Godhra, Gujarat: Gujarat’s Godhra has earned infamy more than once. First with the burning of the train carrying kar sevaks in 2002. Then with widespread rioting that followed and the gang rape of Bilkis Bano and murder — according to the prosecution — of 14 members of her family, including her three-year-old daughter Saleha. A third more recent instance, was when the 11 convicted in the Bilkis Bano case were released following a remission of their sentence, and welcomed back ceremonially. All of these make Godhra a super-sensitive and most prestigious political fight in this month’s Gujarat assembly elections.
Helped along mostly by the Muslim vote that accounts for more than 30 per cent of the electorate here according to the electoral rolls, Congress has won this seat often. But today, it is the one seat the BJP — and more so the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) — wants to win. You can see this easily as you explore the constituency.
Phrases like “Hinduvaad (Hindu sentiments)”, “rashtravaad (nationalism)”, “Hindu party”, “Bali dan of Ram bhakts (the sacrifice of Ram devotees)” versus the “return of Bilkis Bano’s rapists” dominate the campaign. The constituency will vote in the second phase of polling on 5 December.
For the RSS and BJP cadres, it is their true karmabhoomi (work arena). The land of “sacrifice and retribution (balidaan and pratikar )”. “Hinduvaad, rashtravaad” are the real issues for them in Godhra after two decades of “balidaan of Ram bhakts”. “Only a Hindu party can only bring and retain peace here. Muslims know that too,” said Rajesh Bhai Joshi, Sanghachalak (chief) of RSS in Panchmahal district, which includes five assembly constituencies, including Godhra.
For others, it is a call for justice and a hope that the verdict will punish political forces on the Hindutva side rather than reward them. They are up against the entire might of the RSS and its affiliates.
“In the past 20 years, there has been no curfew, and no communal tension despite innumerable provocations. The number of (RSS) shakhas (branches) has increased manifold in the districts since the riots,” said a senior functionary. “Our seva karya (service) during the Covid pandemic brought us closer to people,” he added.
A second senior Sangh functionary added: “We have supplied oxygen, medicines and food to people, and Muslims helped us. We performed the last rites of over 200 people including Muslims and Christians. Narendra Bhai (Prime Minister Narendra Modi) knows our people by name. We need to establish Hinduvaad here firmly.”
An analysis of Godhra’s past election data reveals that the seat has always seen neck-and-neck fierce battles between the Congress and the BJP and the winning margin has never crossed 3000 votes since 2002.
This time around are 10 candidate in the fray in Godhra, five of whom are Muslims. This includes the All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) candidate, Mufti Hasan Shabbir Kacahba. The party is a new entrant here. The other four Muslim candidates are independents.
The BJP, Congress and Aam Aadmi Party have all fielded Hindu candidates.
The BJP, popularly referred to as just the “Hindu party” in Godhra, won the seat in 2002, in the elections that followed the riots. It has since twice lost the seat to the Congress, by a narrow margin of 2000 to 3000 votes.
But political and ideological identities are flexible here. C.K. Raulji, the BJP’s candidate in Godhra, has won the seat five times — twice as a Congress candidate, twice as a BJP candidate and once as a Janata Dal candidate. Raulji who headed the Kar Seva organisation for Panchmahal district in 1991, a year before the Babri Masjid in Ayodhya was demolished, started his political career fighting the elections for Godhra Tehsil as an independent in the 80s.
He later joined BJP under the mentorship of former Gujarat Chief Minister Shankersinh Vaghela, and shifted parties with him, from the BJP to the RJP (Rashtriya Janta Party) to Congress. Raulji won in Godhra in 2007 and 2012 as a Congress candidate and joined BJP in 2017. He won in 2017 too, but with a mere 258 votes.
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Balidan, pratikar, and ‘yug purush Modi ji’
Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath was the first BJP star campaigner in Godhra this year and held a road show in the area Tuesday, with hundreds of supporters on bikes and a bulldozer.
Addressing the rally in Godhra he said, “Ram bhakts were sacrificed in Godhra 20 years ago and then the country got the yug purush, Modi ji who saved the nation. It is because of the sacrifice of Ram bhakts, that the Ram Mandir is now being built in Ayodhya. The Ram temple is Bharat’s samman (respect) to the Ram bhakts who were burnt to death here”.
The burning of the Sabarmati Express carrying the kar sevaks in 2002, the curfews and Godhra riots that followed and the Bilkis Bano case, are the constant refrains in the election campaign by all the parties here. While the Congress and AIMIM talk about Raulji as the one who referred to Bano’s rapists as Brahmins with good “sanskar” (culture), the BJP mentions the Godhra incident as the “balidaan and pratikar (sacrifice and revenge) for Hinduvaad”.
“There is no development related issue in Godhra. The most important and effective issue is Hindutva. The convicts in the Bilkis Bano case are members of RSS and VHP (Vishwa Hindu Parishad). Three of them are Brahmins, while four of them are ST (scheduled tribes). They worked with us as swayamsevaks. We all know that they are innocent and framed. They too need justice,” said a third senior sangh functionary.
