We Have No Orders to Save You - Human Rights Watch

ensure that [Hindus’] sisters-daughters do not fall into the ‘love-trap’ of Muslim boys” and called on Hindus to
vote, but “only for him who will protect the Hindu nation.” 258
According to a February 2003 report in the Bombay-based periodical Communalism Combat, a year after the
beginning of the violence, economic and social boycotts were still widespread in ten out of Gujarat’s twenty-four
districts:
In most areas of Ahmedabad and Vadodara and villages of Gandhinagar, Vadodara rural, Anand,
Panchmahal, Mehsana, Kheda and Dahod, insidious economic and social boycott continues to
cripple the Muslim minority that is still reeling from the effects of last year’s brutal violence. It is
only the villages and areas that have a sizeable Muslim population that has built up a steely
resistance to the politics of hatred and division through the security of numbers — ghettoisation is
the stark solution in post-carnage Gujarat. 259
Many Muslims remain unable to farm their fields, sell their wares, return to their businesses, operate commercial
vehicles, or retain their jobs, including in the public sector. 260 Janvikas director Gagan Sethi explained the
relevance of the illicit liquor trade in Gujarat—a dry state—to the violence, and the rationale behind the economic
boycotts:
There is a Hindu mafia and a Muslim mafia in Gujarat. Muslims controlled illicit liquor trade in
Gujarat until Latif was killed. 261 When you control the liquor and the mafia, then you have
money. So in previous riots both sides used to fight. In the past ten years, Muslims have been
taken out of the liquor trade. Dalits have come up with active VHP-BJP support. 262 So when this
riot happened, it was the last bit, the Muslims were removed from their money and muscle.
That’s why it was one-sided…. The main liquor dens are in Ahmedabad and Baroda. From there
the branches flow…. There are two ways to kill a trade. For example, Muslims dominate in the
wholesale fruit trade. You can either kill the source in Ahmedabad or see to it that the retailers
cannot sell them because of economic boycotts. Slowly, non-Muslims start to take over small
trades in villages. What will and won’t be boycotted is decided by the VHP at the local level
where the VHP is the empowered economic goon. Ultimately, the independent fiefdom of VHP
goons at the local level are run with blessings from the top. 263
Shah-e-Alam camp resident R. Bibi told Human Rights Watch that like many others, her two sons were having a
hard time finding work because of their Muslim names:
They don’t give business or employment to Muslims. Even now they’re not giving work to
anybody with a Muslim name. Even my own sons are unemployed and just roaming around here
and there. They don’t have any work to do. One of them used to do welding work, and the other
one was a rickshaw driver, and even the one that was killed used to have a rickshaw. Now
nobody is giving work. They are saying, “Go, there is no work for you.” Even my son who has
two young children doesn’t have a job. Now he’s gone to his in-laws’ home, he doesn’t know
what else to do. And what is he supposed to do, where would he go? Where will we go? We
even had shops in Naroda Patia, but they haven’t opened them up yet. There’s no public to go to
258 The full text of the pamphlet can be found at http://www.hrw.org/reports/2002/india/India0402-10.htm (retrieved June 1,
2003).
259 Setalvad, “Gujarat—One year later.”
260 International Initiative for Justice in Gujarat, “An Interim Report,” p. 4.
261 Abdul Latif was a mafia leader in Ahmedabad who controlled the illicit liquor trade in the eighties and won several
municipal elections as an independent. “When pride is prejudice,” Indian Express, June 4, 2002.
262 For more on the recruitment of Dalits by the sangh parivar, see Chapter XI.
263 Human Rights Watch interview with Gagan Sethi, Ahmedabad, January 5, 2003.
HUMAN RIGHTS WATCH 49 JULY 2003, Vol. 15, No. 3 (C)