Tag: Madhya Pradesh election

Voting for 5 State Elections Spread Over November, Results on December 3: EC

Elections will be held across November in the states of Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Telangana and Mizoram.

New Delhi: The date of counting of votes in assembly elections to five states in India is December 3, the Election Commission has announced today, October 9.

In the same press conference, the Chief Election Commissioner, Rajiv Kumar, when asked by a reporter as to when elections to Jammu and Kashmir will be announced, said they will be done “at the right time.” The Union Territory has not had an elected government in the last five years.

The Election Commission announced that Mizoram will go to polls on November 7.

Chhattisgarh will go to polls on November 7 and 17. It is the only state which will have a two-phased election.

In Madhya Pradesh, the date of polling will be November 17.

Rajasthan will go to polls on November 23.

Telangana will go to polls on November 30.

The entire election process will be complete by December 5, the Election Commission said.

There are 679 assembly constituencies in five states, which is around one-sixth of total legislative assembly constituencies in the country. They will have have 16 crore electors which is almost one-sixth of the total electors in the country

In Madhya Pradesh Ahead of Polls, PM Modi Pitches Ravidas Against Mughals

The poet and philosopher had been against institutionalised caste hierarchy. In Sagar, which has a Dalit population of over 21%, Modi’s invocation of Ravidas had a clear purpose.

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on August 12 remembered medieval-era Bhakti poet Sant Ravidas for his “courage” and “patriotism” during the Mughal period when, according to Modi, Indian society grappled with “assaults on its faith” and attempts to “erase its identity.”

Modi made the remarks after launching several projects in poll-bound Madhya Pradesh. It included him laying the foundation stone of a memorial dedicated to Ravidas, a poet and philosopher who stood against institutionalised caste hierarchy.

Modi performed the bhoomi pujan (rituals for the consecration of the grounds) for the Sant Shiromani Gurudev Shri Ravidas ji Memorial at an event in Sagar, a district located in the Bundelkhand region of the state.

Ravidas is revered by a large number of Dalits, especially in northern states such as Punjab and Uttar Pradesh. The Bundelkhand region of MP, consisting of seven districts, has a Dalit population much above the state average of 15.6% (as per the 2011 Census). Thus the building pf memorials and the promotion of popular Dalit icons has over the years emerged as a strategy of the Bharatiya Janata Party to woo voters.

In Sagar, which has a Dalit population of over 21%, Modi evoked a popular couplet of Ravidas which speaks against the idea of “paradheenta” or dependence and connected it with present India’s spirit of rejecting the “mentality of slavery.”

“Paradheenta paap hai, jaan lehu re meet. Raidas paradheen sau, kaun kare hain preet.”

Roughly translated, it means: dependency is a big sin and those who accept it and do not take a stand against it are not loved by anybody.

The PM started by describing the Mughal period as one when the Indian society faced “instability, persecution and oppression.” Even during those days, Modi said, Ravidas tried to awaken the society and teach it how to fight against its evil practices:

“When there were assaults on our faith, when restrictions were being imposed on us to erase our identity, even in those days – during the Mughal-period – look at the courage and patriotism with which Ravidas ji said [the couplet]…”

Modi said that Ravidas’s teachings had provided the society with the strength to fight oppression and that even Maratha ruler Chhatrapati Shivaji had used it as an inspiration to lay the foundation of “Hindavi Swarajya” or self-rule of Indian people. The spirit continued to flow through the efforts of lakhs of freedom fighters during the 1857 struggle against the British and today, the nation was moving forward “with the same spirit of liberation and rejecting the mentality of slavery,” Modi said.

At the event, Modi elaborated on some schemes that had benefitted people from the Scheduled Castes, Scheduled Tribes and Other Backward Class communities.” These groups have been the biggest beneficiaries of the welfare schemes run by the government for the poor,” he said.