Talking to ThePrint in his farmhouse in a village in Godhra Tuesday, Raulji introduced himself as an astute RSS worker, who believed in its ideology and called the Congress a “directionless” party that he joined with his mentor Vaghela. He returned to the BJP in 2017.
Raulji triggered a controversy in August, when he referred to the convicts in the Bilkis Bano case as Brahmins with good “sanskar“. He was among the seven-member Godhra Jail Advisory Committee, which recommended remission for the 11.
“I was not the only member who recommended remission. The collector was heading the committee and there were six other members. The recommendation passed through several processes of judicial scrutiny and then granted. I do not want to comment further on the case,” said Raulji.
He added: “I have worked with different parties during crucial phases. I know how politicians of different parties think and work. I have a connection with people and that is across Hindu and Muslim communities. I won here as an independent, as a Janta Dal candidate, as a Congress candidate and also as a BJP candidate. There is no scope for any dent in the BJP vote bank.”
RSS checks out the ‘other’ side
Meanwhile, the RSS is trying hard to penetrate the Muslim-dominanted side of Godhra town, Palam Bazar. Godhra constituency comprises about 30 per cent Muslim voters, but Godhra town, which is at the centre of the seat, has a 52 per cent Muslim population, said Raulji.
“There are around 57,000 Muslim voters in Palam Bazar. The AIMIM campaign is only restricted to that area.” According to the voters’ list, the constituency has a total of 2.58 lakh voters.
Ramjaani Jujura, a member of the BJP’s minority morcha and the party’s state executive in Gujrat, flaunted his saffron identity by the BJP wristband, mobile sticker, mobile stand he used.
Jujura lives in the Muslim-dominated area of Palam Bazar and at least two of his family members were accused in the 2002 train-burning incident.
Sitting in his house, Jujura, a Gujarat High Court advocate, said that he has been a part of BJP since 1995. “I have been a devoted worker of the BJP. I believe in the sangh ideology of rashtravad.”
He added: “I am a devout Muslim too and read Namaaz five times. My uncle spent nine years in Sabarmati Jail as an accused in the Sabarmati Express burning case. He was acquitted in 2011. My nephew, who was a minor then, was arrested and is still in jail. I want to request Modi ji to release all of them now, so that Muslims can also join the mainstream.”
Jujura claimed his house and office had been attacked multiple times and stones were pelted at his office and house as recently as last week by local miscreants. “My sangh brothers and police administration protects me,” he said.
Jujura’s 79-year-old uncle, Inayat, was accused in the train-burning case and was arrested in February 2002. He spent nearly a decade in Sabarmati jail, before being acquitted in 2011. He had been booked under Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections for murder, attempt to murder, rioting and criminal conspiracies.
Talking to The Print Inayat said, ” I was a state government employee, working in the irrigation department. I was picked up by local police around 4 pm while returning from the office. There was no interrogation and no hearing, I was directly sent to jail. In the past nine years, I only had four hearing sessions before the court. I am now a BJP supporter, because I do not want to stray away from the mainstream and as Congress keeps decimating, there is no one to protect us. I appeal to the government to consider the cases of others accused and at least grant them bail.”
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Divided challengers
Post-2002, Congress maintained a steady vote share of around 41 per cent and above in the region. Even though there are new stakeholders like AAP and AIMIM, veterans of both BJP and Congress feel that it is a bipolar fight, where AAP has no space and AIMIM may cut into the Congress’ Muslim vote bank by a few thousands.
“The main poll plank is the BJP’s communal thought process. Godhra has been bearing with the pain for the past 20 years. Post-2002, we have been winning here and in 2017 we lost by merely 258 votes. This time we will win here again. The sitting MLA and the BJP candidate have also shown their real face and their sanskar by calling the convicted people sanskari. People will not fall prey to the same sinister campaign anymore,” said Dushyantsingh Chauhan, the Congress’ pradesh delegate and Godhra in-charge.
Talking about his Hindu credentials, he added, “We are Kshatriya and Ram bhakt, Shiv bhakt. We do not need BJP to teach us Hindutva.”
He alleged: “Muslim brothers know that AIMIM is a helping hand of BJP. Wherever BJP is in trouble, they get AIMIM and as an election mercenary.”
Meanwhile, AIMIM candidate, Mufti Hasan Shabbir Kacahba, said his party had already made its presence felt in the Godhra municipal elections last year, when it won in seven of eight seats it contested. The urban body has 44 seats.
“The Congress is so insecure of us, that they do not even get tired of calling us BJP’s B team. They are not thekedar of Muslims. Hindus are also supporting us especially after they saw how BJP MLA supported the rapists of Bilkis Bano,” said Kachaba.
(Edited by Poulomi Banerjee)
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