Dangerous hate crimes

THE BRUTAL MURDER of a Catholic missionary near Mathura last Tuesday and the bomb attacks on Christian places of worship in Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka and Goa on Thursday reinforce the disturbing pattern of physical assaults on the minority community, its missionaries and the educational institutions run by it. Less than two months ago, Uttar Pradesh was witness to such incidents in places such as Mathura, not to mention the earlier outrageous episodes in the Dangs region in Gujarat and Manoharpur in Orissa. Two factors are striking about the latest attacks. First, they have occurred on the same day and around the same time in three different States and this certainly cannot be dismissed as a mere coincidence. The second and more worrying feature is the use of explosives. In Andhra Pradesh - the State where Thursday's Ongole blast was the sixth such occurrence in recent weeks - a `time' device is reported to have been employed at least in one instance. It is perhaps fortuitous that the blasts did not result in any loss of human life. But the message sought to be conveyed by the perpetrators of the crime is unmistakable: to instil a sense of insecurity in the minority community.

In the immediate context, the priority of the State Governments concerned should of course be bringing the culprits to justice swiftly and initiating measures to ensure that such attacks do not recur. The Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister, Mr. N. Chandrababu Naidu, may be right in suspecting the hand of a ``single criminal gang'' behind the series of bomb blasts targeting churches in his State. In any event, no effort should be spared in tracking down the criminal elements and in unravelling their gameplan in all its insidious ramifications. For instance, one wonders whether there could be an organic or motivational link between the Andhra Pradesh blasts and the Agra episode wherein a Christian group from that State was attacked and some scriptural material was set on fire last April, with the suspect Bajrang Dal coming up with a counter charge of `induced' conversion against the victim, a Hyderabad-based contingent.

But the point is that the Governments have almost invariably tended to see, for their own reasons, the various assaults on the minority community from the narrow viewpoint of law and order and have been overly anxious to discount the `communal' angle. Even where the ostensible motive happens to be robbery or personal grievance (either with the individual or the institution targeted) or enmity, it would be unwise to write out the communal factor and refuse to see such seemingly `isolated' and `purely criminal' acts in the wider perspective of the anti-minority milieu that the hindutva forces have engendered by their hate campaign. In fact, even the National Commission for Minorities, a statutory body mandated to ensure that the minority communities really enjoyed the rights guaranteed under the Constitution, would seem to have acquired the official establishment's blinkered vision. Witness the NCM's report on the Uttar Pradesh incidents, ruling out the communal motive; its finding on the basis of a flawed and cursory exercise flew in the face of facts thrown up by quite a few objective enquiries. Nothing could be more tragic and ironic than the fact that the credibility of the Commission as a protector of the minorities' rights should stand severely eroded just at the time when these communities feel increasingly threatened as a result of the vicious campaign by the majoritarian fundamentalist forces who have apparently become emboldened under the benign gaze of the BJP-led coalition regime at the Centre. In sum, it is not enough that the Governments remove the proximate and superficial causes for the recurrent attacks on the Christian minority; the political establishments need to take credible initiatives towards arresting the sangh parivar's hate campaign. Unless this comes about, whatever assurances that the Prime Minister or Chief Ministers may choose to give the minorities on protecting their rights will carry little conviction.

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Section  : Opinion
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