We Have No Orders to Save You - Human Rights Watch

The main accused are giving them threats saying, “We will file cases against you if you move
forward with your testimony.” When the victims call the police and say, “Arrest the accused,
they are threatening us,” the police respond by saying, “That’s our work, you leave it alone.” The
police are also being bribed. They don’t use the names of the accused and they don’t testify in
court. No families have returned to Gulbarg Society. It looks exactly as it did months ago. Their
residences are not livable. 64
Human Rights Watch spoke to one such witness whose son has been missing since the attack on Gulbarg Society.
A police sub-inspector (PSI) visited the witness in her home and promised that he would help locate her son. In
return, he asked her to sign a piece of paper stating that the police came to save the victims in Gulbarg Society.
The witness told Human Rights Watch what happened next:
I said I wouldn’t sign it and he ripped up the paper. Then he brought another piece of paper
saying that if the police hadn’t arrived at 5:30 p.m. then we all would have been killed. He asked
me to do this because he said that his job was at stake, and that he would be transferred. 65
The attorney helping her with her case explained that the police sub-inspector had been implicated in “private
firing” on the crowd earlier in the day, that is, not as a police officer. The attorney claims that a statement from
the witness stating that he arrived after 5:30 p.m. would help clear those charges. 66 A total of eighteen
eyewitnesses have submitted sworn affidavits to the trial court hearing the case detailing other blatant attempts to
subvert the Gulbarg Society investigations. 67
The problems associated with the Naroda Patia and Gulbarg Society investigations, including the harassment of
witnesses, are also found in other parts of the state. During their visit to Gujarat to determine the feasibility of
holding early elections, members of India’s Election Commission documented similar patterns from almost all of
the twelve districts that they covered. According to the Election Commission report:
Everywhere there were complaints of culprits of the violence still moving around scot-free
including some prominent political persons and those on bail. These persons threaten the
displaced affected persons to withdraw cases against them, failing which they would not be
allowed to return to their homes. In Dhakor (Kheda District), the team was told by a delegation,
in the presence of senior police officers and the district administration authorities, that the culprits
had been identified before the police but no arrests had taken place and the main culprits
continued to threaten the villagers to withdraw their FIRs. The team has cited many other such
cases from almost all the 12 districts covered by them. 68
In Gujarwaha village in Sabarkantha district one Muslim family had resided amidst 3,000 Hindu households for
over thirty years. When the mobs came, Zubeida Razak Memom and her family members ran to hide in the
fields. Zubeida filed an FIR against the villagers who burned down her house. In turn the villagers filed a
complaint against her alleging that she poisoned the village well. They threatened more trouble if she dared to
return to the village; she had no plans to go back. 69
64 Human Rights Watch interview with attorney (name withheld), Ahmedabad, January 3, 2003.
65 Human Rights Watch telephone interview with Gulbarg Society witness (name withheld), Ahmedabad, January 3, 2003.
66 Human Rights Watch interview with attorney (name withheld), Ahmedabad, January 3, 2003.
67
Teesta Setalvad, “Gujarat—One year later,” Communalism Combat , April 2003 [online],
www.sabrang.com/cc/archive/2003/apr03/cover1.html (retrieved May 20, 2003).
68 Election Commission of India, “Press note: General Elections to the Gujarat Legislative Assembly,” August 16, 2002, p. 24
[online] http://www.eci.gov.in/press/current/PN_16082002.pdf (retrieved June 5, 2003) [hereinafter Election Commission of
India, “Press Note.”].
69 Habitat International Coalition, Youth for Unity and Voluntary Action, Rebuilding From The Ruins:
HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH 21 JULY 2003, Vol. 15, No. 3 (C)