पश्चिम बंगाल: तुष्टिकरण, साम्प्रदायिकता और अराजकता

Youth Ki Awaaz पर प्रथम प्रकाशित 

पश्चिम बंगाल एक बार फिर ख़बरों के घेरे में है। कारण एक बार फिर साम्प्रदायिक हिंसा है। पश्चिम बंगाल में साम्प्रदायिक हिंसा पहली बार नहीं हुई है। भारत विभाजन पूर्व, १६ अगस्त १९४६ के दिन जिन्नाह द्वारा डायरेक्ट एक्शन डे घोषित किया गया था। उस कत्लेआम में सैंकड़ो लोग मारे गए थे।भारत की आज़ादी के बाद भी हिंसा का दौर चलता रहा। मुर्शिदाबाद में १९८८ में एक मस्जिद में प्रार्थना के

चित्र आभार: Youth Ki Awaaz

अधिकार को लेकर पश्चिम बंगाल मुस्लिम लीग ने कासिम्बाज़ार में हिंसक प्रदर्शन किया. प्रदर्शन कारियों ने बंगाल के पाकिस्तान में विलय के भी नारे लगाए. पर इतिहास को दोहरा कर हम आज की उपेक्षा नहीं कर सकते। 

वर्तमान पश्चिम बंगाल में वामपंथी पार्टियों ने सत्तर के दशक में क्रान्ति के नाम पर सशस्त्र गिरोहों का गठन किया. उन्ही गिरोहों ने वाम दलों को तीन दशकों तक सत्ता में बनाये रखा. आज वही गिरोह जिहने काडर भी कहा जाता है, वर्तमान तृणमूल सरकार का सहयोग कर रहे है. 

पश्चिम बंगाल में पनप रही हिंसा की एक जड़ बंगलदेश तक जाती है. वहां के कट्टरवादी संगठन, जैसे जमात - ए - इस्लामी, बांग्लादेश को एक इस्लामिक देश बनाना चाहते हैं. २००९ में शेख हसीना के पद सँभालने के बाद वहां इस्लामी कट्टरवाद पर निहाना साधा गया और आतंकी संगठनों का दमन किया गया. नतीजा यह हुआ की बांग्लादेशी कट्टरवाद सीमा लांघ कर पश्चिम बंगाल आ पहुंचा. 

ममता बनर्जी की तुष्टिकरण की नीति और बांग्लादेश से कट्टरवाद और अवैध घुसपैठ का नतीजा आज यह है की बंगाल के कम से कम तीन जिलों में प्रशासन अपना नियंत्रण खो चूका है. अफीम की खेती हो या आतंकी घुसपैठ, इन जिलों में सब खुलेआम हो रहा है. मुर्शिदाबाद, मालदा और उत्तर २४ परगना, तीन ऐसे जिले हैं जहाँ पिछले सात वर्षों में व्यापक साम्प्रदायिक हिंसा हुई है. 

वोट की राजनीति और तुष्टिकरण के चलते बंगाल में साम्प्रदायिक तनाव बढ़ रहा है. इमामों को दिए जाने वाला मासिक भत्ता हो या स्थानीय मीडिया पर सांप्रदायिक हिंसा के प्रसारण पर रोक हो, बंगाल सरकार इस्लामिक तुष्टिकरण को खुलेआम प्रोत्साहन दे रही है. जहाँ वामपंथी पूँजीवाद विरोध की आड़ में हिंसा फैलाते थे वहीँ ममता सरकार इस्लामी हिंसा की और आँखे मूंदी बैठी है. 

हिंसा और सांप्रदायिक तनाव तृणमूल सरकार का हथियार बन चुके है. अवैध हथियारों और विस्फोटकों का पकड़ा जाना या लगातार हो रहे देसी बेम विस्फोट हो, यह सरकार की अक्षमता या विध्वंसकारी ताकतों से सांठ गांठ का प्रतीक है। प्रेस पर सरकार का कड़ा नियंत्रण इस लेख से आँका जासकता है. मिडिया द्वारा हिंसा के समाचार प्रसारित करने पर उनके खिलाफ पुलिस में प्राथमिकी दर्ज़ कर दी जाती है. 

