UPSC: LYNCHING, MOB VIOENCE & MURDER OF RULE OF LAW IN INDIA

Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=joK_QdNKLpI&feature=youtu.be

1.Wave of lynchings

23.06.18 TH

BRUTAL ASSAULT IN U.P.: The events that led up to the brutal assault on Monday of two men in Uttar Pradesh’s Hapur district on the outskirts of New Delhi are unclear — but one of them died and the other sustained injuries.

FAMILY CLAIM CONSPIRACY; ADMINISTRATION CLAIMS ROAD RAGE: The family of the dead man, Qasim, a 45-year-old cattle trader, says that he had set out when he heard about the possibility of cattle being on sale, and the next thing they heard was that a mob had set itself upon him, killing him. Sameyddin’s relatives say he had been out getting grass for his cattle when he spied the mob attack on Qasim — he tried to run to safety, but was beaten up nonetheless. Qasim’s son says his father’s death was the outcome of a conspiracy. Others in the village say locals were on edge following rumours that cow smuggling was afoot. And administration officials say it may all have been a case of road rage.

Investigations are on, so what actually transpired is not definitively known yet.

INSTANCES OF RECENT LYNCHINGS: But given lynchings across north India by ‘cow protection’ vigilantes, it is not difficult to miss the communal dangers here. Elsewhere, from Tamil Nadu in the south to Assam in the Northeast, men and women have been lynched on suspicion that they were out to kidnap children. To give just a few examples, in May, a homeless man in Pulicat, north of Chennai, was battered to death on such suspicion, as was a car-borne woman pilgrim in Tiruvannamalai district, who offered some sweets to children while seeking directions. This month, in Assam’s Karbi Anglong district, two men from Guwahati were killed by a mob on the same anxiety that they were looking to kidnap children. In many cases — including in Tamil Nadu and Assam — such public concern was created or heightened by warnings that were circulated on social media.

Yet, irrespective of whether the lynchings are due to fear of kidnappings or are deliberate acts by cow protection vigilantes, the authorities should not treat the crime of murder and the allegations that enrage a mob with the same equivalence. Murder is murder, but the killing of another human being by a murderous crowd out to enforce mob justice or avert an imagined crime takes an extraordinary toll of the civilities of wider society. The police must make it clear, by word and action, that murder and mob violence will be strictly dealt with.

Yet, the administration must also reckon with a new challenge: the use of social media, especially WhatsApp groups and forwards, to spread fear and panic.

Responses such as surveillance and Internet shutdowns are not just impossible — in a free society, they are inadvisable.

What is needed is an administration that reaches out to local communities to keep them in the loop in order to check trouble-makers — and that conveys sufficient good faith so individuals will trust it to keep the peace and sift real threats from mischievous rumours.

Xxx

2.Wages of vigilantism

23.06.18 TH

LYNCHINGS THREATEN RULE OF LAW: The recurring incidents of lynching and targeted mob violence against vulnerable groups reported from various parts of the country are a direct challenge thrown by right-wing groups to political processes, especially electoral processes and the rule of law.

According to India Spend, a data-journalism website, 86% of those killed in lynching incidents in 2017 were Muslims.

SUPEREME COURT DIRECTIVE AGAINST VIGILANTISM: In September 2017 the Supreme Court, responding to a Public Interest Litigation, directed all State governments to take measures to prevent vigilantism in the name of cow protection.

However, public lynching or vigilante violence hasn’t subsided; in fact, it has spread from Uttar Pradesh, Jharkhand and Haryana to Gujarat, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and West Bengal. An overwhelming majority of these attacks are bovine related, although there are other reasons for anti-minority attacks, too. Hate violence has also happened around festivals such as Ram Navami (Bihar and West Bengal), provocations over azaan and namaz (Gurugram in Haryana) and violence against those looking overtly Muslim (U.P. and Haryana trains). The victims in cases of lynching are almost entirely from poor families.

