington DC

18. Dr. Amala Mahadevan
University of Cambridge

19. Dr. Perveez Mody
King's College

20. Dr. Subha Mukherji
Fellow and Director of Studies in English
Fitzwilliam College
Cambridge

21. Dr. Parita Mukta,
Senior Lecturer,
Dept. of Sociology,
University of Warwick

22. Dr. Priyamvada Natarajan,
Research Fellow,
Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge
Trinity College,
Cambridge.

23. Dr. Uttara Natarajan,
Lecturer, English Dept.
Goldsmiths' College, U. of London.

24. Dr. Fransesca Orsini,
Faculty of Oriental Studies,
University of Cambridge

25. Professor Tapan K Raychaudhuri'
Professor Emeritus of History,
St.Anthony's College,
Oxford University

26. Dr. S. S. Saxena,
Low Temperature Physics
Cavendish Laboratory
University of Cambridge

27. Dr. Ursula Sharma
Department of Anthropology,
University of Manchester

28. Pritam Singh
Oxford Brookes University

29. Professor Sanjay Subrahmanyam,
Professor-elect, Chair of Indian History and Culture,
University of Oxford.

30. Dr. Rajeswari Sunder Rajan
Reader, English faculty, and
Professorial Fellow, Wolfson College,
Oxford University

31. Dr. David Anthony Washbrook (MA, Ph.d. Cantab.);
Reader in Modern South Asian History at Oxford University
Professorial Fellow of St Antony's College, Oxford.

32. Professor Robert J.C. Young
Professor of English and Critical Theory
University of Oxford