Poster of Public Meeting on the Aftermath of Mumbai Terror Attacks

SFI Pamphlet on the Mumbai Terror Attacks dated 2nd Dec, '08

In the Aftermath of the Mumbai Terror Mayhem

Unite against Terrorism

Friends,

The dreadful terrorist attacks in Mumbai, which according to official estimates have led to the tragic death of at least 183 persons, including 22 foreign nationals, and injured hundreds of others, have shocked the nation. The completion of operations led by the NSG against the heavily armed terrorists at the Taj Palace Hotel on 29^th November marked the end of the nightmare, which Mumbai witnessed since the night of 26^th November. The terrorists had mindlessly killed innocent civilians in many places including the Chattrapati Shivaji Railway Terminal, Leopold Café, the Taj Palace and Oberoi Trident Hotels, Nariman House and two hospitals. Nine terrorists have been killed by the security forces and one has been captured and taken into custody. These terror attacks, besides killing several innocent civilians, have also led to the death of several security personnel from the Mumbai Police and the NSG. Officers like the ATS Chief Hemant Karkare, NSG Commando Major Sandeep Unnikrishnan and others, who led from the front in the anti-terror operation, sacrificed their lives in the combat. The country will remain grateful to them.

While the successful completion of the anti-terror operations in Mumbai has brought some relief, the sheer magnitude and ferocity of these attacks have created deep rooted anguish and insecurity among people across the country. This attack has come in the backdrop of a sharp rise in the number of terrorist attacks across the country over the last few months. Despite growing outrage at the increasing frequency of the terror strikes, the UPA Government has failed to take appropriate steps to effectively deal with the terrorist menace. The belated resignation of the Union Home Minister Shivraj Patil and the callous statement made by the Maharashtra Home Minister RR Patil, leading to his resignation, point towards sheer ineptness at the highest level of the Union and State Governments. The Mumbai terror attacks, while clearly bringing out the rigorous planning and training undergone by the terrorists, have also exposed the glaring gaps in India’s intelligence and security apparatus. The fact that these terrorists could use the sea route to make their entry into the city has shown the poorly protected coastline in India. The blame game between different arms of the Government on whether there were intelligence inputs forewarning the attack also show a clear lack of coordination. Questions have also been raised regarding the speed of deployment of the NSG and marine commandos. These issues have to be addressed by the Union Government on a war-footing. Further laxity on the part of the Government in revamping and modernizing the intelligence and security apparatus would be totally unacceptable.

Immediate and strong steps need to be taken against those forces which are indulging in terrorist activities in the name of religion. Initial investigations into the Mumbai terror attacks suggest the involvement of the extremist group Lashkar-e-Toiba, which is based in Pakistan. Concrete evidence of their involvement must be swiftly collected and presented before the international community and the UN Security Council, so that pressure can be built on the Government of Pakistan to decisively act against the terror groups. Pakistan is also besieged by the scourge of terrorism. The assassination of Benazir Bhutto, the explosion at the Marriott hotel in Islamabad and the Lal Masjid episode have shown that the terrorists who are acting in the name of Islam are as much the enemies of the Muslims as they are of people belonging to other religions. Several commentators from Pakistan have repeatedly pointed towards the complicity of the Pakistani military establishment and the ISI in aiding and abetting these extremist groups. Democratic opinion in India and Pakistan need to unite in marginalizing these sections which are enemies of peace and stability in South Asia. Moreover, the anti-terror operations in the sub-continent, in order to be successful, need to be delinked from the US-Israel sponsored “war on terror”. The imperialist aggressions against Afghanistan and Iraq, have caused enormous death and destruction of innocents, which far from curbing the terrorist menace create fertile grounds for its proliferation.

It is also important in the present context to ensure that those political forces in India, who seek to cynically utilize the terror attacks to polarize the people on communal lines and whip up jingoistic sentiments through war mongering against Pakistan, are not allowed to gain ground. The cheap attempts by the likes of L.K.Advani and Narendra Modi to encash the widespread anti-terror sentiment for narrow electoral ends need to be thoroughly exposed. The refusal of the widow of late Hemant Karkare to accept the Rs. 1 crore compensation announced by Narendra Modi, who along with his saffron brotherhood was busy vilifying the ATS Chief for being “anti-Hindu” till a few days back on account of the investigation and arrests in the Malegaon blasts case; has come as a tight slap in the face of such forces. The refusal of L.K.Advani and the BJP President to attend the all-Party meeting convened by the Prime Minister clearly shows that for the BJP, doing vote-bank politics on the issue of terrorism is more important than unitedly fighting terror.

SFI appeals to the student community to stand united and firm in these difficult times and defeat all attempts to terrorize or divide the people. Only a firm unity of people irrespective of religion, region, caste and creed and effective steps by the Government to counter terrorism, can defeat the nefarious designs of the extremist elements. It is such resolve that we have to muster in order to meet the challenge posed by terror.

Sd/- P.K.Anand, President, SFI-JNU. Sd/- Roshan, Secretary, SFI-JNU.