Minorities under siege

MASS VIOLENCE HAVE BEEN REPLACED BY SMALLER SCALE CONFLICTS ACCOMPANIED BY STATE INACTION: South Asia has a long history of communal violence, but these were primarily big episodes of mass violence. This has now given way to a smaller-scale of conflict and vigilante violence against individuals endorsed by state inaction. One possible reason for this shift could be an attempt to avoid public scrutiny that accompanies mass violence, whilst at the same time ensuring that minorities are continually kept under siege through targeted attacks. India has a poor record when it comes to prevention and punishment of the perpetrators of mass violence and/or lynchings. Each event of violence has hardened community boundaries and widened the divide between Hindus and Muslims.

Citizens Against Hate (CAH), a civil society group investigating and seeking to provide legal help to victims of hate crimes, has documented 50 lynching deaths (Muslims), including three lynched in the last one week — two in Godda, Jharkhand (June 14) and one in Hapur, U.P. (June 18) over rumours of cow slaughter/smuggling. According to the CAH report, ‘Lynching Without End’, published in September 2017, 97% of cow-related lynchings had occurred since the Bharatiya Janata Party’s (BJP) rise to political dominance in 2014.

RUMOURS OF SLAUGHTERING AND SMUGGLING -> SOCIAL MEDIA -> STEREOTYPING -> VIOLENCE: Most of these attacks were based on rumours sparked by accusations that the victims, almost always Muslims, slaughtered or smuggled cows. The content of these rumours and fears often circulating on social media take the shape of communal stereotypes of victims either eating beef or intending to do so, or showing any form of perceived disrespect for cows, which is broadly claimed as a motivation for lynching. Most actors leading the charge are suspected to belong to, or have connections with, groups such as the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), Bajrang Dal, Gau Raksha Dal and Hindu Yuva Vahini. Professing allegiance to Hindu right-wing parties, they feel emboldened by a political regime that has prioritised a crackdown on cow slaughter. The back-end support comes from BJP MPs providing political protection to these organisations and their activities.

What explains the phenomenon and spread of lynchings across several States? Apart from the political reasons alluded to above, the rising trend is directly related to the intensification of communal polarisation and instrumentalisation of prejudice for political ends apparent in various government attempts to infuse religion into politics and education. In the event, these acts seem to have acquired a certain degree of legitimacy in the public mind. Also, it’s important to acknowledge the widespread role of violence in Indian politics which is not considered an illegitimate form of politics. Popular anger, outrage and violence are integral features of everyday politics in contemporary India. The feeling that mobs are exacting Bollywood style justice beyond the procedures of law, with crowds of locals triumphantly watching the gruesome spectacle captured by videos that subsequently go viral, has its own vicarious fascination.

Hate crimes

As hate crimes grow, so does the sense of impunity enjoyed by the actual perpetrators of the crime and those who prompt it. Lack of justice for victims further reinforces the vicious cycle of impunity. There is also little condemnation of lynchings by those in positions of authority except in very generalised terms. The strategic silence of the BJP-Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) leadership works like unspoken approval to carry out the attacks. The tacit endorsement of mob violence may be the most disturbing effect of decades of communal politics in India. The lack of public reaction to recent incidents implies a degree of acceptability of violence as an expression of vengeance against ‘injustices’ suffered by Hindus in the past. The theory of ‘Hindu insecurity’ and ‘Hindu persecution’ comes at a time when political representation of Muslims in legislatures and administration and their presence in the public sphere is at its lowest since Independence.

The police often stand by, careful not to interfere with the actions of the majority community. Both mobs and police have regularly treated victims of cow vigilantism, rather than those indulging in violence, as suspects in ways that de-victimise these individuals. Rather than taking swift action against perpetrators, law enforcement agencies act mostly against the victims themselves, booking them for violating cow protection laws which act as a legitimate cover for taking action against people they suspect of trafficking in cattle intended for slaughter. In these attacks, whether the victim actually possessed beef, or whether cows were actually being transported for slaughter, or even that cows were not involved, is not relevant.

Most of these are not spontaneous acts of violence; there is usually systematic planning behind them. Common to all the episodes of violence is coordination across groups and States and districts, and no other political force masters this better than the Sangh Parivar with its numerous affiliates. Active support of powerful political figures in the current establishment at the Centre and in the States has helped to build networks, gain new recruits, resources and legitimacy that Hindu right-wing groups did not have in the past. The newly acquired organisational capacity, including manpower, money and feet on the ground, has proved crucial for translating dark ideas into concrete action across districts and converting rumour and prejudice into attacks across State borders. Apart from providing employment opportunities to youth belonging to right-wing groups, another big incentive is participation in electoral politics as these foot soldiers double up as campaigners and booth committee members of the BJP during elections.

