Fascism

Why BJP is Fascist Despite Contesting Elections.?

Published

2 years ago

December 9, 2022

This article is a detailed analysis of why India’s ruling party BJP is a fascist party. It analyses BJP using the literature on fascism.

Bhartiya Janata Party (BJP) is a political party but it traces its roots in a social and cultural movement called Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS). RSS was founded in Nagpur in 1925 by K.B. Hedgewar. Hedgewar was inspired by Savarkar who had written Essentials of Hindutva (1921-22)in which he had given a framework on how Hindus can be united based on kinship. While Savarkar vouched for electoral politics but RSS, against his wishes began as a social and cultural organization that was against participation in electoral politics.

After the killing of M.K. Gandhi, RSS was banned from February 1948 till July 1949. The ban was a setback to RSS and it was accompanied by two other shocks- the death of all the two Hindu nationalists’ voices in the parliament. Syama Prasad Mookerjee who had earlier been associated with Savarkar’s Hindu Mahasabha resigned from the cabinet as the Industry Minister in April 1950. Just after eight months, the then Deputy Prime Minister and Home Minister of India, Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel died. The ban on RSS after the death of Gandhi had got RSS thinking that they would need their own supporters in the parliament and the government. Now that their two sole voices in parliament were lost, they needed a new political insurance policy.

Syama Prasad Mookerjee approached RSS for support in establishing a new political party and on 21 October 1951, the Bharatiya Jana Sangh was formed. RSS deployed its important members to the party and most of the powerful positions inside the party were held by RSS men. The first major impression that Jana Sangh would make as a political party at a national level was after the Emergency of 1975. There were protests against the government in 1975 and Jana Sangh along with RSS and other anti-Congress groups formed an amalgam called Janta Front to take on Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. In June, Indira Gandhi declared an emergency, and RSS was banned again. After the end Emergency in 1977, Janta Front was converted into Janta Party and they fought elections, winning a majority- 298 seats out of 542 all over India. Despite all the concessions given by the majority partner Jana Sangh, there was an internal rift in Janata Party and in July 1979, some of the parties left Janata Party, which was followed by new elections in which Congress won a clear majority.

One of the reasons given for the fall of the Janta Party government was that Jana Sangh members were holding dual membership- RSS and Jana Sangh- to which some people in Janta Party had objected but Jana Sangh rejected the demands to give up the RSS membership. Thus, Jana Sangh formed a new party named Bhartiya Janata Party in April 1980. Like Jana Sangh, most of the leaders in the BJP come from RSS.

In the 1996 general elections, BJP won 161 seats and the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) led by BJP came into power for the first time. Atal Bihari Vajpayee, a member of RSS was chosen as Prime Minister but the government only lasted for 13 days. Vajpayee became prime minister again in 1998 and then from 1999 until 2004. After emerging victorious in the 2014 and 2019 elections, BJP chose Narendra Modi, again an RSS member as the prime minister.

Therefore, all the prime ministers of BJP governments till now have been RSS members. It is thus for these reasons that the ideology of RSS and BJP are the same. Any analysis of the ideology of the BJP as a political party will inevitably lead to the analysis of the ideology of the RSS.

This article is based on the premise that “fascist ideology is actually only a pastiche of motifs, it is a pastiche of different ideological currents” and that “it has very little coherence on its own”. Therefore, the article without going into the definition of fascism analyses BJP and RSS on the basis of their ideology and argues that despite contesting elections, BJP is a fascist party.

It goes into the question of why the RSS chose to get into politics after the initial anti-politics philosophy and uses Jairus Banaji’s concept of “electoral fascism”. Further, it takes up the recent general elections of 2014 and 2019 where the BJP sought votes in Modi’s name and argues how it is for the first time that BJP for the first time built a Führer cult similar to that of Hitler.

Also Read: What is wrong with BJP’s Appropriation of Sardar Patel?