Release against Mumbai Terror Attacks of 26th Nov, '08

SFI Pamphlet dated 12th November, '08

Notice on Serial Blasts in Assam

Notice on Blast in Mehrauli

SFI Pamphlet dated 23rd Sept, '08

SFI pamphlet dated 18th September, '08

SFI Pamphlet dated 17th September

Poster of Candle Lighting and Peace March against Delhi Blasts

Release on Bomb Blasts in Delhi

Release on serial blasts in Ahmedabad and Bangalore

SFI Notice on Serial Blasts in UP dated 23rd Nov '07

On Verdict on Mumbai Blasts

Justice Must Not Be Discriminatory

01.08.07

As we go to press, three more people have been delivered the death sentence by the special TADA court hearing the 1993 Mumbai serial blast case. The total number of those sentenced so far has, thus, gone up to 91 out of the 100 convicted. Of these, eleven have been handed capital punishment while 17 others have been sentenced to life imprisonment. The Mumbai serial blasts, readers will recall, killed over 250 people and injured over 700.

While it is welcome that finally some justice is being delivered in this case of mindless killing of innocent people, it must be remembered that it has taken more than fourteen years for these sentences to be pronounced. Fourteen years is the normal period of time that constitutes life imprisonment. Even now, the convicted can appeal to the Supreme Court against these sentences. Given the track record of the system of delivery of justice in India, one need not be surprised if this process continues to drag on for a long time. Such apprehensions are substantiated by the fact that it has taken nearly two decades for known and identified culprits to be sentenced in the ghastly communal riots in Bhagalpur. The perpetrators of the Maliana (Meerut) communal massacre of 1987 have so far only been legally charge-sheeted! Again, after two decades, the Nanavati Commission had submitted a report on the post-Indira Gandhi assassination killings of Sikhs in 1984, without nailing the culpability of any. The perpetrators of the post-Godhra Gujarat genocide continue to roam free while mountains of circumstantial evidence have not led to the necessary convictions.

Then, there is this glaring case of the findings of the Justice Srikrishna Commission on the post-Babri Masjid demolition, 1992-93 communal riots in Mumbai. In fact, the 1993 blasts were widely propagated as being the response of minority terrorism to the majority terrorism unleashed in the communal riots. Far from taking any action against anybody indicted in the Srikrishna Report, the Shiv Sena-BJP government initially tried to reject this report officially when in government nine years ago. Later they settled for rejecting the report in practice. The subsequent Congress-NCP governments have also failed in ensuring delivery of justice. Yet again, the justice delivery system in our country has failed to convict and punish the perpetrators of communal violence and crimes. These are not the only instances in independent India when justice has simply failed to be delivered to the victims of communal riots. There have been at least five important judicial commissions of enquiry that have submitted their voluminous reports, and yet justice has simply been elusive. These are the Justice P Jaganmohan Reddy Commission of Inquiry into the Ahmedabad Riots of 1969; the Justice D P Madan Commission on the Bhiwandi riots of 1970; the Justice Vithayathil Commission on the Tellicherry riots of 1971; the Justice Jitendra Narain Commission on the Jamshedpur riots of 1979; and the Justice P Venugopal Commission on the Kanyakumari riots of 1982. The Kanyakumari riots were the result of a conflict between Hindus and Christians while the rest have been Hindu-Muslim riots. The RSS was indicted in all of these.

Clearly, the conflicts between different religious communities that inhabit India have all universally denied justice to the victims. For how long can the modern secular Indian republic afford to not improve its justice delivery system in such instances? The question of punishing the perpetrators of communal strife is necessary not only from the viewpoint of humanism and compassion. It is absolutely imperative that justice be delivered in order to strengthen the secular democratic foundations of the modern Indian republic.

There is a universal adage that justice delayed is justice denied. Not only must justice be delivered promptly, but it can never afford to be seen as being partial. While justice in the Mumbai blasts is, to repeat, welcome, the refusal or the reluctance to deliver justice in the various instances mentioned above, only gives the impression that the justice delivery system is not only a system of inbuilt delays but also a system with inbuilt discrimination. At the expense of repeating what we had stated in these columns two weeks ago in relation to some Indians being detained in connection with the Glasgow terrorist attacks, it needs to be underlined that terrorism cannot be associated with any one religion. Terrorism is a crime against humanity that needs to be erased. But this cannot be done by targeting any one specific community as this can only be counterproductive by creating the atmosphere that breeds terrorism’s recruits. We had also noted that even mainstream Hindi cinema (such as Fiza, meaning environment) has chronicled such instances.

In India’s case, the victims of terrorist attacks have been of such a diverse range that the terrorists cannot be straight-jacketed into any single religious group. We have experienced the agonies of attacks on Muslims, Sikhs, Christians, tribals, Hindus, lost two erstwhile prime ministers through terrorist assassinations, Mahatma Gandhi himself a victim of terrorist bullets, in the sixty years since our independence. What is required is to deal effectively with the environment that continues to breed and perpetuate terrorism as the prime minister himself recently stated. A system of delivery of justice that is seen to be discriminatory only vitiates such an environment further. While the other elements crucial to improving such an atmosphere have been detailed by us earlier and the need to be urgently addressed, this aspect of improving the system of delivery of justice needs immediate attention. In the final analysis, the strength of the Republic is measured in its capacity to treat all its citizens equally without any discrimination. The Indian Constitution promises to do so in its very preamble. The incapacity to deliver this promise can only undermine the foundations of the Republic. India cannot simply afford this. The secular democratic foundations of the Indian Republic must be strengthened by strengthening the equality of all before law.

SAY NO TO DISCRIMINATORY JUSTICE SYSTEM

ENSURE JUSTICE TO THE COMMUNAL RIOT VICTIMS

an SFI release

[People’s democracy, july 29, 2007]