Other States - Gujarat

`Modi Govt. must be dismissed'

Prominent personalities from various fields have expressed serious concern at the situation in Gujarat and called upon all Indians to put pressure on the Prime Minister to dismiss the Narendra Modi Government in the State.

Participants at the `Siting Secularism Conference', held at the Oberlin College,

Ohio, U.S., recently, said in a statement:

We the participants of the Siting Secularism Conference express our serious concern at the state-sponsored pogrom launched against Muslims of Gujarat for over 45 days now.

The incident at Godhra shocked us all and was immediately condemned by various religious and human rights organisations.

However, we unequivocally condemn the cynical use of that incident by the RSS, BJP, VHP and Bajrang Dal and the Gujarat State machinery to justify the massacre that followed.

Several fact-finding reports have revealed the pre-meditated nature of the violence and the planned targeting of Muslim lives and businesses with the full backing and connivance of the police and State administration.

Every government official who took a principled position has been targeted, harassed and transferred.

There is also no doubt that the VHP and the RSS have been the primary organisers of the carnage in Gujarat.

We are deeply alarmed by the continued refusal of the Indian Government to take action against the Government of Gujarat headed by Narendra Modi and by the recent public pronouncements of India's Prime Minister, Atal Behari Vajpayee, describing the Muslim communities of India and elsewhere as trouble-makers.

We are equally concerned at the prospect of elections being held in the State of Gujarat under the present conditions where the Muslim community is in a state of siege.

We call upon all Indians to:

— Put pressure on the Prime Minister of India to dismiss the Government of Narendra Modi and commence criminal proceedings against the Gujarat Government and Sangh Parivar organisations.

— Expose the use to which donations to the VHP are being put, especially from abroad.

— Build sub continental solidarities with others involved in contesting and fighting religious intolerance and the politics of religious hatred in South Asia

The 53 signatories include: Gauri Viswanathan (Professor of English and Comparative Literature,

Columbia University, New York, U.S.), Partha Chatterjee (Professor of Political Science and Director, CSSSC, Calcutta), Shyam Benegal (Film maker, Bombay), Nira Benegal (Bombay), Mushirul Hasan (Director, Academy of Third World Studies , Jamia Milia Islamia, New Delhi), Kum Kum Sangari (Nehru Memorial Library, New Delhi), Ravi S. Vasudevan (Fellow,Centre for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi), Nivedita Menon (Delhi University), Ravina Agarwal (Assoc. Professor of Anthropology, Smith College, U.S.), Rachel Sturman (Asst. Professor of South Asian History; Fellow, Society of Fellows, University of Michigan, U.S.), Upendra Baxi (Professor of Law, University of Warwick, U.K.)

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