I/III. http://scroll.in/article/744842/jyoti-punwani-when-compassion-failed-and-baying-for-blood-prevailed
Jyoti Punwani: When compassion failed and baying for blood prevailed The only saving grace of this sorry shameful tale of appeasing mob sentiment is that so many of our best minds have stood up against it. Jyoti Punwani · Today · 08:30 am Had Narasimha Rao had the guts, he would have acknowledged publicly in July 1994 that the only educated member of the infamous Memon family of Mahim had decided to return and help the government with evidence of Pakistan’s hand in the March 12, 1993, bomb blasts in Mumbai. The prime minister would not have cared about the howls of indignation that would have emanated from the Bharatiya Janata Party-led Opposition and from the families of the 257 people who died in the blasts. Yakub Memon and his family would have been arrested, but their bail petitions would not have been contested by the Central Bureau of Investigation – an understanding reportedly given to Yakub Memon’s first lawyer Shyam Keswani. Had President Pranab Mukherjee had the guts, he would have accepted Yakub Memon’s second mercy petition – the only one filed by him (the first had been filed by his brother). The president had enough grounds to do so, both legal and ethical, spelled out in the letter written to him last week by a galaxy of retired judges, including some from the Supreme Court, eminent lawyers, artists and academics. Had the Supreme Court taken the advice of one of its own former judges, Justice HS Bedi, it could have sent the death warrant back for a fresh look or looked at the new evidence itself, given the revelations being made over the last week. After all, it wasn’t some rookie activist lawyer giving the advice – it was a judge who had himself handed out a death sentence. A 'travesty of justice' But all of this could have happened only if those with the power to show mercy, considered Yakub Memon worthy of it. Imagine a man coming back full of hope and faith in his country, a man who risked his life to gather proof against his own brother and the powerful Inter Services Intelligence, a man who convinced his family to come back too. Now imagine all of them thrown behind bars, rapidly disintegrating. Yet, that man never lost faith. "The investigating agencies have complete knowledge about me,’’ he wrote to the Chief Justice in 1994. "I am a good citizen of this country. I have tried to help the government in whatever manner I could. In fact, when this case will come to its logical end and the truth will unravel, everybody will come to know about my humble effort and sacrifice. If my story is known, I’m convinced the court will set me free." Yakub Memon’s daughter, whom he wanted to be brought up as Indian, and with whom he could never spend even a year, says he never stopped telling her that he would come home. Political activist Arun Ferreira, who was in Nagpur Jail, told Scroll.in that Yakub Memon would never join any protest because he didn’t want anything to spoil his spotless record and come in the way of his freedom. Former Supreme Court judge Markandeya Katju has called Memon’s conviction a "travesty of justice’’. If his conviction can’t be undone – Justice Bedi felt it could – doesn’t this man at least deserve mercy? Or is the baying for his blood too much to risk ignoring? By ruling parties, maybe. But by the courts? The only saving grace of this sorry shameful tale of appeasing mob sentiment is that so many of our best minds have stood up against it. And hardly any of them is Muslim. That counts, because Yakub Memon’s fate is irretrievably tied up with him being a member of the Memon family. If the March 12, 1993, blasts were motivated by religious revenge, there’s also a long list of savage crimes committed by persons motivated by Hindutva. What of the men who gang-raped Bilkis Bano, killed 14 of her family members, flung her three-year-old daughter to the ground, smashing her head in the Gujarat savagery of 2002? They were sentenced to life. Did the "collective conscience’’ of the nation want these accused to hang? We don’t know because there was no baying for blood in these cases. Not that there should be. The death penalty spells revenge, not justice. But the fact is such a clamour becomes loud enough to be noticed only when made by the majority community, it would seem. A travesty There’s yet another travesty in Yakub Memon’s case – the date of his execution, which seems to have acquired some sacrosanct value looking at the way everything is being hurried through. July 30 is his 53rd birthday. So we watch helplessly as a man whose culpability – or at least the extent of it – even judges are not convinced of, is hung from the noose. The Shiv Sena might celebrate as it has in the past. The BJP might do so too. Meanwhile, the Mumbai police has as usual asked Muslims to keep the peace, as if they are the only ones who pose a threat to it. II/III. http://scroll.in/article/744399/the-crimes-of-commissions-of-inquiry-when-governments-dont-want-to-punish-terrorists Commissions of Inquiry: When governments don't want to punish terrorists Consider the terrorists of November 1984 or December 1992 and January 1993. Now contrast with those of March 12, 1993. Dilip D’Souza · Today · 08:45 am Sometimes one comment says it all. In a recent argument with someone over the death sentence of Yakub Memon, the massacres in Bombay in December 1992 and January 1993 came up. Nearly a thousand of my fellow Indians were killed in those ghastly two months. “Oh, those guys were punished," was this person’s airy handwaving response. “Really?” I