RSS Ideology and Fascism

It would be important to first go into the ideology of RSS. The ideology followed by RSS is not entirely its own since the Hindu Mahasabha’s Savarkar played an equally seminal role in forging its main elements.

The ideology is that of extreme nationalism “that was embodied in different ways in Savarkar and Golwalkar (who as the head of RSS was involved in formation of Jana Sangh) and encapsulated India’s version of a fascist utopia ethnically cleansed or purged of its ‘alien’ elements”.

Further, “everyone knows that both propagandists were deeply influenced by the Nazi extermination of the Jews and took that as their model for the way Muslims would have to be dealt with, in principle anyway”. Savarkar’s main argument in his book is to justify that Hindus and Muslims are a separate nation. In his exclusionary definition of a Hindu, Savarkar writes that a Hindu is “he who looks upon the land that extends from Sindu to Sindu – from the Indus to the Seas,-as the land of his forefathers —his Fatherland (Pitribhu)” shares a “common classical language Sanskrit and represented by a common history, a common literature, art and architecture, law and jurisprudence, rites and rituals, ceremonies and sacraments, fairs and festivals; and who above all, addresses this land, this Sindhusthan as his Holyland (Punyabhu)”. This definition asserts that besides being bound by geography, culture, and language, Hindus are also bound by a common history.

At another point in the book, Savarkar writes that a Hindu is one who “has inherited and claims as his own the Hindu Sanskriti, the Hindu civilization, as represented in a common history, common heroes”. He clearly mentions that though these things might not be common to all Hindus, a Hindu “has more of it common with his Hindu brothers than with, say, an Arab or an Englishman”. Savarkar also contends that all those Hindus who have converted to Islam, their “heroes and their hero-worship, their fairs and their festivals, their ideals and their outlook on life, have now ceased to be common with ours”. He dismisses the common culture among Muslims and Hindus as trivial and of no importance to the concept of a nation.

He writes about Muslims of Kashmir and Christians in South India who “observe our (Hindu) caste rules to such an extent as to marry generally within the pale of their castes alone” but dismisses them from being considered a part of the Hindu nation because “they cannot be called Hindus in the sense in which that term is actually understood, because, we Hindus are bound together not only by the tie of the love we bear to a common fatherland but also by the tie of the common homage we pay to our great civilization—our Hindu culture” and the “history of our race”. He further states that Hindus “are one because we are a nation a race and own a common Sanskriti (civilization)”.

This example of Muslims following a Hindu tradition but still not considered Hindus dismisses all these common traditions as trivial with no considerable contribution towards the formation of a nation. Hence, it can be said that RSS ideology is similar to that of Nazism. For Nazis, they purged Germany of Jews while RSS aims at purging the holy land of India of its Muslim ‘alien’ elements. RSS model for the creation of a homogenous Hindu nation essentially matches that of Nazi Germany.

Also Read: India Bans Islamist Organization PFI

Counterargument to BJP’s Fascism

Now one of the main counterarguments to BJP and RSS being described as fascists is that fascists once in power, destroy the electoral and parliamentary system but BJP always has participated in and upheld these systems. Jairus Banaji argues that RSS practices a kind of fascism that can be called “electoral fascism” which appeals to racism and xenophobia to mobilize electoral support. The anti-political philosophy that RSS followed for at least the first 25 years of its foundation also needs to be factored in.

For all these years RSS had successfully resisted getting involved in politics. However, as mentioned earlier, RSS took to politics as an “insurance policy” for its existence. Therefore, politicization was an answer to the existential threat. What follows from this argument is that RSS did not join politics because it wanted to bring in change through parliament by implementing its policies based on its ideology.

The fear came from the fact that it needed to preserve its own organization so that it could carry out its cultural and social activities unhindered. So, it does not appear that RSS took to politics for the sake of politics but it got into politics to guarantee itself that it could carry out its background activities of ‘cultural and social importance.

