Mapping the contours of communal violence in India: A critical engagement with existing scholarship and emerging trends

ABSTRACT

Through this article, I seek to expound a series of concrete formulations and explanations about the nature and trajectory of communal violence in India. I wish to gauge a sense of the diverse factors which make communal violence possible, ascertain the underlying links which facilitate such periodic outbreaks, and identify the practices of exclusion and segregation which these instances engender. The article relies on a combination of written and oral sources: in addition to drawing on the existing corpus of literature, it taps into oral testimonies for creating a rich and varied archive of events and experiences.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 According to Brass (2006a), ‘the first carries the appearance of spontaneous, intergroup mass action, the second of deliberately organised-and especially-state-supported killings and the destruction of property of a targeted group’.

2 The names of the interviewees have not been disclosed in the paper. Instead, I have used the initials of their names. This has been done in order to protect their identity and ensure their privacy. However, one crucial point of difference between the two interview exercises conducted one after the other in Delhi and Bhopal needs to be cited here. The Sikh survivors from Delhi encounter no immediate threat in speaking about the violence and brutalities that took place in November 1984. Conversely, the accounts that Muslim survivors from Bhopal relate of the events of late 1992 are firmly couched in and spring from the experience of persistent fear and insecurity. The latter therefore remain quite reluctant, in most cases, to discuss what had befallen them in those fateful days.

3 This debate, vigorously carried on by the Arya Samajis and the Singh Sabhas, involved complex and overlapping questions of faith, identity and demography, with the former claiming that Hinduism was a larger overarching paradigm subsuming Sikh faith within its ambit and the latter asserting that Sikhism was a separate religious entity, the adherents of which were clearly distinct from the Hindus. For further reference, see: Jones (1973)

4 Balraj Puri, ‘Anatomy of Communalism’, cited in Mahmood (1989).

5 The Sangh Parivar (family) is the predominant representative of majoritarian right-wing politics in India. It is an intricate network of organisations, active in diverse spheres – political, social and cultural. The Rashtriya Swayam Sevak Sangh (RSS), founded in 1925, is the spearhead of Hindutva politics in India. Its offshoots include the Vishva Hindu Parishad (VHP), the Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) and Bajrang Dal (BD) among others. VHP is a religious organisation, having several ascetics as its members. BJP is the representative of the Sangh in electoral politics. BD refers to groups of young men who are indoctrinated into the Hindutva ideology and are trained to indulge in violence targeting specific segments of society at the command of their senior leaders. This clique of right-wing parties and organisations regards itself to be the chief protector of the Hindu faith and the interests of its followers. These so-called exponents of the concerns of the majority community view themselves to be the chief advocates of the wider national interest. Considering themselves to be the patriots of highest order, the members and the cadre of the RSS combine suspect the motives and loyalties of most others. In this process, they conveniently arrogate to themselves the status of the true representatives of the Indian nation.

6 Bhopal Riots: A Report, Delhi: People's Union for Democratic Rights and Sanskritik Morcha, 1993, 4.

7 Interview with DG on 16 October 2013 at 10 am at his residence in Vasant Vihar, Delhi. He was involved in the independent investigation carried out by People's Union for Democratic Rights and People's Union for Civil Liberties, in the immediate aftermath of the 1984 violence, with a view to highlight the role and responsibility of the then government in organising and orchestrating attacks on the members of the Sikh community across the national capital. He is a researcher, writer and teacher of sociology.

8 Interview with KS on 24 August 2015 at 10.30 am at her residence in Koh-e-Fiza, Bhopal. She has taught at a number of educational institutions in the city. A social activist with a leftist perspective, she is associated with a number of initiatives which strive for gender equality in society.

9 For further reference, see: Basu (1994) and Brass (2006b).

10 Interview with OA on 29 October 2015 at 10 am at his residence near Moti Masjid in Bhopal. He periodically organises and conducts lectures and programs on a range of issues, including the need for higher education and communal harmony. He is a lawyer by profession.

11 Bhopal Riots: A Report, 8.

12 ‘Report of the Women's Delegation to Bhopal, Ahmedabad and Surat’, AIDWA, CWDS et al., reproduced in Women and the Hindu Right: A Collection of Essays, edited by Tanika Sarkar and Urvashi Butalia (New Delhi: Kali for Women, 1995), 306.

13 Interview with GA on 13 November 2015 at 10.30 am at his residence in Vijay Nagar on Airport Road, Bhopal. He is a retired employee from the Post and Telegraph department. He is an activist, a writer and a trade unionist. He was involved in the relief effort, organised in Bhopal after the 1992 riot and participated in the peace march that was taken out by concerned citizens through the city.

14 Bhopal Riots: A Report, 11.

15 Report to the Nation: Truth about Delhi Violence, Delhi: Citizens for Democracy, 1985. Accessed May 28 2016. Source: http://www.carnage84.com/human/truth/truth.htm.