In the 2018 assembly election, the Congress secured more seats than the BJP and managed to form a government in the state with the help of the Bahujan Samaj Party, the Samajwadi Party and four independent winners.

However, in 2020, the BJP led by Shivraj Singh Chouhan, toppled the Kamal Nath government after almost two dozen Congress MLAs resigned and shifted loyalty to the saffron party. Barring the one-year stint of Kamal Nath in between, Chouhan has been at the helm of the state for almost last 17 years.

Given that the BJP and Chouhan are battling fatigue and possible anti-incumbency, the saffron party would need to perform reasonably better in regions such as Bundelkhand where the Congress and the two Uttar Pradesh-based parties, Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party had a decent run in the last election.

The Ravidas memorial would be constructed in an area of more than 11.25 acres at a cost of Rs 100 crore. It will include an art museum and a gallery to showcase his life, philosophy and teachings.

Don’t Be Fooled by the Apologies, They Love Godse and Hate Gandhi

While Gandhi-bashing ought not to surprise us anymore, praising his assassin takes matters to a different dimension.

Throughout election season, I have been determined not to allow the negativity of the prevalent political culture to get to me. Yet, there are moments when it becomes exceedingly difficult to suppress the deep pain I experience as I see the likes of Pragya Singh Thakur valorising Nathuram Godse. Even though she seems to have ‘apologised’, and Narendra Modi has expressed his ‘anguish’ over her statement, the fact remains that in this age of loud and toxic politics, the violence that Godse embodied has become the new normal – and all that Gandhi represented, it seems, has to be ridiculed and laughed at.

Well, Gandhi-bashing is not new. Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi is known for his ‘experiments’ in diverse sites of his spiritually engaged and politically active life – from Tolstoy Farm in South Africa to Noakhali in undivided Bengal, his determined urge to see politics as a field of spiritual practice, and his art of resistance which differed sharply from the gospel of hyper-masculine/’radical’ violence. It is natural that such a man would evoke diverse reactions and emotions. His enemies were no less than his admirers.

Also read: Sadhvi Pragya as BJP Candidate: How the SC Missed an Opportunity to Cleanse Politics

Gandhi-bashing ought not to surprise us anymore. Ambedkarites do it quite frequently as they suspect savarna Gandhi’s approach to the caste question; the writer Arundhati Roy further glamourises this ‘anti-Gandhi’ campaign. But praising his assassin takes matters to a different dimension. What Pragya Singh Thakur’s statement indicates is that the dominant ideology of Hindutva-induced nationalism wants Gandhi to die every moment. Occasionally, Modi and his lieutenants can ‘praise’ the Mahatma and try to sell the ‘brand’ for their instrumental interests. But the fact is that they cannot stand Gandhi. What adds to the tragedy is that even many ‘progressive’ and ‘secular’ individuals are not very sincere in their engagement with Gandhi.

Why is this so? There are two primary reasons. First, the toxic political culture that the ruling regime has been nurturing since 2014 has aroused and activated our brute instincts. Its manifestations are diverse and many. Look at Amit Shah’s road shows, including the last one in Kolkata, his body language and gestures. See how the Prime Minister loses the grace of the position and resorts to the language of abuse we often hear in road side dhabas.  When the top leaders begin the process, why should a Pragya Singh Thakur learn to control what she says? Why should the BJP’s cadres not indulge in vulgar social media campaigns or everyday violence? What worries me is that this pathology is infectious. Indeed, the tragedy is that even the opposition –  Mamata Banerjee is a good example – begins to see the BJP as the ‘intimate enemy’, to use Ashis Nandy’s term, and imitates the same culture of negative campaigning, abusive language and street violence. In an environment of this kind, Gandhi is an embarrassment; you need a Godse to kill him time and again. Pragya Singh Thakur is a cumulative expression of this mood.