asked. “Can you name one person who has been punished for those crimes?” To which this person said two things: First, “Yakub Memon!” Second, “The rest are all named in the Srikrishna Commission report, why don’t you read it?” So let’s get this straight. This person believes that those responsible for the slaughter in 1992-'93 have been punished. That Yakub Memon is one of those responsible. That the Srikrishna Commission report names all the murderers, and names Memon as well. Add one more: since in reality pretty much nobody has been punished for those killings, this person also believes that merely being named by Srikrishna constitutes punishment. Wrong on all counts. And, therefore, a more twisted world view would be hard to find. You’d think. Justice BN Srikrishna was asked to inquire into those massacres in Bombay. He submitted his report to the government of Maharashtra in 1998. I have read it, actually. No, his report does not mention Yakub Memon. No, Memon had nothing to do with the December 1992-January 1993 killings – unless you’re one of those who falls for the specious and perverted argument that one atrocity justifies another. Entirely separate from Srikrishna’s inquiry, Memon was arrested, tried and sentenced for his role in the bomb blasts that happened two months later, in March 1993. But yes, Justice Srikrishna’s report does name people. Among them, Bal Thackeray. Justice Srikrishna famously calls him “a veteran general” who ordered men from his Shiv Sena to carry out “organised attacks against Muslims”. Crime and punishment Here’s the real issue: the great majority of those whom Srikrishna’s report names have never faced justice for their deeds, let alone being punished. Far from it, some even went on to greater successes in their political careers. Case in point: Madhukar Sarpotdar, a mere Shiv Sena MLA when the army took him into custody for carrying guns and swords in a riot-hit area at the height of the violence (January 11, 1993). In 1995 and 1998, this same Sarpotdar was elected to the Lok Sabha – my MP, as it happened. There’s plenty more to say about Sarpotdar, but I’ll save that for another day. For now, perhaps you’re wondering why those who were named in Srikrishna’s report were never punished. There’s a simple, almost tautological reason for that: what he conducted was an inquiry, as spelled out in the Commissions of Inquiry Act, 1952 – and such an inquiry is not a court of law. Period. True, an inquiry under the Act has “the powers of a Civil Court” in various respects. But the judgement in a 1977 case before the Supreme Court (State of Karnataka vs Union of India and Another) spells out what this really means (actually referring to an even earlier judgement, from the Nagpur High Court in 1954). The judges observed that “the Act merely clothes the Commission with certain powers of a civil court but does not confer on it the status of a court … the Commission is only fictionally a civil court”. What’s more, “there is no accuser, no accused and no specific charges for trial before the Commission, nor is the Government, under the law, required to pronounce one way or the other on the findings of the Commission”. There you have it. Not only is an inquiry not a court of law, not only has it no powers to punish anyone – but our own law permits our governments to totally ignore an inquiry’s findings. Commissions and omissions Have you ever wondered why, when various particular episodes of terrorism in India happen – the massacre in Delhi in 1984, the massacre in Bombay in 1992-'93, the massacre in Gujarat in 2002, and more – governments promptly set up Commissions to inquire into them? Wonder no more. The reasoning goes like this: Governments know well, like you know well, that our homegrown terrorists, with their intricate political connections, are responsible for all this slaughter of Indians. Naturally, they can’t be touched. Yet there remains a degree of public outrage over the slaughter, at least at the time it happens. Therefore, quickly deflate that outrage by announcing an Inquiry Commission. Let it drag on for several years. By then, the outrage has dissipated, memories of the slaughter have grown fuzzy, and anyway the inquiry can be ignored. And what’s more, there will even be some yahoos who will run around telling people that an inquiry equals punishment. That’s the very Indian story of every inquiry like Srikrishna’s. Don’t believe me? Consider only that there have been nine official inquiries – I’m not making this up – into the 1984 massacre of 3,000 Indians in Delhi alone: Marwah, Misra, Jain-Bannerjee, Kapur-Mittal, Ahuja, Potti-Rosha, Jain-Aggarwal, Naroola, Nanavati. Nine inquiries, all completely ignored. Not one has resulted in punishment for anyone who killed any of those 3,000 Indians in 1984. In exactly the same way, Srikrishna’s report has been completely ignored. Seventeen years since it was submitted, and it hasn’t resulted in punishment for anyone who killed any of those nearly 1,000 Indians in 1992-'93. Compare and contrast With all that as context, let’s juxtapose two situations. After the terrorism of December 1992 and January 1993 – the carnage that killed nearly 1,000 Indians – we had an inquiry and nobody has been punished for those crimes. After the terrorism of March 12, 1993 – the bomb blasts that killed nearly 260 Indians – we had no inquiry. Instead, there was a long trial and many convictions, including that of Yakub Memon. Perhaps we might all look in the mirror and ask: Why this difference? Perhaps we might then ask: What does this do for justice and terrorism in