Gujarat and Anti-Sikh Riots

The law of the land should prevail. The highest and the mightiest should respect the word and spirit of law. Otherwise the very existence of democracy in the country would be threatened. It would be a law of the jungle.

Yet, equally important is that the provisions of the Constitution that provide for equality before law for however high or law, an individual may be, irrespective of caste, creed and sex. But it is here that our democracy is deficient.

The SIT constituted by the Supreme Court to investigate some cases of Gujarat riots has summoned Gujarat Chief Minister Shri Narendra Modi. The law should take its own course. Shri Modi is expected to extend full cooperation and respect the law of the land.

But what raises eyebrows and pains the observers is the duplicity and double standards being practiced by the judiciary, the media, the intelligentsia and the so-called tribe of liberals and secularists. The Gujarat riots and the 1984 anti-Sikhs riots have many similarities and, in a sense, the latter riots were more heinous and cruel in the sense that these were directed only against Sikhs and only in the States ruled by the Congress. Shri Modi never justified the riots but the then Congress President and Prime Minister Shri Rajiv Gandhi did, saying on record having stated that "when a big tree falls, the earth below is sure to shake". Yet, Shri Gandhi has been spared for the anti-Sikh riots the epithets that are used for Shri Narinder Modi for Gujarat riots.

More people died in anti-Sikh riots than in Gujarat riots. Delhi then, and even now, for law and order is directly under the administrative control. It is here that more than 3300 Sikhs died. The total number of Sikhs having been butchered in different parts of the country is more than 4000 while it is about 2500 in Gujarat which includes Hindus too. For full three days, as per reports of successive Commissions of Inquiry, the anti-Sikh rioters ruled Delhi and no FIRs were registered. No military was summoned to quell the riots. The police remained a silent spectator. Yet, the Congress which ruled at the Centre and the States continued to remain the holy icon of piety, secularism and rule of law. Even after 25 years the anti-Sikh riots sufferers continue to suffer the agony of their loss with little hope for justice.

Last update : 15-03-2010 14:19

Keywords : Editorial, The Guilty Men of Our Democracy

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