Also read: BJP Scrambles for Cover as Pragya Thakur Brands Gandhi’s Assassin a ‘Patriot’

Second, the doctrine of Hindutva – developed by Golwalkar and Savarkar, politicised by Vajpayee and Advani, and weaponised by the Amit Shah-Narendra Modi duo – is the anti-thesis of Gandhi’s nuanced and creative engagement with Hinduism, Christianity and Islam. It has nothing to do with Gandhi’s anashakti yoga, his engagement with Tolstoy and Ruskin, his cross-religious dialogue, and his ability to see the futility of violence even in the Bhagavadgita.

In fact, the ‘soul force’ that Gandhi sought to activate through his political pilgrimage in Champaran and Ahmedabad, Noakhali and Kolkata, and Bihar and Delhi is something that the proponents of ‘brute force’ – the ‘social engineers’ of the 2002 massacre – would never understand. (What happened in Gujarat cannot be overlooked because there was yet another grotesque act in 1984 perpetuated by another political group). Let us be clear: No matter how they pretend, or excel in their dramaturgical performance – and Modi knows this art pretty well, as his ‘condemnation’ of Pragya Thakur’s comment tends to create the impression that he is a saintly figure, a follower of Gandhi – the fact is that they love Godse, and hate Gandhi.

On May 23, we will finally get to know the results of this ‘historic’ election. However, irrespective of the outcome, one thing is certain. The collective degeneration the past five years have brought will take a much longer time to be reversed.

Avijit Pathak is a Professor of Sociology at JNU

Watch | Babri Demolition a Big Mistake, Says Ayodhya Karsevak

Rakesh Kumar, who was in his teens in 1992 when the Babri Masjid was demolished, recounts his active participation and explains why he thinks it was wrong.

Rakesh Kumar was in his teens in 1992 when the Babri Masjid was demolished.

He recounts his active participation in bringing down the structure. He vividly describes the day when over two lakh people gathered in Ayodhya chanting Lord Ram’s name.

Kumar admits what happened back then was wrong, contrary to the statement made by BJP’s Bhopal candidate Pragya Thakur who said that she is ‘proud of the demolition’. Even Prime Minister Narendra Modi was in Ayodhya this week, campaigning for Lok Sabha elections 2019.

Kumar blames religious politics for the lack development in Ayodhya.

EC Bars Pragya Thakur From Campaigning for 72 Hours for Karkare, Babri Remarks

The panel “strongly condemned” her remarks” and “warned her “not to repeat the misconduct in future”.

New Delhi: The Election Commission Wednesday barred BJP candidate from Bhopal Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur from campaigning for 72 hours for her remarks on former ATS chief Hemant Karkare and the Babri masjid demolition.

The panel “strongly condemned” her remarks” and “warned her “not to repeat the misconduct in future”.

The EC said though Thakur had apologised for her statement against the slain IPS officer, it found the statement to be “unwarranted”.

Also read: Sadhvi Pragya Was First Arrested in Terror Case by BJP Government, Not Congress

The ban would come into force from 6 am, May 2.

Thakur had said Karkare was killed in the 26/11 Mumbai terror attack because of her “curse” as he “tortured” her when he probed the Malegaon blast case as chief of the Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS).

She also had said that she was “proud” of her participation in the demolition of the Babri mosque at Ayodhya in 1992.

With Pragya Thakur Set to Contest Polls, Malegaon Victim’s Father Has No Hope for Justice

Nisar Ahmed had contested Thakur’s candidature in a special NIA court, but his application was rejected saying the matter was beyond its jurisdiction. 

Mumbai: For 59-year-old Nisar Ahmed Sayyed Billal, the nomination of Pragya Singh Thakur – the prime accused in the 2008 Malegaon blast case – as the BJP’s candidate for Bhopal Lok Sabha constituency, was the last straw. His 20-year-old son, Sayyed Azhar Nisar Ahmed was among the six killed in the blast.

Eleven years later, Nisar Ahmed says, his struggle for justice has been rendered meaningless with the ruling BJP government’s decision to appoint his son’s “killer” as its representative in the ongoing elections.