This would also raise the question: does RSS believe in the electoral processes? From the discussion, it can be inferred that yes RSS does believe in the electoral process but it has been following the electoral process for very different reasons than what we usually associate it with- democracy. RSS’ sole motive for participating in the electoral process is safeguarding itself against bans. Now the “insurance policy” would be needed only if the RSS is very much aware that it would get banned again at some point. That would mean RSS is using the electoral process to protect its activities from coming under government scrutiny because its activities cannot be encouraged or approved by a government that is not RSS itself.

Also Read: Is This the Ultimate Solution to Rising Islamophobia in India?

Building a Führer cult

Further, recently during the 2014 general elections, BJP for the first time asked for votes in the name of its prime ministerial candidate Narendra Modi. It was a huge success and the phenomenon of attracting voters by using his name was called “Modi Wave”. RSS till now had always discouraged a leadership cult but “with the repeated acclamations of Modi as the next prime minister, this seems to be changing now, for it is the first time this political sector has found a figurehead around whom to build a Führer cult”. The building of a Fuhrer cult is again straight out of the Nazi playbook. As Ian Kershaw points out that the Hitler cult was the ‘crucial adhesive’ of the Nazi movement, its ‘integrating mechanism’. Similarly, Modi’s name was used as an integrating mechanism to attract voters to one name of Modi in the BJP.

Also Read: Why Is Indian PM Modi’s Silent About Attacks Against Muslims?

Conclusion

This essay thus argues that RSS joined politics as an “insurance policy” to safeguard its activities. It questions as to why RSS would need protection against any other government that is not RSS. The creation of BJP is followed by its predecessor Jana Sangh which was itself created in 1951 by Syama Prasad Mookerjee with the help of RSS. Further, the creation and the ideology of RSS itself are traced in Savarkar’s Essentials of Hindutva. The ideology is then compared to that of Nazi Germany. Then, the phenomenon of the “Modi Wave” of the 2014 general elections is compared to that of the Fuhrer Cult of Nazism. Using these arguments and coupled with Jairus’ term of “electoral fascism”, it is concluded that BJP is indeed a fascist party despite its participation in electoral processes.

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Fascism

Israel is and will always be a crime against humanity

Published

2 years ago

May 16, 2023

Khaled Amayreh

Israel, the misbegotten Zionist entity, on Wednesday, May 5 celebrated the 74^thanniversary of its birthday, an allusion to the usurpation by brutal military force of the Arab-Muslim land of Palestine.

In the process, Zionist gangs, armed and funded by wealthy Jews and colonialist Western powers, such as the UK, carried out a well-devised terrorist campaign of indiscriminate murder and violence against the virtually-unarmed and defenseless Palestinian community, during which dozens of hideous massacres, like Dir Yasin, were perpetrated by Zionist gangs, like the Hagana, Irgun, Stern, and others.

Also Read: The most brutal massacres of the “Zionist gangs” in Palestine in 1948

The grisly atrocities forced the vast majority of Palestine’s population at that time, in 1948, to flee their villages lest they face the same fate that the people of Dir Yasin, Tantura, Dawaymeh, and many other hamlets and villages had just faced.

The Deir Yassin massacre took place on April 9, 1948, when 130 Jewish terrorists from the paramilitary terror groups of Irgun and Lehi stormed Dir Yasin near Jerusalem and murdered 107 Palestinian civilians. Other sources, like New York Times, put the number of victims at 200.

Also Read: Israel having free season on Palestinian civilians including Children and Journalists

In his Memoirs, the Rvolt, Menachem Begin, the head of the Irgun terror group, who eventually became Israel’s Prime minister, described the Dir Yasin massacre as a real miracle because it cast terror in the hearts of the Palestinian populace, prompting them to leave. Even before Dir Yasin, Begin was branded by the British government as “leader of the notorious terrorist organization and banned from entering the UK.”