इस सप्ताह बशीरहाट में हुए साम्प्रदायिक दंगे भी देश की नज़र में नहीं आते अगर सोशल मीडिया पर स्थानीय लोगों ने तस्वीरें और वीडियो नहीं डाले होते। आखिर क्या चाहतीं हैं ममता बनर्जी? क्या देश में साम्प्रदायिकता से जूझ रहा एक राज्य, कश्मीर, काफी नहीं है? क्या बंगाल को भी वोट की राजनीति के वेदी पर कुर्बान कर दिया जायेगा? क्या मालदा की तरह बंगाल के बाकि हिस्सों में भी इस्लामी कट्टरवाद सर चढ़ कर बोलेगा? इसका जवाब शायद ममता बनर्जी के पास ही है. परन्तु राजनितिक दल तो सत्ता की धुन में अंधे हो जाते है. 

शायद हमें अपने बुद्धिजीवी वर्ग से उम्मीद लगनी चाहिए. बुद्धिजीवी जो फिलिस्तीन से लेकर परमाणु बिजलीघरों तक पर प्रदर्शन करने से नहीं कतराते, क्या वह बंगाल में हो रही कट्टरवादी हिंसा के खिलाफ प्रदर्शन करेंगे? यहाँ आश्चर्य यह है की बुद्धिजीवी वर्ग को हिंसा नहीं दिखाई देती. दिखाई देता है तो केवल राज्यपाल और मुख्यमंत्री के बीच चल रहा पत्राचार. 

हमारा संविधान सभी नागरिकों को सामान अधिकार देता है. फिर क्यों एक और भारत "लीनचिस्तान" बन जाता है पर वही दूसरी ओर उतनी हे वीभत्स हिंसा को केवल क़ानून व्यवस्था का मामला बताकर हम किनारा कर लेते हैं? 

Bengal on its way to become Kashmir

There are many ways to remain relevant in politics. One way is to make realistic promises before elections and working hard to fulfil them once the electorate handover their trust to you by electing you. But come on, that happens only in Bollywood. So the second way is to make exaggerated promises, offer bribes in form of television sets, laptops, smartphones and so on and win the election. However there is a third way, a time tested one at that. In here you identify the block of voters who can be manipulated, nurture them by offering irrelevant but perceived goodies like a stipend for their religious leaders, land grants for their schools and turning a blind eye to crime emanating from the places they live in. You become so dependent on them for your political relevance that there comes a time when, what seemed like patronising looks more like appeasement but it actually is giving up control.

When fire engulfs your turf.
Picture Courtesy - India Today

This is what has happened in West Bengal. The government of Ms Mamata Banerjee has lost control over a large territory in the state. West Bengal was never a peaceful state. With the first street battles of Naxal bari, culminating into a three decade long stagnation supervised by the Communist Party of India (Marxist), yes the same Marx, whose ideology killed millions in Soviet Russia and Maoist China, the state has always been a den of violence. But that discussion is for another day. To get a sense of the level of anarchy prevailing in the state, Indian Affair conducted a simple Google search for “West Bengal blast 2015”. The search yielded a NDTV link siting at least seven instances of blasts where people have been killed or injured. Read the reports here, here, here, here, here, here and here. To top this all was, the now forgotten, Burdwan blast where two women, members of an Islamist terror organisation, were killed. The house was owned by a Trinamool Congress leader, Hasan Chowdhury.

If these seven instances of blasts were not enough there were at least three instances of the police seizing arms cache, read the reports here, here and here. If bomb blasts and illegal arms turning up like soft serve ice cream every now and then is not losing control over territory then what else is? Perhaps it will take something more drastic for Ms Banarjee to see in, which drain her state is drowning. So here is more. As fresh as today, a report from India Today claims 80,000 bigha (32,000 acres) of farm land is being used for poppy cultivation in the district of Malda. The district administration is scared for their lives and do not venture into these pockets and obviously Ms Banerjee has no problems with this small poppy garden in her backyard.