Speaking to The Wire over the phone from Malegaon, a small town in Nashik district, Nisar Ahmed says he has gone through a range of emotions in the past two weeks. “I have lost my young son in the blast. No one can even imagine what it means to lose someone so young in such a tragic way. But in the past ten years, I had not lost hope in the system. I always believed my son’s killers would be punished someday. I don’t feel the same anymore. Her (Thakur’s) nomination has made me hopeless,” he said.

Soon after Thakur’s candidature was announced, Nisar Ahmed, with the help of his lawyers, moved the special National Investigations Agency (NIA) court in Mumbai seeking its intervention in the matter. In his application, Nisar Ahmed had stated that Thakur should be barred from contesting the elections and also her bail be cancelled. Thakur, on spending nine years in Byculla prison, was granted bail by the Bombay high court on April 24, 2017.

Nisar Ahmed’s application has been rejected by the NIA court on the grounds that it does not have the jurisdiction to bar anyone from contesting elections. Nisar Ahmed says he expected better from the court.

“I had pointed at the false medical claims that Thakur has been making before the court and also the seriousness of the charges against her. She had claimed that she was ailing with (breast) cancer. But there she is moving around the city and talking to the press and making horrid comments on the slain police office (Hemant) Karkare. Yet, the court did not consider my application and it was rejected (on April 24),” he told The Wire.

Also read: Pragya Thakur and BJP’s Mockery of the Legal System

Thakur, upon filing her nomination, had made several obnoxious comments, including the one on Karkare’s death in the November 2008 Mumbai terror attack. “I told him, ‘You will be destroyed,’ and just over a month later, terrorists killed him,” Thakur could be heard saying to a crowd in a video released by news agency ANI, which also showed BJP leaders applauding her statement.

Nisar Ahmed recalls the investigation conducted in 2008 by the then ATS chief Hemant Karkare. “In no time, Karkare and his officers had identified the prime accused. Thakur and other Hindutva men were arrested in the case. He (Karkare) spared no one. Even a serving army man was arrested. And now all of them have been let out on bail and the case has shown no sign of progress,” he says.

Further accusing the NIA of watering down the strong case built by the ATS, he says: “As soon as the BJP government came into power, the NIA started slowly giving a clean chit to the accused. It went to the extent of claiming that the agency has no evidence to prosecute Thakur under MCOCA. This even when her motorcycle was used to carry out the blast,” he points out.

According to the ATS’s chargesheet, Thakur, a former ABVP activist, was the prime conspirator and her LML Freedom motorcycle was used to carry out the blast opposite one Shakil Goods Transport Company, killing six persons and injuring over 100 in the attack.

A scene from the blasts. Credit: PTI

The ATS case was considered to be fool-proof and it had made it difficult for the accused to avail bail. But as soon as the NIA stepped in, things changed. NIA’s special public prosecutor Rohini Salian had also accused the agency of manipulation with the accused and intentionally watering down the case. In 2014, the NIA had unceremoniously ousted Salian, who was handling two high-profile terror attacks – the Malegaon terror attacks of 2006 and 2008.

Also read: In Fielding Terror-Tainted Pragya Thakur, What Message is the BJP Sending?

Responding to Nisar Ahmed’s application, the NIA claimed it has no jurisdiction to initiate any action against an accused contesting election. However, strangely, it went out of its way to claim it has no case against Thakur.

Questioning NIA’s reasons behind mentioning that no case was maintainable against her, the special NIA judge V.S. Padalkar said:

“It is not known as to why this portion is included… by the investigating officer when there is no prayer by the intervener to that effect. This court had rejected her discharge application on December 27, 2017. Only after hearing the accused, the special public prosecutor and the intervener, had the court framed charges against her and other accused. This means that the court found some prima facie evidence in the chargesheet filed by the ATS (Anti-Terrorism Squad) though investigation was taken over by the NIA.”