Since Dir Yasin 74 years ago, Zionist massacres of Palestinians have never really stopped as successive Zionist governments retained and maintained the original Zionist strategy toward the people of Palestine. This genocidal strategy was aimed at achieving three main goals: Expulsion of the bulk of Palestinians. (There are 7 million Palestinian refugees today), enslaving Palestinians as as “water carriers and wood hewers,” (apartheid), or outright physical extermination. This is not propaganda or media hypes. This is the un-official but authentic ideology of the ruling Zionist establishment, even today.

Also Read: Religious Fascism in India & Israel: Tweedledum and Tweedledee

In 1967, Israel launched the 6-days war, during which it seized the rest of mandatory Palestine, namely the West Bank which was under the Jordanian rule, and the Gaza Strip, under the Egyptian rule. Thus, Islam’s first Qibla and third holiest religious place, al-Aqsqa, fell under the Zionist occupation.

When East Jerusalem was seized from Jordan, the Israeli army’s rabbi Moshe Goren, strongly advised army generals to blow up the gold-gilded Dome of the Rock, which is part of the Aqsa Mosque. However, a prominent general refused to heed Goren’s exhortations.

Ever since that time, Israel transferred hundreds of thousands of its citizens into the West Bank to live on land that belongs to another people. The purpose of this criminal act is to re-enact the White settlements of the defunct apartheid regime in South Africa and former Rhodesia as well as the Russian demographic presence in the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine, pending the annexation of the territory and possible expulsion and ethnic cleansing of the Palestinians.

Also Read: Palestine-Vs. Ukraine: Stark Western hypocrisy on Palestine and Ukraine

Numerous UN resolutions were issued, ruling that the settlements were illegal and in a brazen violation of international law. Furthermore, Israel consistently refused to consider the West Bank as an occupied territory, insisting that the region was a “disputed” rather than “occupied” land. The Israeli defiance of the UN and its Security Council’s resolutions is attributed to the almost total American submission to the Zionist entity.

A few years ago during a televised debate with an Israeli official, I confronted him with the settlements problem as he claimed that it was Israel that really wanted peace and that the Palestinians were the party that displayed intransigence. I asked him rather tersely if he thought that a peace-loving country would build 300 colonies on occupied territories and transfer hundreds of thousands of its citizens to live on land that didn’t belong to them. He was dumbfounded.

Clearly, the brazen Israeli insolence and arrogance of power stem from the absolute, unlimited, and total backing the Jewish state receives from the United States due to the overwhelming influence of American Jewry on the US government, congress, and political life in America.

Also Read: “Jewish State”: A Nazi Concept Implying another final Nakba

I remember one American writer saying half-jokingly that the Palestinians will not be liberated from the Israeli occupation until America is freed from Zionist domination. The Zionist stranglehold on the American government was described amply and analyzed elaborately by the late Jewish intellectual Alfred Lilienthal in his monumental book “The Zionist Connection: What price peace.”

The Palestinians remain the ultimate reversioner

Despite its military might, economic prosperity, and international connections, Israel still lacks the legal and moral legitimacy.

In ancient times and the Middle Ages, military conquests gave conquerors sovereignty over occupied territories. However, in the modern era, sovereignty, especially de jure sovereignty, can not be acquired or gained through war. Otherwise, the occupation by Nazi Germany of 8 European states would have been perfectly legal and compatible with international law. The same thing applies to the Iraqi invasion and occupation of Kuwait nearly 30 years ago. The same thing can be said about the ongoing Russian invasion of Ukraine.

So what makes the Israeli occupation of Palestine, both in 1948 and 1967, different from the Nazi occupation of Europe, the Iraqi occupation of Kuwait, and the Russian occupation of Ukraine. In truth, Israel and the Zionist movement have no convincing answer for this crucial question. Instead, they indulge in legalistic sophistry, historical prevarication, and verbal juggling

Also Read: Israel should stop trying to force-feed the Holocaust down people’s throats as bloody repression of Palestinians goes on unabated

Some Zionist apologists try to outsmart themselves by arguing that Israel came under attack and that the occupied territory were won in a war of self-defense.

