DR. S. AUSAF SAIED VASFI analyses the Sep 7 bomb blast at the Delhi High Court in the backdrop of various earlier blasts in the country and the stereotype approach of our investigating agencies.
As we rush to the press, (Friday, Sep 9) the casualty figure of the Sep 7 bomb blast at the Delhi High Court stands at 13. More than 18 people received shrapnel injuries.
Our heart goes out to the next-to-the-kin. May Allah give them patience and forbearance.
Till date five persons have been arrested, including two from Kishtwar in Jammu & Kashmir and one from Balrampur.
The investigation has been entrusted to the NIA (National Investigation Agency). Other agencies are assisting the NIA. The ATSs from various neighbouring states are also cooperating in the “unprecedented” hunt.
LAME EXCUSE OF INTELLIGENCE
It goes without saying that an unambiguous input in this regard had been put in July. So said the Union Home Minister, Mr. P. Chidambaram. His subordinates say that input was not specific. It is a lame excuse. The truth is the Police and Intelligence Officers did not cover themselves with glory when they did not attach due importance to the Union Home Minister’s information rather instruction. It is a serious reflection on their official behaviour. It amounts to insubordination. By any stretch of imagination, the Minister’s missive cannot be taken in a lackadaisical manner.
Otherwise too, the record of the two important wings of the law and order dispensation does not add to our national pride.
It was in Feb 2010 that the German Bakery in Pune was reduced to ashes. Out of seven only one person has been arrested. The chargesheet has been filed. Is it satisfactory progress?
The Mehrauli tragedy occurred in March 2010. The Special Cell and the Delhi Police are still investigating the crime. No accused has been arrested. Is it satisfactory?
It was in April 2010 that the Chinnaswamy Stadium experienced turmoil in Bangalore. Five cases were registered. The case is under investigation. No arrest has been made.
The Delhi Jama Masjid blast and firing took place in Sep 2010. The Special Cell and Delhi Police are still investigating. No arrest has taken place and the case is under the proverbial investigation.
The Sheetla Ghat tragedy struck Varanasi in December 2010. No arrest and the investigation continues.
In May 2011, the Delhi High Court was attacked. The case is under customary investigation.
In July 2011, Mumbai was shaken to its foundations. No arrests. The case is under investigation.
One feels outraged rather nauseated at this progress. How do Mr. Chidambaram and the Police and Intelligence chiefs feel at these well-known, unsolved cases? Do they not smell dereliction of duty in them? The apex-court, the highest palladium of justice, has described the terrorist attack on the Delhi High Court as an attack on justice.
Initially, the Dhaka-based Harkat-ul-Jehad-e-Islami (HuJI) claimed responsibility for the Delhi blast. But the government also suspects the role of Lashkar and Indian Mujahideen.
According to the informed sources, five Muslim terrorist outfits operate in Bharat. –Lashkar-e-Tayyeba, Jaish-e-Mohammad, Hizb-ul-Mujahideen, Indian Mujahideen and Harkat-ul-Jehad-e-Islami. If the expediency demands, the name of Students Islamic Movement of India (SIMI) is also mentioned.
SIGNIFICANT QUESTION
How many outfits belonging to the majority community operate in Bharat? Save the honourable exception of those bodies which work in the open, our knowledge is next to negligible. But we have an idea about their activities as the Muslims have, more often than not, fallen prey to their machination. The most remarkable aspect of these outfits’ modus operandi is commission of crimes that may appear to be committed by Muslims. Were false beards, scull caps, shalwar-qameez suits, and a diary and a map having locations of mosques in Maharashtra not recovered from a Hindutva bomb-maker’s house in Nanded following the blast there on April 6, 2006 in which two Bajrang Dal activists 29-year old Naresh Rajkondawar (son of house owner Laxman Rajkondawar) and 31-year old Himanshu Panse were killed while making bombs and three others were seriously injured (one injured person Rahul Pande had escaped from the site but was later caught by the police)? And the experience is that the Police and Intelligence do not hesitate in avoidably harassing and arresting Muslim youth for the crime. The simple question that no Muslim can attack a Masjid doesn’t occur to them.
Sri Ram Sene, founded in the late 1960 by Kalkiji Maharaj is alleged to be the only party that organises communal upheavals for monetary considerations. Mr. Kalki was once the right-hand man of the Shiv Sena chief, Mr. Bal Thackeray. Then he enjoyed Z category security of the Government of India. The Sena vandalised the late M.F. Hussein’s exhibition in August 2008 in Delhi. Its irate activists smashed Hussein’s framed paintings. They also violently oppose the Valentine’s Day. They had a role in Malegaon blast as well. But the RSS maintains a distance from the Sene. Not long ago, the Mother of the Saffron called for stringent action against the outfit and asserted that they would have no objection should the government ban the Sene.
SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITY
The Maharasthra government on March 2011 decided to ban the Sanathan Sanstha. The late Hemant Karkare exposed the organisation before his murder. He had found it involved in terrorist activities.
Ramesh Gadkari and Vikram Bhave were sentenced to 10 years rigorous imprisonment in Mumbai on August 30 for carrying out blasts in Thane and Vashi. The social workers had charged them with subversive activity at Parbhani, Jalna, Pune, Ajmer, Goa and Malegaon. Its mouthpiece Sanstha Prabhat came under scanner for provocative write-ups and targeting a particular community.
Abhinav Bharat has been a secret organisation or society founded by Mr. Ganesh Damodar Savarkar in 1904. It was, and is, manned by radical Hindu nationalists.
The Italian ideologue Mazzini is said to have exerted profound influence on G.D. Savarkar whose belief was: Swaraj can never be attained except by bloody and ruthless war on the British. He stood for armed struggle. Today it is presided over by Savarkar’s grand-daughter, Hmani Savarkar. She is also related to Nathuram Godse.
ABHINAV
INVOLVEMENT
For a bird’s eye view, let us recall the involvement of Abhinav Bharat in the bomb blasts in Ajmer, Samjhauta Express, Malegaon and Mecca Masjid.
In the Ajmer blast, two persons were reported dead while 11 received injuries. In the beginning the blast was blamed on the Pakistani terrorist group LeT. However in 2010, the ATS arrested five persons for the blast, four of whom were the members of the RSS. Swami Aseemanand in his confession admitted the involvement of the former RSS member and the Inter Services Intelligence (ISI) in the blast. His lawyer understandably claimed that the confession was made under “extreme pressure”.
COOPERATION
WITH PAKISTAN
Initially the Samjhauta Express bombing was considered an act of the Pakistan-based groups like the JeM and LeT. But in November 2008, the Indian officials suspected the attacks were linked to Lt. Col. Srikant Prasad Purohit, an Indian Army officer and member of the Abhinav Bharat. On January 8, 2011, Aseemanand reportedly confessed that Saffron terror outfits were behind the bombing of Samjhauta Express. His confessions – hold your breath – included that the ISI was supporting the activities logistically. On March 2011, Aseemanand retracted citing government pressure.
In the 2008 Malegaon blast case, the Police filed a charge-sheet against Purohit as the alleged main conspirator who provided explosives, and Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur as the alleged prime accused who arranged the men who planted the explosives.
The 4000-page charge-sheet, stated that Purohit joined the Abhinav Bharat in 2007 with an alleged intention to propagate a separate Hindu Rashtra with its own constitution. The accused collected huge amounts to the tune of Rs. 21 lakh for himself and Abhinav Bharat to promote his fascist ideology. The accused confessed to Police on Narco Analysis that a group of Muslim individuals was used to obtain the RDX used in the blast.
Swami Aseemanand confessed in January 2011 that he and other Hindu activists were involved in bombings at Muslim religious places including the Mecca Masjid, Hyderabad. The interesting justification for attack was because the Nizam of Hyderabad wanted to opt for Pakistan at the time of partition.
Other charges against Abhinav Bharat are equally significant. It is reported that the organisation had been involved in a plot to kill the then RSS chief Mr. Mohan Bhagwat, allegedly with the help of Pakistan’s Inter Services Intelligence. Does it not mean that these radical Hindutva nationalists can cooperate with Pakistan also to assassinate their chief ideologue?
The Headlines Today released recorded video, tested by Central Forensic Science Laboratory, which indicated the uncovering of an alleged plot to assassinate the Vice President, Mr. Hamid Ansari. The Tehelka also released audio tapes transcripts of main conspirators which indicated involvement of some military intelligence officers with the Abhinav Bharat group in January 2011 edition.
Mr. Rahul Gandhi, by the way, believes that RSS poses a bigger threat to India than the Lashkar-e-Tayyaba.
MUSLIM OBSERVATION
The Muslim leadership feels the Union Home Minister and the Police and Intelligence agencies know much more on Abhinav Bharat and other outfits of the same ilk. We recalled these incidents from the printed material found easily everywhere just to underscore the point that ignoring the Saffron outfits and overlooking the Abhinav Bharat particularly may cost plural Bharat too heavily.
Arrest the Muslim youth if you have fool-proof evidence otherwise why lengthen the shadows between the 180-million strong minority and the majority, and the minority and the government. It would serve no constructive purpose.