The victim’s father had also challenged Thakur’s claim that she was suffering from breast cancer, one of the grounds under which her bail plea was accepted by the court. Nisar Ahmed, in his application, pointed to her active campaigns in Bhopal and how she had chosen an Ayurvedic hospital for treatment.

Top oncologists have also slammed Thakur’s claim of her medical condition and that she got cured through a combination of cow urine and other cow products. As quoted in the Mumbai Mirror, ex-JJ hospital dean T.P. Lahane, under whose watch she was examined in 2010, says her tests showed no signs of major ailments.

Nisar Ahmed says he isn’t giving up just yet. “I am urging the Jamiat Ulema-e-Hind (the organisation providing legal aid to the victims’ families) to travel with me to Bhopal and stop Thakur from winning the elections. I plan to meet as many voters as I can and tell them that they should vote for humanity.”

“Yeh ek mujrim insaan hain. Inki jagah jail main hain. Inko koi bhi vote na kare (She is an accused person. Her place is in jail. No one should vote for her,” he said he will tell this to the voters of Bhopal while urging them to vote wisely in the polls scheduled on May 12

Another EC Notice to Pragya Thakur, This Time for Bragging About Demolishing Babri Masjid

“I climbed up on the structure to raze it and I feel proud of this,” the BJP candidate from Bhopal had said.

New Delhi: On a day when she clarified her stand to the Election Commission on her comments about Mumbai anti-terror squad chief Hemant Karkare, Malegaon blast case accused and Bharatiya Janata Party candidate from Bhopal, Pragya Thakur, was served another notice by the district election office. This time, she has been questioned for her remark that she was “proud of the Babri Masjid demolition”.

The explanation has been sought by Bhopal district election officer Sudham Khade. The same DEO had earlier issued her a notice for violating the model code of conduct in connection with her statement on Karkare.

Thakur boasted that she participated in the demolition of the Babri mosque in Ayodhya in 1992. In a television interview, she was quoted as saying: “We will build a Ram temple and we will build an imposing (temple). We had gone there to demolish the structure. I climbed up on the structure to raze it and I feel proud of this. God had given strength to us and we removed a scar on the face of the country.”

`Babri statement in violation of MCC’

The DEO asked Thakur to explain the comment within a day. The notice issued by the officer said: “The statement seems to be in violation of chapter 4 of the model code of conduct which states ‘No activity, which may aggravate existing differences or create mutual hatred or cause tension between different caste/communities/religious/linguistic groups, shall be attempted’.”

He also issued an advisory to all political parties to refrain from using objectionable language during the campaign.

Also read: Pragya Thakur and BJP’s Mockery of the Legal System

Thakur has been quoted as saying in her defence that, “I talked of my Ram and religion. I will give a reply to the notice.”

Meanwhile, in response to the earlier notice on Karkare, she is reported to have stated that she has already taken back her statement. In a television programme, she was shown saying that Karkare died because of her “curse”.

‘I only described the torture inflicted on me’

In her defence, Thakur argued that she has “already taken back” her statement.

She also insisted that her statement was not a defamatory comment against Karkare, who was martyred in the 2008 Mumbai terror attack. Instead, Thakur said it was only a reference to how she was “tortured” during the previous Congress government in connection with the Malegaon blasts case.

“I didn’t pass defamatory comments against any martyr. I only described the torture inflicted on me on the orders of the then Congress government,” she told news agency ANI. “It’s my right to put before the public what had happened to me… But I have already taken back my statement.”

Also read: In Fielding Terror-Tainted Pragya Thakur, What Message is the BJP Sending?

However, her statement drew a lot of flak from all quarters and even her own party, BJP, distanced itself from it.