India? III. http://scroll.in/article/744734/the-message-is-clear-the-bjp-is-against-terrorists-only-if-those-terrorists-are-muslim The message is clear: The BJP is against terrorists only if those terrorists are Muslim If it has got away with this blatant hypocrisy, it can only be because a substantial proportion of the population shares that view. Girish Shahane · Yesterday · 06:30 pm If Yakub Memon hangs, will it be because of his faith? That’s what Asaduddin Owaisi of the All India Majlis-e-Ittehadul Muslimeen suggested, setting off a predictable storm of outrage. On his news programme, Arnab Goswami called Owaisi’s statement, “Completely unnecessary, provocative and seen as an attempt at religious polarisation”, and accused the politician of, “insulting the supreme court of the country.” [Video] Owaisi countered that the killers of Punjab’s chief minister Beant Singh and India’s former prime minister Rajiv Gandhi had their sentences commuted thanks to political backing, which Memon lacked, presumably because he was Muslim. Logjam on death row To understand whether Owaisi is on to something, it is useful to look back at the history of capital punishment in independent India. The nation frequently executed convicts in the decade after independence but as voices against state sanctioned killing grew stronger around the globe leading to the practice being banned in over a hundred nations and moratoriums being placed in over 50 others, we became increasingly hesitant to use the gallows. However, although the Supreme Court ruled as early as the 1970s that death be awarded only in the rarest of rare cases, it wasn’t particularly reluctant to condemn criminals to hang. The combination of the willingness to convict and unwillingness to execute created a logjam on death row. The last recourse for those sentenced to hang is usually a plea for mercy to India’s head of state. For almost a decade, between 1997 and 2007, such mercy petitions were simply ignored. KR Narayanan and Abdul Kalam were excellent Presidents, but both kicked the capital punishment can down the road. Narayanan didn’t decide on a single case during his term in office, and Kalam made a judgment on just two petitions, accepting one and rejecting one. Pratibha Patil, a controversial replacement for the inspirational Kalam, may have proved lacklustre in office generally, but considered dozens of mercy pleas, and gladdened liberal hearts by commuting a record number of death sentences. The damage to the process, however, had already been done. Rajiv Gandhi’s killers were spared the noose on grounds of inordinate delay, even though Patil rejected their mercy plea. A similar commutation was offered to Devinder Singh Bhullar, a Khalistani militant convicted for planting a bomb that killed 9 people, though not its intended target, the Congress leader Maninder Singh Bitta. Before the Supreme Court’s final verdict in those cases, politicians launched campaigns on behalf of the convicts. Tamil Nadu’s legislative assembly passed a resolution against hanging Gandhi’s assassins, while the Akali Dal adopted Bhullar’s cause. The Akalis have also demanded mercy for for Balwant Singh Rajaona, one of Beant Singh’s assassins. Astonishingly, Rajaona has been elevated to the status of Living Martyr (Zinda Shaheed) by the high Sikh religious authority, the Akal Takht. Pratibha Patil’s successor Pranab Mukherjee has been even more energetic than she was in tackling mercy petitions, but with a very different perspective. He has ruled against commutation in the vast majority of cases before him. Of the 24 people thus condemned, three were convicted of terrorism, or political killings, while the others were murderers of a more common variety. The appellants in the three terror-related cases all happened to be Muslims: Afzal Guru, Ajmal Kasab, and Yakub Memon. The first two have since been hanged, the only individuals put to death by the Indian state in the past decade. Double standards It’s difficult to decide, based on the small sample size available, whether Guru and Memon were ill-served by the judicial process because they were Muslim (Kasab’s case was, of course, open and shut), or whether they were simply unlucky to be convicted in a period when presidents took relatively expeditious decisions on mercy pleas, thus eliminating the "inordinate delay" recourse. I find the attitude of the public to these cases more worrying than anything that happened in court. When Omar Abdullah spoke out against executing Afzal Guru, he faced a backlash that his DMK and Akali Dal counterparts had not. He tweeted about this and created a bigger stir. The BJP made hanging Afzal Guru part of its political platform even while condemning the supposed violation of the "cultural and human rights" of Hindus under trial for bombing civilians, and partnering with the Akali Dal that supported convicted Khalistanis. It’s difficult not to conclude that the party is against terrorists only if those terrorists are Muslim. If it has got away with this blatant hypocrisy, it can only be because a substantial proportion of the population shares that view. I understand why people feel threatened by Islamist terrorism and extremism, but when they adopt double standards as a consequence, it only causes disaffected Muslims to be drawn to identity politics of the kind peddled by the Owaisis, or something far worse. -- Peace Is Doable -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Green Youth Movement" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send an email to [email protected]. Visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
