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Reading The Riot Act

By Neerja Dasani

05 October, 2009
Countercurrents.org

The common element visible in the ‘communal’ confrontations in Sangli, Maharashtra in September and Shahpur, Gujarat, a few weeks earlier was been the uniformly formulaic and superficial coverage by the English press.

English dailies predictably resorted to shorthand versions of the violence: ‘communal clashes erupt’, ‘mob fury breaks loose’, ‘police intervention’, ‘tense but under control’ and finally ‘limping back to normality.’

The standard narrative for Sangli was that an arch depicting the Maratha warrior Shivaji killing the Mughal general Afzal Khan as part of the Ganesh Chaturthi decorations, had provoked Muslim outrage. But the media ignored a press conference held by various Muslim organisations where leaders categorically stated that Afzal Khan was unrelated to the teachings of Islam. Their request to avoid simplistic explanations remained unheeded.

The fact that the arch was erected by workers of the Shiv Sena-BJP combine, despite warnings from the police, was similarly brushed aside. People’s Democracy was the only publication that drew attention to the polarising designs of a debilitated BJP under the guidance of the RSS.

It is no coincidence that the violence in Shahpur, Gujarat too was centred on a procession. The most common ‘story’, sourced to the police, was that a temple had recently been constructed in close proximity to the Nagoriwad mosque. Despite police warnings a Janmashtami procession, coinciding with namaz timing, was taken out on the ‘irregular’ route before the mosque, leading to the clashes.

A few follow-up reports noted the arrests of some of the ‘trouble-mongers’. None of them mentioned that among the arrested were BJP workers, who had initiated the move to construct the roadside temple adjoining the mosque.

The average reader could therefore safely assume that some ‘communities’ in this country are mutually antagonistic; composed of mobs always on the verge of violence and that the slightest spark can raise a communal fire.

But is this really the case?

Rejecting the trope of ‘spontaneity’ over a decade ago anthropologist Peter van der Veer wrote in ‘Riots and Rituals: The Construction of Violence and Public Space in Hindu Nationalism’ (1997): “However, riots in India I have witnessed or read about were more often than not well-planned and had well-defined targets and rules”. In ‘Writing Violence’ (1996), he notes: “Communal violence in India has to be understood in the context of the politics of sacred space. Riots and rituals have come to be linked in the construction of communal identities in public arenas. Ritual processions through ‘troubled’ areas often end in full-scale riots. Often one is confronted here with ‘rituals of provocation’.”

Veer’s work has revealed the nation and religious communities to be cultural constructs, most evident in his extensive analysis of the Babri Masjid dispute. The reflection of the Shahpur and Sangli violence in Veer’s words is stark. The seemingly innocuous procession suddenly represents a well-researched move, fine-tuned over the years in the conducive environs of the Hindutva laboratory. The common communal clash begins to demand its own context.

What are the demographics of the affected areas? How does it reflect in the socio-economic scenario? Could the fact that the area elected its first Muslim MLA (Congress member Gyasuddin Sheikh) in 2007 have anything to do with the increased activities of BJP workers? Similarly in Sangli can the timing of the riot and the impending state elections be a mere coincidence? What are the insecurities, frustrations, motivations and desires leading neighbours to attack one another?

But the mainstream English press operates under the principle of non-incitement, in other words to leave it as vague as possible, until it appears to be self-explanatory. This might explain why the Press Council’s guidelines have barely changed despite several ‘modifications’.

Instead of treating 1969, 1984, 1992, and 2002 as roadblocks that should force us to change the direction we are heading in, the press sees them merely as speed-breakers and after the mandatory deceleration they continue down the beaten track.

This is evident in the way in which the word ‘community’ pervades reportage. A sample from the Shahpur coverage: ‘The police said the trouble began late on Saturday evening following an alleged attack on a religious rally by members of another community… Some Congress leaders, however, alleged that the police were deliberately harassing members of a community, but the police denied this.’

There can be very little doubt about the ‘communities’ in question, so what exactly has this vagueness achieved? How are we countering prejudice by resorting to stereotypes? If encouraging readers to make subjective interpretations is meant to be objective journalism, at best it is naiveté, at worst it speaks of complicity in the perpetuation of prevalent power structures. Is there any evidence of such a contradictory approach having led to communal harmony?

Then there is the issue of the definition of a community, in essence ‘a unified body of individuals.’ The conflation of community and religious identity is a misrepresentation. This has been acknowledged by major newspapers across the world. As Ian Mayes, former readers’ editor of the Guardian, notes, “This use of ‘community’ tends to imply that there isn’t a diversity of opinion. To the extent that we can be said to be members of communities, we are members of many at once: for example, the community of one’s workmates, or sports team, or TV show discussion forum.”

Further the positing of ‘communities’ as equal entities, without taking into account the power dynamics and existing discriminatory patterns is misleading. A community, whether religious or not, does not exist outside of the State and society. At a time when ‘cultural nationalists’ are rewriting the state’s past so as to make the future more homogenised, minorities are constantly under threat.

The media cannot afford to treat communal violence as an aberrant in an otherwise peaceful society. It must acknowledge the daily tensions and struggles that underlie this violence and the forces that manipulate them.

Neerja Dasani works with the Spaces Foundation, Chennai.

 


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