REPLAY OF BABRI MASJID?
TOMB RAIDERS

The image of Goans as a peace loving, fiercely secular, people was shattered with the arrest of 21 Goan hooligans in Maharashtra armed with dagger and trishuls. Their mission was to join other Vishwa Hindu Parishad hooligans set to demolish the tomb of Afzal Khan in Pratapgarh. RAJAN NARAYAN laments the spread of the saffron plague.

SEVERAL SECTIONS OF THE media including 'the newspaper you can trust' made the alarming, horrifying revelation that 21 Goan Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) activists armed with trishuls and other deadly weapons were arrested at Mahad, in Maharashtra. They were part of a group of 41 VHP activists from Goa on a mission to desecrate, demolish and vandalise the 17th century tomb of Mughal chieftain Afzal Khan in Pratapgarh.

I understand that Goa's demolition squad was led by none other than the state VHP chief, Subhash Velingkar. Subash Velingkar ironically was awarded the Presidential award for Outstanding Teacher on 5th September, Teacher's Day. Incidentally, Velingkar heads Vidhya Prabodhini which was in the news lately when a professor teaching at the school allegedly molested one of his students.

Cover story. . . (Goan Observer, Sep 18-24, 2004.)

The VHP demolition squad was inspired or provoked or instigated to join the Afzal Khan tomb demolition mission by another ‘notorious’ Goan. Ashok Chowgule who is the VHP Supremo of Maharashtra and Goa. Ashok Chowgule had served notice that the saffron vandals would march to Pratapgarh and demolish the tomb of Afzal Khan at a press conference held in Panjim on August 26th. At the press conference Ashok Chowgule had allegedly boasted that 30,000 VHP cadres including a 200- member goon delegation from Goa would participate in the unholy, illegal and anti-social act of demolishing the tomb of Afzal Khan. We are not really surprised as the Sangh Parivar has for sometime developed a taste for necrophilia. Let alone the living they will not even let the dead rest in peace.

In a chilling replay of the demolition of the Babri Masjid over a decade ago the VHP goons decided to go ahead with the demolition of Afzal Khan’s tomb in defiance of the order of the Bombay High Court on September 5 th directing the state government and all potential and aspiring vandalisers to maintain the status quo. Which meant that the tomb was not to be touched. Given the competition in Maharashtra to polarise voters along communal lines, but for the court order the NCP-Congress government which also swears by Shivaji, may well have stood silently while the tomb was being demolished.

BABRI MASJID
It will be recalled that in the case of the Babri Masjid demolition also the then BJP Chief Minister, Kalyan Singh, had given a solemn undertaking that the Masjid would not be damaged or demolished. And though the then Congress Prime Minister, P V Narasimha Rao, had advance warning from intelligence agencies that the state police would abet and collude in the demolition of the Babri Masjid, he did not take any preventive action. In fact even the central security forces stood by idle.

The absurd part of the latest exercise of saffron hooliganism is that the land for the tomb was gifted to the family of Afzal Khan by Shivaji Maharaj himself. Shivaji Maharaj may have had no compunctions about using his vagnak claw to kill or atleast fatally wound Afzal Khan. After all, all is far in love and war. But Shivaji Maharaj was a very gracious king and would not grudge even his enemy a tomb worthy of his status. By seeking to demolish the tomb of Afzal Khan the VHP hooligans in fact are insulting Shivaji Maharaj and the tradition of chivalry and charity and honour that has always characterised the great Hindu Kings.

The arrest of the VHP cadres from Goa dramatises to what extent the saffron plague has spread in the state under the patronage of the Chief minister Manohar Parrikar. In sharp contrast to the Chief Minister’s silence and complicity in sending armed VHP hooligans to demolish Afzal Khan’s tomb, it will be recalled that Parrikar had distanced himself from the VHP yatra launched from Divar by Ashok Singhal and others in 1999 to demand an apology from Portugal for the excesses committed during the inquisition.

