In history something often comes out by default and not by design. So without wasting any more 17 long years on discussing the intention of the Congress Party or even Justice Liberhan one can safely jump to the conclusion that the delay by so many years in submission of the report is going to serve a great purpose – yes may be by accident.
We all know that 17 years is more than half a generation. A child born on December 6, 1992 will be 17 now. A 17-year old teenager may now be a 34-year old married person. And a 34-year old will surely turn 51 and so on and so forth. We all know that the Congress seriously lacks courage to take any action against anyone of those named in the report. We also know that there is an in-built mechanism in the system of the country which prevents the law of the land from taking any action against anyone related to the BJP, Shiv Sena or Sangh Parivar. Drug-addict Rahul Mahajan, Babulal Katara, BJP MP caught red-handed at airport in trafficking of women to the United States and Canada and the then party president, Bangaru Laxman, caught in camera accepting money from the fictitious arms suppliers are just random examples. The Thackerays can go on abusing, beating and killing anyone under the sky – not necessarily Muslims. They can even call Chhath, the Hindu religious festival of eastern India, a drama. None of them has been punished and there is no trace of their being penalised in the near future. Nothing and absolutely nothing happens to them even if they are out of power. Even a Congressman would have got jailed if they had committed any of the above crimes.
In that way expecting something great from the Liberhan Commission report amounts to living in fool’s paradise. But what the Commission has inadvertently done is that it gave an opportunity to the coming generation to know the real fact as to what actually happened in those tumultuous months of the Indian history, which led to the killing of thousands of innocent people.
In that way the delay in the submission of report by 17 years is not a waste of so many years. It has come as a blessing in disguise as we have a very poor record of passing down the history to next generation. Not to speak of any Hindu, Sikh or Christian, ask any high school going Muslim boy or girl about December 6, 1992. It is most likely that they may end up saying something unbelievable. Last year I personally asked several Muslim teenagers as to who is responsible for the demolition of Babri Masjid, Mumbai and Bhagalpur riots and such related tragedies. There were blank faces everywhere with one or two more conscious students saying something about the BJP. But, believe it, a handful of them even went on to hold Mulayam Singh Yadav and Lalu Prasad responsible for those holocausts. This is what we have taught to our children. Whatever be their politics, today the truth is that in those horrendous days they were the two politicians of north India, who managed to instil confidence among Muslims and stood by what they said.
Liberhan has provided the Indian youths with an opportunity to learn history which nobody was teaching them. The subsequent media debate – even if it is slanted by some –is helping the youths of the country remove the cloud of confusion from those dark days. Many youths, especially Muslims, who for whatsoever reasons, started admiring Lal Krishna Advani, have come to know the real face of this man. Some of the photos which appeared in the media after 17 long years have really shocked the Indian youths as over the years they have been shown a much moderate Advani, Atal Bihari Vajpayee and Murli Manohar Joshi.
Today the same media had to show the photographs of Uma Bharati embracing Murli Manohar Joshi, Vinay Katiyar and company publicly celebrating the demolition. The shots show gleeful Advani in front of Babri Masjid being ransacked and demolished. Once again stories have appeared as to how the Hindutva zealots thrashed the mediapersons present in Ayodhya on December 6, 1992 and how woman journalists were molested the dresses torn. None of them was Muslim.
These were the facts which were till now hidden from the younger generation as the BJP goes on image build-up after coming to power with the so-called secular parties like Janata Dal (United), Trinamool Congress, National Conference, Biju Janata Dal and to some extent even Telugu Desam (from outside).
The tabling of Liberhan Commission report in Parliament on November 24 was followed by the raising of the same old slogans by the BJP members. These were the tones the Indian teenagers were not familiar with. Today they at least got an inkling of what these gentlemen and women actually did. These youngsters were of the view that only Narendra Modi is the lone rabble-rouser. Now they have realised that they all are made of the same stuff.
The Gen-Next has been thrown back into the dark days of 1989-93 – that is from the start of Bhagalpur riots in Bihar on October 24, 1989 just after Lal Krishna Advani-led Ramshila Puja to March 12, 1993 serial bomb blasts in Bombay, which was preceded by two-months long dance macabre in the commercial capital of India in the immediate post-Babri Masjid demolition days. And it is the media which were compelled by the demand of the situation to open the old wound once again.
While the younger generation of the country – Hindus, Muslims, Christians, Sikhs, Buddhists, Jains, etc. – were bombarded with so much information about the Mumbai serial blasts and other such explosions, they were hardly aware as to what actually transpired in those 40-odd months in Indian history between 1989 and 1993.
Had the Liberhan Commission submitted its report in 1993 or 1994 or at any earlier date, it would not have served the same purpose. The then Prime Minister Narasimha Rao, whose hand in the demolition has also come up now, would simply have pushed it inside the carpet. Even today it may meet the same fate, but at least the report has managed to generate some heat and in the process teach a great lesson of history to the young generation. And for others the opportunity has come as a warning that those who tend to forget history is forgotten by history.