Other States - Gujarat

Fernandes mission a failure?

By Manas Dasgupta

AHMEDABAD APRIL 20. If the total sense of no-confidence expressed by the minority leaders is any indication, the current trip of the Defence Minister, George Fernandes, for evolving ``confidence-building'' measures has failed.

``What do we expect from Mr. Fernandes? He came here as an agent of the Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee,'' said Inamul Iraki, who till the Godhra carnage was an active member of the ruling BJP. He is one of the organisers of the Dariakhan Ghummat relief camp which was visited by Mr Fernandes yesterday. It is the second largest camp of the minorities after Shah Alam Roza and it provides shelter to over 4,500 persons.

``I will bring about an understanding between the two communities,'' Mr Fernandes told Mr. Iraki when he held a meeting. ``What understanding,'' pat came the reply from Mr. Iraki. An understanding is possible between two quarrelling groups, but in this case it is a one-sided affair. Muslims were beaten up and they never retaliated, he told Mr. Fernandes.

Mr. Fernandes was told by the camp organisers that not even one of the 114 Class 10 and 12 students in the camp and another about 200 students in the vicinity were appearing for the on-going secondary and higher secondary examinations, but he told a meeting of the Gujarat Chamber of Commerce and Industry in the evening that the attendance by the minority students in the examinations was ``almost cent per cent.''

``How Mr. Fernandes came to such a conclusion is a mystery to all of us,'' said Ataullah Khan, another organiser of the camp. He claimed Mr. Fernandes of having remarked that he was aware that the communal carnage was the Narendra Modi Government's ``politics of vote bank.''

Mr. Fernandes' brief address to the camp inmates also failed to inspire any confidence among them. ``So many leaders and officers have visited the camp, gave umpteen number of promises but nothing has happened so far. We are there where we were on February 28 and except for some improvement in the supply of foodgrains to the relief camps, nothing tangible has been achieved,'' said some of the inmates.

``This Government did not even bother to honour the promises given by the Prime Minister. What can we expect from Mr.Fernandes,' Mr. Iraki said. Mr. Khan, however, is hopeful that at least on the issue of providing land for the riot-victims, Mr. Fernandes seemed serious. ``It is our main demand, give the Muslims land in one cluster so that they can live together to instil a sense of confidence among them,'' Mr. Khan said. Mr. Fernandes told the organisers that it should not be difficult if land was available and he would try to convince the State Government about it.

Whether he would be successful, Mr. Khan was not certain.

The promise has an inherent contradiction to what the prime minister during his visit earlier this month said he would not like to encourage. Mr Vajpayee was opposed to creation of ''community-based ghettos'' in the aftermath of the riots, but allocation of lands in one cluster, if accepted by the state government, would inevitably lead to ghettoisation.

Mr. Iraki claimed that most of those inmates who had flocked the camp only out of fear from the nearby areas had returned to their houses.

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Other States

News: Front Page | National | Southern States | Other States | International | Opinion | Business | Sport | Miscellaneous |
Advts: Classifieds | Employment | Obituary |

Stories in this Section

• Fernandes mission a failure?
• `Gujarat Govt. callous towards students'

Copyright © 2002, The Hindu. Republication or redissemination of the contents of this screen are expressly prohibited without the written consent of The Hindu