When the BJP consolidated its position, the Chief Minister, Manohar Parrikar, very quickly dropped his Mukda and brandished his passion for Hindutva in its most fanatical avatar. It will be recalled that in the year 2002 after returning to power for the second time the Chief Minister participated in the traditional RSS Dushera rally held at the Campal maidan. The Chief Minister in a vehement assertion of his historical ties with the RSS, attended the rally in the traditional RSS uniform of khaki shorts and white shirt and black topi. Complete with the danda which all RSS cadres carry before graduating to the Trishul.

The Sangh Parivar and its frontal organisations like the RSS and VHP has spread like the weed which have been choking the lakes of Goa. But then we are not surprised because the lotus always flourishes in the cesspool. In the case of Goa, a cesspool created and maintained by the Congress. Before the BJP captured power by toppling the Sardinha government and engineering defections in the Congress the Hegdewar School occupied a hole in the corner near the Mahalaxmi temple. Thanks to the generous patronage of the former sanchalak, Manohar Parrikar, the Hegdewar school has not only taken over the former Planning Development Authority offices in Mala but encroached on the grounds which are used to impart or rather indoctrinate young people in the politics of hate.

Similarly under the benign patronage and encouragement of the Parrikar led government the Vidya Prabodhini – the RSS educational trust - has also grown and flourished. At the height of the molestation controversy the VHP chief, Subhash Velingkar, who heads the Vidya Prabhodini boasted of how four or was it eight schools were handed over to the Sangh Parivar in appreciation of its contribution to “value based” education. Which presumably includes training in demolition of historical monuments.

Since the BJP came to power the saffron brigade has become a law unto itself. The saffron brigade has been guilty of several acts of omission and commission ranging from the desecration of the Masjid in Socorro to the more recent vandalisation of the Mapsua hotel of Mathew Braganza. Though preliminary police investigation into the desecration of the masjids at Socorro allegedly implicated senior VHP functionaries no action was taken and presumably the case has been closed. Unlike in the case of the desecration of Hindu idols in Sanguem the Chief Minister Manohar Parrikar did not consider it necessary to visit the Masjid and reassure the minority community that justice would be done.

Further evidence that the saffron brigade has nothing to fear from the Parrikar government and can go about bending and breaking the law with impunity is the fact that no arrest have been made in the incidents of vandalisation of street name plates and house plaques in Fontainhas. None of the RSS activists who participated in the attacks on Mathew Braganza’s hotel have been even arrested let alone charge-sheeted. All that happened was the token arrest of the Law Minister, Francis D’Souza, who in any case is expendable because he is not considered a staunch Sangh Parivar man.

Afzal Khan's tomb at Pratapgarh.

I understand that the Sangh Parivar has virtually taken over the Divar island and with the collusion and collaboration of the Chief Minister, Manohar Parrikar. It is going full speed ahead with its conversion of Divar into the Kashi of the East. During the Bonderam festival I understand that RSS cadres went about warning Hindu families not to take part in the Bonderam festival which the Sangh Parivar sees as a catholic festival. Reportedly the Sangh Parivar is also lobbying very hard for banning the carnival. Of course in the case of the carnival the church would be equally enthusiastic in supporting the ban.

The participation and the arrest of VHP activists from Goa, with deadly weapons in their possession in Mahad should serve as a wake up call to all Goans. The Sangh Parivar has for quite sometime now been claiming that several minority institutions have come up on the ruins of Hindu temples. If left unchecked there is every risk that VHP hooligans may target minority community monuments within the state.

The conspiracy to demolish the tomb of Afzal khan and the open participation of the VHP cadres in the act of desecration and vandalisation makes its imperative to halt the spread of the saffron plague. It makes it imperative for all secular minded forces in Goa irrespective of caste community and creed to ensure the defeat of BJP’s mercenary in Poinguinim Isidore Fernandes. If the BJP in the state succeeds in capturing power on its own it may convert the whole of Goa into a Goshala and inject the veins of our children with communal poison.

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