Sustained propaganda

Lynchings are encouraged by the atmosphere of hate and suspicion created through sustained propaganda. Always ready to refurbish the deep historical archive of anti-Muslim prejudice by focusing on the past to demonise all Muslims, the BJP has weaponised Hindu anger and paranoia into a legitimate expression of a majoritarian nation. Localised violence happening with regularity also serves a political purpose. By allowing lynchings to continue unchecked, the Hindu right boosts its image as the lone protector of Hindu religion and culture in India and this can help expand its social base. Cow vigilantism, which is a pretext to exacerbate social conflicts between religious communities, serves the political purposes of ideologies and political formations that thrive on hate and polarisation. Preventing further atrocities requires respect for the rule of law and legal institutions and strong prosecutions and expeditious punishments. Unless checked, it can cause irreversible harm to the social fabric of our society and to the tenets of democracy that have shaped and sustained the idea of India.

xxx

3.A new vulnerability

25.06.18 TH OPINION

Post-2014, cow vigilante groups have emerged as the most prominent non-state actors in India in terms of their capacity to unleash violence. They strike at will even in regions not governed by the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). Given the shoddy nature of the allegations levelled by these groups, the objective seems more to target Muslim traders and citizens than rescuing cows. The brutal attack on two Muslims last week in Hapur, Uttar Pradesh is the latest instance of this pernicious trend. Hence, it would be more appropriate to call these groups as Muslim vigilante groups.

GANDHIJI WAS IN FAVOUR OF ADOPTING A PERSUASIVE APPROACH TO PROMOTE THE IDEA OF STOPPING COW SLAUGHTER: The cow protection movement has a long history that goes back to the colonial days. Gandhiji wrote: “But, just as I respect the cow, so do I respect my fellow-men. A man is just as useful as a cow no matter whether he be a Mahomedan or a Hindu. Am I, then, to fight with or kill a Mahomedan in order to save a cow? In doing so, I would become an enemy of the Mahomedan as well as of the cow. Therefore, the only method I know of protecting the cow is that I should approach my Mahomedan brother and urge him for the sake of the country to join me in protecting her.” (Hind Swaraj, chapter 10). Had Gandhi been alive today, he would have protested the Dadri lynching with a fast unto death. Like Nayantara Sahgal, Gandhi would have wanted a ban on man slaughter. But Gandhians like Anna Hazare are silent. While Gandhiji urged for persuasive approach, the Hindu right believes in creating a climate of fear and intimidation.

BEEF IS A DIETARY HABBIT AMONG MUSLIMS AND DALITS AND IT IS NOT DONE DELIBERATELY TO HUMILIATE HINDUS: For decades the Hindu right has campaigned for cow protection as a Hindu-Muslim issue, as if Muslims took to beef eating only to humiliate Hindus. No definitive theory exists of how Muslims took to beef eating; but none approves the humiliation of Hindus as the reason for Muslims to resorting to beef eating. As Dalits too eat beef, this is a Dalit issue as well. As a cause, cow slaughter is limited to the upper castes.

A churning

A comparison of the protests triggered by the Dadri lynching in 2015 and the Una flogging in 2016 sheds crucial insights into the political churning taking place in both communities. In the first instance, artists and intellectuals, and not Muslim organisations, led the protests. Despite vigilante violence, Muslims have conducted themselves with remarkable dignity, showing their unwavering trust in India’s constitutional polity.

HINDU CONSERVATIVES HAVE PROMULGATED LAWS AGAINST COW SLAUGHTER; BUT VIGILANTES HAVE TAKEN MATTERS INTO THEIR OWN HANDS: No doubt the cow protection movement has struck a chord with many Hindu conservatives, most of whom constituted various levels of leadership of the Congress and non-Congress parties under whose patronage anti-cow slaughter laws were passed in various States long before the BJP came into existence. The difference between the Hindu right and Hindu conservatives is their position on vigilante violence, which a majority of Hindu conservatives do not approve of. What political colour their silence takes in the future will determine the future of Hindu-Muslim relations.