However, international law experts make it very clear that coming under attack gives a country the right to repel the attack, but not occupy territories. Thus, the acquisition of territory by military force is absolutely illegal under the international law. This is the reason most countries don’t recognize Israeli sovereignty over both East and West Jerusalem as the city, indeed the entirety of Palestine was conquered by military force, which gave Israel only a de facto sovereignty, but no de Jure sovereign whatsoever.

Needless to say, authentic de jure sovereignty would require all the normal qualifications of sovereignty, which Israel obviously lacks.

Hence, Israel should be viewed as a belligerent occupying power, irrespective of how many countries recognize it and have diplomatic and economic relations with it.

According to Hal Draper ” At the present time Israel is a belligerent occupant of the city (Jerusalem) and is bound by the laws governing such occupation.”

Headly Cook, an international law expert believes that Israel among all countries of the world possesses not a single inch of territory which she could assuredly proclaim to be her own in perpetuity.(2)

This is why, Palestinians, and Muslims in general, are strongly advised not to ascribe any legal or moral legitimacy to Israel, an entity that has been and continues to be a crime against humanity. (end)

(1) Draper, Hal. the Status of Jerusalem, p. 163

(2)” (Cook, Headly, Israel: A blessing and Curse, London 1960, p. 168)

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Fascism

Expect a Srebrenica-like massacre anytime by Jewish Settlers in the West Bank

Published

2 years ago

March 1, 2023

Azhaar Amayreh

Encouraged by the Israeli government’s acquiescence, millenarian Jewish settlers in the West Bank seem to miss no chance to emulate “Hitler youth,” the para-military Nazi gangs that murdered, and terrorized Jews prior and during the Second World War.

“Hitler Youth” carried out some of the most outrageous acts of mass terror against Jews throughout Germany and Austria prior to the outbreak of the World War II.

During their rampages, they murdered people, vandalized property and torched businesses. They took an active part in Kristallnacht’s “Night of Broken Glass” on 9-10 November, 1938, burning down numerous synagogues.

According to historical sources, the pretext for the attacks was the assassination of the German diplomat Ernst vom Rath by Herschel Grynszpan, a German-born Polish Jew living in Paris.

Kristallnacht was followed by additional economic and political persecution of Jews, and is viewed by some historians as part of Nazi Germany’s broader racial policy, and the beginning of the holocaust.

Jewish Settlers in the West Bank: Judeo-Nazis

Today, more or less the same scene is being replayed by the Nazi-like Jewish settlers in full collusion and coordination with the Israeli government and security forces in the West Bank.

The settlers play the role of Hitler Youths and other Nazi paramilitary gangs while the Israeli security forces play the role of Gestapo and SS.

I know there are differences between the two cases. However, one must be faithful to one’s rectitude, which compels us to recognize the immense similarities.

In both cases, we are talking about a nefarious racist ideology (Aryan Supremacy -the Master Race) in the German case, and (Jewish supremacy or chosen people) in Israel’s case.

Indeed, when subjecting the two movements to cool examination and analysis, the two terror groups (Jewish settlers and Hitler Youth) look as two sides of the same coin, notwithstanding some secondary differences.

Most of the Jewish settlers now marauding through the West Bank and Jerusalem are graduates or students at Talmudic schools known as Yeshivot. They are thoroughly indoctrinated in the Talmudic ideology which views non-Jews as virtual animals. This means that the life of any goy (non-Jew) has absolutely no sanctity. This is far worse than the Nazi concept of the lower classes or Untermenschen.

The Jewish Settlers’ terror : Never forget

Mohammed Abu Khdeir was kidnapped, beaten, forced to swallow petrol then burned alive by a Jewish Israeli settler in Jerusalem

On 13 July, 2014, Jewish settlers in the West Bank kidnapped and burned alive a Palestinian child, after pumping gasoline into his body. Typically, when hair-raising incidents like this occur, the perpetrators often blame Torah sages and Talmud teachers in their communities for okaying the hideous crime.