16 In late February 2002, coaches of the Sabarmati express were set on fire, as it halted at Godhra, a town in the state of Gujarat. The train was carrying kar sevaks, returning from Ayodhya. It was alleged that local Muslims had been involved in a conspiracy to set the train ablaze. It was also alleged that the kar sevaks had been deliberately adopting an aggressive stance and were resorting to provocation, with a view to trigger a violent clash with the Muslims of the area. Here, it will suffice to say that the attack on the train was a horrendous incident, claiming 59 lives. The ruling state government of the BJP, along with other allied organisations, fully capitalised on it to spread venom against the Muslim community. A massive state-supported anti-Muslim pogrom was launched which lasted for months on end. The Newtonian logic of action and reaction was used by an extremely callous and complicit government to account for the turn of events, legitimise the grave human rights violations in the state and deflect its own culpability.

17 The text of a letter acknowledging the positive contribution of the Gujarati newspaper Sandesh during the period of violence signed by Narendra Modi, the then chief minister of Gujarat, has been reproduced in Varadarjan et al. (2002).

18 Interview with PK on 2 August 2013 at 5 pm at her office in Jangpura, Delhi. She has been active in the legal struggle, demanding redressal for the 1984 survivors and punitive measures for the culprits.

19 Interview with DK on 26 October 2013 at 3 pm at her residence in Raghubir Nagar, Delhi. In 1984, she was a resident of Tirlokpuri, a locality in East Delhi which saw extreme violence and brutality. She lost 12 members of her family, including her husband in the pogrom. Presently, she works as a nurse in a government hospital.

20 Mander (2010), Unpublished First Draft, obtained from the office of Aman Biradari, Delhi. Aman Biradari is an initiative that strives to bring about peace, equality and justice in the society.

21 Interview with NH on 26 August 2013 at 11 am at her residence in Vasant Enclave, Delhi. Following the 1984 pogrom, she participated in the independent investigation carried out by People's Union for Democratic Rights and People's Union for Civil Liberties, the findings of which were released in the form of a report, titled Who are the Guilty? She also became a part of Naagrik Ekta Manch, the spontaneous citizens’ initiative which played a leading role in organising relief effort in the aftermath of the violence in Delhi. She is a human rights lawyer and activist.

22 Interview with RR on 31August 2013 at 11 am at his residence in Gulmohar Park, Delhi. In the immediate aftermath of the 1984 violence, he joined the relief operations which were being coordinated by Naagrik Ekta Manch and volunteered at the Farsh Bazar relief camp, established at Shahadra, Delhi. Now, he is an independent film maker.

23 Interview with RC on 6 January 2014 at 11 am at her office in Delhi. She participated in the relief effort, organised after the 1984 anti-Sikh violence. Currently, she is a Professor of Sociology at Delhi University.

24 English translation of the testimony of Ms Harbans Kaur documented in Speaking from the Guts: Memories of Communal Riots (Mumbai: Sound and Picture Archives for Research on Women, 1999), 10.

25 Interview with IH on 4 September 2015 at 1 pm at his residence in BDA Colony, Koh-e-Fiza, Bhopal. He is a victim of the 1992 violence. His house was attacked by the rioting mob, on account of which he and his family members were forced to seek shelter with friends and acquaintances for several days. He owned and managed a business and is now retired.

26 A systematic campaign of hatred and violence was unleashed against the Muslim community by the Sangh Parivar from the late 1980s. It gained momentum across different regions, culminating in the demolition of the Babri Masjid located in Ayodhya in December 1992. The demolition was followed by a fresh wave of communal violence, spreading to various parts of the country. Mumbai, formerly known as Bombay, regarded as the commercial capital of India was one of the severely affected cities. It witnessed ghastly violence, involving active complicity from high-level State politicians and the city's police, in which mostly Muslim residents were targeted. Only a couple of months after the violence had subsided, the city became the site of a series of bomb blasts in early 1993.

27 Interview with MB on 30August 2013 at 11 am in Delhi University, where she is a professor. She was involved in the relief effort that was organised following the 1984 pogrom. Later, she took lead in organising a summer school for children survivors which continued to work for a few years.

28 Interview with JJ on 14 April 2013 at 4 pm in Nizamuddin colony, Delhi. She was the coordinator of the Farsh Bazar relief camp which was among the largest to be set up in the city, immediately following the 1984 pogrom. She is a social activist and writer who has been involved in Indian politics.

29 ‘Report of the Women's Delegation to Bhopal, Ahmedabad and Surat’, reproduced in Women and the Hindu Right, 308.

30 Bhopal Riots: A Report, 47.

31 For a detailed account of such selective destruction that was wrought at several places in Gujarat in 2002, see Oommen (2008, 64)

32 Taking the Jewish ghetto existing in the Venetian city state in the late sixteenth century as a reference point, Sennett (1996, 217) observes:

segregation increased the Jews daily otherness, non Christian lives ever more enigmatic to the dominant powers beyond ghetto walls … Venetian Christians sought to create a Christian community by segregating those who were different, drawing on the fear of touching alien, seductive bodies. Jewish identity became entangled in that same geography of repression.

For a detailed discussion of the ways in which these early ghettos in the world emerged and were maintained, amidst widespread contempt and apprehension, as distinct abhorred zones within the city limits, see Sennett (1996).