R K Misra
Rolling stones may gather no moss but hurtling boulders crush cactus and carnations alike. The boulders may be communally tarred and the stones racially wrapped but the net impact is fragmentation of a fragile society.
Critically timed communal clashes, whether in Gujarat in 2002, Uttar Pradesh before the general elections 2014 and in Delhi recently forms one end of the canvass. Racist attacks on students from the North-East in Delhi, Haryana, Bangalore and Kashmiri students in Uttar Pradesh and some other parts of the country make for the other end of it.Ostensibly, the two don’t meet. Actually, it is part of the same unfolding process. And a study of Gujarat, post 2002, provides clues to this.
The politics of communal clashes or the electoral outcome it is designed to serve is not the subject of this analysis.
The forces it unleashes and it’s cascading effect are. The 2002 communal riots in Gujarat that followed the Godhra train carnage widened the communal divide and results of the Gujarat Vidhan Sabha elections that followed immediately after provided conclusive evidence of the consolidation of majority community votes.
Ironically, though, there may have been electoral consolidation of hindu voters, the fact is that in the period thereafter the caste differentiation within the wider Hindu pantheon has increased considerably in Gujarat. Over the last decade, there is a resurgence of sorts taking place with individuals now sporting, even defiantly showcasing their caste identities. Vehicles (trucks, cars, scooters and motorcycles) proudly display stickers which distinguish their caste identities like Patidar (Patels), Durbar (Rajputs), Desai (shepherds) Parushram (Brahmins). Even homes and shops sport such nomenclatures.
The caste divisions were all along sought to be played down in Sardar Patel’s Gujarat where business was the dominant flavor of life and living and all other considerations were subjugated to personal or close community gatherings. Not so any longer. And the faultlines emerging on the surface are beginning to show. It also gets reflected in a show of political muscle once in a while. A case in point is BJP politician Purshottam Solanki who belongs to the koli community. Solanki has been a controversial politician. He was indicted by the Gujarat High Court in a Rs 400 crore fisheries scam but managed to retain his place in the Narendra Modi Government in Gujarat by virtue of his caste muscle. Anandiben Patel who replaced Modi as Chief Minister, however dropped him from her cabinet. Under pressure, he was however brought back in the expansion last week as minister of state for Animal Husbandry. Riled at the comparatively low profile portfolio, within hours his brother announced a koli caste convention to voice protest at the injustice being meted out to the community.
Such community muscle flexing in politics is not uncommon. What is, however, new is that it is becoming a two-way process which is leading to increased friction in rural society and caste consolidation in urban areas. This, in turn, is leading to an increase in caste conflict. Only last week, the Gujarat High Court ordered summoning of a district police chief to explain why a FIR was not registered against a ruling party MLA who had sought to forcibly intervene to get accused persons in a caste conflict released from police custody.
While pulpit sermons of national unity abound,in actual terms,the triggered communal strife acquires a momentum of it’s own once the boulder starts rolling.The process is no longer limited to communal sphere but acquires ethnic ,racist and caste connotations.The growing caste conflict in Gujarat and the racist attacks in other parts of the country are part of this unfolding process.
Recently P.D. Rai, secretary general of the North-East MPs Forum has in an emotional appeal sought the intervention of Prime Minister Narendra Modi to halt the attacks on the people hailing from the North-East.’
Are North-Eastern people not Indians??’, he has asked, seeking his intervention nearer home even as he reaches out to ethnic Indians in faraway countries.
Even in Gujarat, Chief Minister Anandiben Patel convened a high- level meeting to address the issues of increased communal and casteist strife in the state which is causing social unrest. She gave a dressing down to the police top brass and in an unprecedented move directed the state chief secretary to go to state police headquarters to convene a meeting of the top cops.
According to a distinguished social scientist, India may be an ancient civilization but it was a gaggle of principalities and small kingdoms which were painstakingly sewn together by Sardar Patel.This country comprising a plethora of castes and communities is a fragile entity which is still having it’s baby steps in co-existence.Politicians playing Communal hockey or racist football may end up fraying the fabric causing incalculable damage.
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