Dalits, on the other hand, came together in massive protest after the Una flogging, forcing the Prime Minister to make a statement on August 6, 2016. Their protest is said to have been a major reason why Anandiben Patel resigned as Chief Minister of Gujarat a few days before this. Interestingly, the name of Dadri victim, Mohammad Akhlaq, that parliamentarian Sugato Bose described as “a beautiful name” in a parliamentary debate in 2015, has yet to be acknowledged by the Prime Minister.

Differences and the state

When Mohammad Ali Jinnah campaigned for Pakistan, Muslim settlement in “geographically contiguous areas” was a favourable factor for Muslim separatists to argue for their cause. But B.R. Ambedkar could not make a similar case for a Dalit homeland because he did not have the argument of “geographically contiguous areas”. Hence, he upheld the message, “educate, organise and agitate”. The Dalit uprising post-Una is a glorious tribute to that message of Ambedkar.

BY VIOLENTLY TARGETTING INDIVIDUAL INNOCENT MUSLIMS AND VIOLATING RULE OF LAW, WE WILL BE PLAYING INTO THE HANDS OF SECESSIONISTS: That Muslim food habits, particularly beef eating, could be a major impediment to harmonious life in a free India was foreseen by Muslim separatists. Jinnah made a categorical argument that a separate homeland was necessary on account of Muslim food habits, among others. Unconvinced by the claim that Indian Muslims as a religious minority would be granted all the freedom that they could possibly enjoy in future Pakistan, he gave a new twist to his campaign at Lahore in 1940. He argued by saying, “Mussalmans are a nation according to any definition of a nation, and they must have their homelands, their territory, and their state”, and opposed the tag of Muslims as religious minorities. It would undermine Indian democracy if the vigilante violence against Muslims serves to project those fears of Jinnah and other Muslim separatists as legitimate.

STRICT ACTION MUST BE TAKEN AGAINST MURDERERS: In its fight against radical Islam, the Indian state has launched preventive arrests; often, innocent Muslim youths become its tragic victims. No such effort is seen with regard to the vigilante groups, though the Prime Minister has declared that most gau rakshaks have a criminal background. Gandhiji understood that India has enormous potential for violence, which is why he chose the path of non-violence, according to Paul Brass. The continuation of vigilante violence would only make India even more vulnerable to violence.

XXX

It’s time to enact an anti-lynching law

In a civilised society, even one lynching is too many. But India has seen a spate of them of late. The data website IndiaSpend has compiled instances of cow-linked violence from 2010 to 2017. It found that during this period, 28 people were killed in 63 such incidents.

An overwhelming 97% of these attacks took place after Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government came to power in May 2014. About 86% of those killed were Muslims. In 21% of the cases, the police filed cases against the victims/survivors. Cow-related lynchings rose sharply in 2017, with 20 attacks in the first six months. This marks a 75% increase over 2016, which had been the worst year for mob lynchings since 2010.

The groundswell of public disgust at the lynchings crystallised under the banner of the National Campaign Against Mob Lynching (NCAML), which has initiated a campaign for a law against mob lynching. Also known as ‘Masuka’, short for Manav Suraksha Kanoon (law to protect humans), a draft of the proposed legislation is currently up on the Internet, awaiting suggestions from the public.

The primary argument of the activists and lawyers advocating an anti-lynching law is that it fills a void in our criminal jurisprudence. It is true that at present there is no law that criminalises mob killings. The Indian Penal Code has provisions for unlawful assembly, rioting, and murder but nothing that takes cognisance of a group of people coming together to kill (a lynch mob).

It is possible, under Section 223 (a) of the Criminal Procedure Code (CrPC), to prosecute together two or more people accused of the same offence committed in the course of the “same transaction”. But the provision falls far short of an adequate legal framework for prosecuting lynch mobs.

The NCAML’s draft Protection from Lynching Act, 2017 defines, for the first time in Indian legal history, the terms ‘lynching’, ‘mob’ and ‘victim’ of mob lynching. It makes lynching a non-bailable offence, criminalises dereliction of duty by a policeman, criminalises incitement on social media, and stipulates that adequate compensation be paid, within a definite time frame, to victims and survivors. It also guarantees a speedy trial and witness protection.

