The Hindu : Muslims worried

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Monday, Dec 16, 2002

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Other States - Gujarat

Muslims worried

By Manas Dasgupta

The scene at the Kalupur Dabgadawal area after a bout of violence when stones were pelted at BJP supporters celebrating the victory of the party's Shahpur candidate, Kaushik Patel, on Sunday. — Photo: Rajeev Bhatt

AHMEDABAD DEC. 15. As the Bharatiya Janata Party workers celebrated the party's resounding success in the Gujarat Assembly elections by bursting crackers and taking out victory processions, a sense of fear and apprehension seems to have gripped the minority community battered in the recent communal riots.

The BJP workers raised the "Jai Shri Ram" slogan, borrowed from the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, to hail the party's victory. There were also occasional shouts of "vande mataram'' and "BJP zindabad". As the processions passed through the Muslim-dominated areas, people preferred to stay indoors and watch the bursting of crackers from windows or balconies.

The minority leaders refused to comment on the BJP victory even as some Congress leaders admitted that the "fatwa" of the Muslim clergy asking their followers to vote only for the Congress did more damage to the party by polarising the Hindu votes in favour of the BJP.

The Chief Minister, Narendra Modi, who is almost certain to head the new ministry, however, reassured the people of the minority communities saying that he would not make any discrimination on communal lines.

Talking to presspersons here, Mr. Modi said it was a section of the media and the "pseudo-secularists" who had coined the term "communal card'', allegedly used by his party during the elections. The party had always sought the people's support based on the performance of the BJP Governments in the State.

He disagreed that Muslims had any reason to feel scared under the new BJP dispensation. Protection of life and property of all the citizens of the State would be the Government's responsibility and that included those belonging to the minority communities.

Describing the results as a victory for the "self-respecting people of Gujarat", the party's State unit president, Rajendrasinh Rana, said the people had shown that they could overcome any obstacle to fulfil their resolve to defeat "pseudo-secularism".

The pradesh Congress vice-president, Hasmukh Patel, said the people had apparently given priority to their "religious sentiments" over their day-to-day problems and economic bankruptcy of the State.

The party's State unit president, Shankersinh Waghela, said the bubble would burst within three months when the people who voted the BJP back to power demanded more jobs, water and power, and the Government "running on overdrafts'', would fail to fulfil the same.

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