Not many news shops covered Malda in early days of January when an estimated mob of 2.5 lakh people marched the streets, ran a riot, burnt down a police station, set police vehicles on fire and pelted stones at policemen fleeing the scene. Ms Banerjee was at least swift to take action this time. She ordered immediate refurbishment of the police station and ensured no traces of the arson and riot were left behind. She really is the Maa in “Maa Maati Manush”, saving her kids from harm’s way.

West Bengal shares an international border with Bangladesh, a very porous one at that. Forget flinging rice sacks across the fence, cattle and women are trafficked with ease, sometimes one can’t tell one from the other. Then there is the case of fake currency smuggling. Any sensible person heading a sensitive state like West Bengal will do their best to ensure law and order and reclaiming the lost territory. But Ms Banerjee has a different plan. Perhaps she wants to gift India another Kashmir. A border state with worsening law and order situation, large swathes of territory ceded to criminals, smugglers and terrorists. A bomb blast a month, madarsas doubling up as terrorist hideouts. And a flourishing mini Afghanistan in a poppy garden.

West Bengal is slipping away under the supervision of Ms Banerjee and she is not bothered. The bigger question, however is, who else can stop this?

The fringe is now mainstream

The fringe has gone mainstream, claims Rana Ayyub in her latest post on DailyO (a site run by India Today). In another article on Firstpost, G Pramod Kumar warns that the attacks on Christians are merely a warning shot for Muslims. Meanwhile former officer of the Indian Police Service, Julio Ribeiro wrote a letter to the Indian Express saying, “As a Christian, suddenly I am a stranger in my own country”. Ribeiro later told a TV channel that he exaggerated some of the claims to attract attention.

In the past few months, there have been thefts in Churches in some parts of Delhi, one church was gutted. These incidents were painted as an attack on Christians by some Hindu groups. The commissioner of Delhi Police later issued a statement giving information on cases of theft in places of worship. It turned out that more temples were burgled than any other place of worship. The highest number of temple theft being reported in 2014, the year Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) lead National Democratic Alliance came to power.

The spate of concerned opinions like the claims of Rana Ayyub, the warning from G Pramod Kumar and the emotional outburst of Ribeiro came just after the brutal sexual assault on a nun in Ranaghat, West Bengal.  Are these concerns justified? Is there evidence suggesting Christians are being targeted? Your guess is as good as mine. The one thing that is common in all such concerned opinions is that the blame squarely lies at the Prime Minister’s door step. Almost the entire Indian media is blaming the Prime Minister for the law and order situation that is essentially the responsibility of the state governments according to the constitution.

There are two important things to be taken note of. One, an atmosphere of panic is being created by the media, where minorities, especially Christians are shown under siege. The three articles sighted above are full of text sans any statistics to back the opinion up with. Such writings would classify as provocative, if someone were to carefully scrutinize them, at best and hatemongering at worst. A law and order problem is being given a communal colour, deliberately. Second, the blame is selectively put on the union government, where it actually lies with the state government (surprisingly no one has questioned the respective state governments, unless it happens to be a BJP government).

So should one trash the concerns raised by the press and a decorated IPS officer? The answer in a word is, no. But having said that the cases should be examined on what they really are. A law and order problem. Safety is not just a concern of the Christians, but of every citizen of India. The individual state governments should ensure that the rule of law is imposed without any discrimination or favour. Mamata Banerjee’s West Bengal has become one of the most dangerous places for women. She in the past has dismissed the rape and assault of Suzette Jordon as a “sajano Ghatana” (concocted incident) to malign her government. After the rape of the nun, when she went to show her sympathy, she was welcomed with a blockade of her convoy, rightly reflecting the anger of people against the miserable failure of her government to maintain law and order. Her colleague, Firhad Hakim shifted the blame from his government to Gharwapsi. Surprisingly there is no hue and cry on such indifference  and apathy by an elected chief minister.

What the press should be concerned about is the absence of strict implementation of laws to ensure safety of everyone, not just the Christians or women or minorities. We all deserve a safe environment to live in.