The apprehensions

On the face of it, it is difficult to fault the intent or the provisions of the draft legislation. Nonetheless, two aspects merit close scrutiny: the potential for abuse, and the underlying premise that a generic anti-lynching law could address India’s lynching problem.

On the question of misuse, the provisions empowering local law enforcement officials to take pre-emptive action could easily be invoked to criminalise peaceful public assembly, especially if the gathering is of workers or members of marginalised communities agitating for their rights. For instance, the police could use this law to detain a group of labourers planning a dharna, on the grounds that they constitute a mob that poses a threat to company officials.

To take another example, the ‘Review Committee’ that would monitor the prosecution of cases under this law is supposed to be headed by a senior police officer. Its findings would be submitted to a senior police officer. In a scenario where the police often serve as the handmaiden of the ruling dispensation, could we realistically expect one member of the police force to hold another accountable? Would it not have been prudent to mandate that the Review Committee make its report public or have members from civil society?

A category error

No one can dispute that a major reason for the recent rise in lynchings is impunity. It can be reasonably assumed that the lynch mobs that murdered Mohammad Akhlaq in Dadri, Pehlu Khan in Alwar, and Hafiz Junaid in Haryana were confident of getting away with it. So far, the state has done little to shake that confidence.

The NCAML activists must know that this confidence has little to do with legislative lacuna. Rather, it has everything to do with the law enforcement machinery taking the side of the lynch mob. This phenomenon has been observed time and again in cases of targeted violence against minorities — which is precisely what cow-related lynchings are.

Put simply, the problem is not mob lynching per se but the mob lynching of minorities, for that is where impunity kicks in. We can be certain that if a mob of factory workers were to lynch someone from the management, retribution would be swift. The historical proof of this argument, if one were needed, was supplied by the lynching of Maruti Suzuki’s HR manager in July 2012. The police arrested 148 workers and charged all them with murder.

Evidently, the state can act, if it wishes to, using the existing provisions of the law. It is a matter of whether it is in its interests to do so. In the case of cow-linked lynchings, a lot depends on whether the incumbent in power considers it compatible with its political interests to crack down on such attacks.

It’s about communalism

It is therefore mystifying why the advocates of Masuka appear reluctant to name the problem for what it is: targeted communal lynchings. Perhaps they feel that doing so carries the risk of their campaign being dismissed as a ‘minority issue’. But it actually is a minority issue, and that is why the majority needs to take it up.

It is understandable that in a climate of majoritarianism, any political mobilisation for the protection of minorities would be anxious about the bogey of minority appeasement. It could even mean that an anti-lynching Bill stands less chance of making it through Parliament. But then, a truly ‘civil’ society should feel no hesitation in demanding that the state protect its minorities because protection of minorities is one of the biggest responsibilities of any democracy. The UN has a Special Rapporteur for minority issues precisely because it recognises that “minorities in all regions of the world continue to face serious threats”.

India already has an antidote – two, in fact – to combat the impunity enjoyed by anti-minority lynch mobs. The first is the Prevention of Communal and Targeted Violence (Access to Justice and Reparations) Bill, 2011, or the Anti-Communal Violence Bill. The other is police reforms, which are pending despite the Supreme Court ordering their implementation.

The Anti-Communal Violence Bill was buried because it was felt that it threatened the autonomy of States by mooting a parallel structure that undermined federalism. This is a misrepresentation, and the Bill needs to be revived for three reasons: it fixes command responsibility for communal incidents; it recognises that targeted communal violence disproportionately victimises minorities; and it creates a mechanism to insulate investigations of communal violence from political interference. The last reason is also why police reforms are vital, and a purely legislative approach to tackling anti-minority violence could prove ineffective.

The draft anti-lynching law needs to be revised to incorporate these key elements of the Anti-Communal Violence Bill. Second, the demand for an anti-lynching law needs to be buttressed by a parallel campaign for police reforms. All said and done, even the best of laws can achieve little in the face of a law enforcement machinery primed to do the bidding of its political masters.