I don’t know why these Jewish settlers in the West Bank chose this particular gruesome method to end the innocent child’s life. Did they want to vicariously punish the Nazis, on the ground that all goyem are the same, irrespective whether they are Germans, or Palestinians or Chinese?

What was even more outrageous was the behavior of the Israeli government. The Israeli security officials spread disinformation alleging that Abu Khdeir was murdered by his own family.

Israeli Offilcals: Lying like breathing

Indeed, only when there was no room for denying the obvious did Israeli leaders admit the occurrence of the crime. The reluctant admission was not due to concern about the monstrosity of the crime. It was rather imputed to concerns about the public relation damage that Israel would incur as a result of the crime.

The Jewish settlers’ terror against the Palestinian people in the West Bank occurs with the knowledge, acquiescence and direct or indirect encouragement of the Israeli government. Claiming otherwise would be like committing an act of lewdness with truth.

In fact, it is well known that some Israeli security officers often teach Jewish settlers how to conceal evidence of murder just as the Israeli justice system easily exonerates Jewish murder suspects accused of murdering Palestinians. A few weeks ago, I asked a Jewish lawyer from Haifa to explain the chances of a Palestinian receiving true justice in a Jewish court.

The lawyer, a lady, told me this: “No non-Jew can hope for true justice in a Jewish court, period.”

Jewish settlers and their supporters from within the army and Shin Bet security agency have burnt and vandalized dozens of mosques in the West Bank. However, so far, not a single perpetrator has been apprehended let alone punished. This amounts to a green light that encourages the terrorist settlers to “keep up the good work.”

Jewish Settlers in the West Bank: Expect the worse

Jewish Settlers train their kids how to use weapons . — **PHOTOGRAPHY**
Israeli Jewish “Settlers” (Occupiers) in Palestine Train Children in Use of Firearms (Guns)

Today, the Israeli government is using these genocidal fanatic Jewish Settlers to murder and terrorize unarmed and unprotected Palestinians for the purpose of driving them away from their homeland in the West Bank and Jerusalem.

The criminal Jewish settlers pray for a miracle to empty the land, the West Bank and Jerusalem, of its indigenous inhabitants, the Palestinians. They invoke the 1948-Nakba, saying “if we did it once, we could do it again.”

This is why these evil people are willing and ready to embark on the unthinkable, including carrying out a Srebrenica-like massacre of Palestinian villagers.

The settlers believe they could do such heinous act with minimal or no impunity. They cite Jewish domination of the American government and Congress as well as the settlers’ domination within the Israeli army.

Yes, they could embark on the unthinkable. Don’t say “we didn’t know.”

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Ethnic Cleansing

BBC’s Modi Documentary Rattles Modi Government

Published

2 years ago

January 25, 2023

Arif Jamal

BCC recently released a documentary on India’s controversial right-wing Prime Minister Narendra Modi rattling Modi and his ruling party Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). The documentary’s first episode titled “India: The Modi Question” which was released in the UK on 17th January drew a sharp reaction from the Modi government.

Modi Government Blocks the Documentary in India

The Modi government moved swiftly to block the documentary in India. Proving right the critics of IT Rules, 2021, the Modi government’s Ministry of Information & Broadcasting invoked emergency powers under the IT Rules, 2021 to order YouTube to take down all the videos that had published the first episode of the documentary. Orders were also issued to Twitter to take down all the tweets that had posted the link to the documentary. Both YouTube and Twitter complied with the orders, removing all the posts and videos flagged by the government.

The government alleged that the documentary was found to be “undermining sovereignty and integrity of India, and having the potential to adversely impact India’s friendly relations with foreign states”, which allowed for the invocation of the emergency powers under the IT Rules, 2021. The government also alleged that the documentary questions the credibility of the Supreme Court of India and attempts to sow divisions among different communities while also making unsubstantiated allegations regarding the activities of foreign governments in India.

Earlier India’s External Affairs Ministry spokesperson dismissed the documentary as a “propaganda piece that lacks objectivity and reflects colonial mindset”. The spokesperson also questioned the timings of the release of the documentary.

