Gujarat Carnage 2002

The recent Tehelka expose of the “Gujarat riots” of 2002 demonstrates very starkly that these were neither “spontaneous” nor “riots”, but were in fact mass murder, loot and mayhem orchestrated and organised by the top echelons of the Gujarat units of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, the Bajrang Dal, and the Bharatiya Janata Party with the full connivance and complicity of the Gujarat government headed by Narendra Modi. The Tehelka tapes show senior functionaries of these organisations and of the government bragging and confessing to their having committed and participated in heinous crimes like brutal mass murder, rape, burning, looting, etc. Many of them claim and boast about how Narendra Modi explicitly encouraged the carnage and told the killers and rioters that they were being given a free rein of three days. These people also claim how several senior police officials not only aided and abetted these killers by their actions and inaction but in many cases themselves participated in the carnage.

These senior functionaries who boast about having committed these crimes also claim how Modi provided shelter to these people and even got inconvenient judges changed to ensure that these mass murderers got out on bail. They also boast about having successfully subverted the integrity of the Nanavati Commission. In short, the tapes reveal a horrific state of affairs in Gujarat, which seems to have gone beyond the pale of the rule of law, and the most basic norms of humanity.