Also Read: Why Is Indian PM Modi’s Silent About Attacks Against Muslims?

The Documentary

The documentary’s first episode produced by the BBC tracks Modi’s “first steps into politics”- his association with the right-wing Hindu extremist organisation Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS), his rise through the ranks of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), and further his appointment as Chief Minister of the state of Gujarat in 2001 till 2014. As the Chief Minister of Gujarat, Modi’s involvement in and his response to a series of communal riots in 2002 remains a source of controversy.

The documentary highlights a previously unpublished report, obtained by the BBC from the British Foreign Office, which raises questions about Modi’s actions during the religious riots. The report claims that Modi was “directly responsible” for the “climate of impunity” that enabled the violence.

The report cited by the BCC was part of an inquiry ordered by the then foreign secretary Jack Straw. The reports say that “the extent of violence was much greater than reported” and “the aim of the riots was to purge Muslims from Hindu areas”.
Jack Straw is heard in the documentary saying, “these were very serious claims that Mr Modi had played a proactive part in pulling back police and in tacitly encouraging the Hindu extremists. That was a particularly egregious example of political involvement to prevent police from doing their job to protect the Hindus and the Muslims.”

Also Read: Gujrat Riots: Has Indian Democracy Breathed its Last?

Modi’s Role in Gujarat Riots of 2002

It is the documentary’s highlight of the Gujarat riots of 2002 that has rattled the Modi government.

The Gujarat riots of 2002 claimed the lives of more than 1,000 people. Most of those killed were Muslims. Modi is alleged to have instigated the riots and further prevented the police and the army from taking any action to stop the riots. Most of the reports published on the Gujarat riots by the Indian media as well as the international media point out Modi’s direct role in facilitating the riots. It has been claimed that Modi gave a free hand to Hindu extremists to kill Muslims and the aim was to purge Hindu localities of Muslims.

Modi has rejected these accusations. Further, in 2013 an investigation approved by the Indian Supreme Court absolved Mr. Modi of complicity in the rioting. Based on that finding, a court in the state of Gujarat found that there was insufficient evidence to prosecute him.

Also Read: Why BJP is Fascist Despite Contesting Elections.?

Action Taken by Foreign Countries against Modi

Like the above-cited British Foreign Office report, there were many countries that were convinced of Modi’s role in the killing of Muslims during the riots. Concerned countries acted against Modi at different levels.

Modi was banned entry into the U.S. for more than a decade for his role in the riots. In 2005, Modi became the only person ever to be denied a U.S. visa under the 1998 law on violations of religious freedom. The U.S. State Department invoked a little-known U.S. law passed in 1998 that makes foreign officials responsible for “severe violations of religious freedom” ineligible for visas. The ban on Modi’s travel to the U.S. was revoked by the Obama administration in 2014 after he became the prime minister of India.

Also Read: How Practical is the Secular Democracy of India? Curbing of Religious Freedom in Kashmir

A Permanent Stain on Modi’s Career

Modi may have achieved great things in his political career, but the stain of the Gujarat riots is permanent on his career.

Modi loves the camera. He loves advertising and branding himself. Modi puts his picture on everything. He loves hearing his voice. However, ever since he became the prime minister of India, he has never given an unscripted interview to the media. He has also never held a press conference in India or abroad. It has been claimed that Modi does not want difficult questions about his attitude towards the Muslim minority of India thrown at him.

When Modi became the prime minister of India, Indian liberals were hopeful that Modi had changed. They were wrong in their assessment that Modi as a prime minister would be inclusive. However, after Modi’s eight years as a prime minister now, he has not changed his attitude towards Muslims. As of now, Muslims are increasingly persecuted by his government.

This author highly recommends that you watch the BBC documentary on Modi. Its first episode has been released here (if you are outside the UK watch it here or use VPN). The next episode will be available on Tuesday, January 24, 2023, at 21:00.

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