Incidentally, her claim that she was torture has been rebuffed in the past. A former public prosecutor in the case, Rohini Salian, had gone on record to state recently: “First, a trial court found no evidence of torture or illegal detention in the case. So they (the accused) challenged the verdict in the High Court, which went through all the records – including medical reports – and rejected her appeal too.”

Former top cops term statement despicable

Thakur’s attack on Karkare has also been criticised by eight former director generals of police. In a statement issued on Sunday, these officers – Julio Ribeiro, Prakash Singh, P.K.H. Tharakan, Kamal Kumar, Jacob Punoose, Sanjeev Dayal, Jayanto N. Choudhury. and N Ramachandran – termed her comments to be “unfortunate remarks” on an officer who fell to terrorist bullets while defending his country.

“He would probably be alive today had he not volunteered to return to the Maharashtra cadre from a plum posting at the Centre with the specific intention of working with the Anti-Terror Squad to prevent and investigate the activities of terrorists so that the rest of us could sleep safe in our beds,” the officers said.

They added that “the country owes him a huge debt of gratitude” and “anything that detracts from this is worthy of strong condemnation.”

“This despicable and regrettable statement of Pragya Thakur only serves to highlight the need to publicly recognise the supreme sacrifice made by the 35,000 police personnel from all corners of India who since Independence have laid down their lives in the line of duty,” the officers added.

Pragya Thakur and BJP’s Mockery of the Legal System

While it may be legal, it is unethical to nominate somebody undergoing a trial for the murder of six persons and injuring over a hundred.

Pragya Thakur – or ‘sadhvi’ Pragya as she is better known – is currently facing trial in the Malegaon blast case in which the special NIA judge framed charges against her for terror activities, criminal conspiracy and murder, among others. In this blast, six people were killed and 101 were injured.

Thakur is now the BJP’s candidate for the Lok Sabha elections from Bhopal. The saffron party appears to be revelling in the fact that the Mecca Masjid case in Hyderabad and the Samjhauta express case have both resulted in acquittals, all the while forgetting that in the Ajmer Dargah case, three people were convicted, including Sunil Joshi, who was supposedly the masterminds of all these blasts. Joshi was himself murdered prior to the initiation of these trials.

While being convicted in one case does not mean the person must be convicted in others as well, the BJP’s political line remains that the cases that are resulting in acquittals are false.

Further, in cases that have resulted in acquittals, the NIA – under the BJP government – failed to provide enough evidence in court through sheer negligence. An attempt to do the same was made in the Malegaon case as well.

While the BJP is claiming that all these cases are false, not a single case of departmental action, let alone a criminal case has been filed against those officers who, as per the party, framed these ‘innocent’ persons. This itself shows how much faith the BJP has in its own allegations against them.

Also read | Samjhauta Express Bombing: With a Prosecutor Like the NIA, Who Needs Defence?

While the BJP seems to be of the opinion that Pragya Thakur was ‘framed’, the special NIA judge has framed charges against her based on two facts. Firstly, the motorcycle used for carrying out the bomb blast –  in fact, the one on which the bomb was installed – was owned by her. Secondly, witnesses have stated that there was a meeting in Bhopal on April 11-12, 2008, to plan the blast and Thakur was a part of this meeting.

All this was a part of the investigation done by the ATS Maharashtra under late Hemant Karkare, and the probe was later transferred to the National Investigation Agency.

More importantly, an appeal against her bail is pending before the Supreme Court and she has repeatedly exempted herself from attending the trial on the grounds of ill health. Clearly, she is fit enough to contest an election but not to attend court. Considering that one of her bail conditions was to regularly attend court, this would be grounds for cancellation of bail.

Also, one can imagine the terror and fear felt by the witnesses and victims that an accused has been given a ticket for the Lok Sabha elections by the ruling party. There is little possibility of a fair trial under such circumstances. Of course, the trial has carried on until now only due to the diligence of the judges, despite many attempts by the NIA to release the main accused.

The attempts by the agency to save Thakur became known in 2014. After the government changed at the Centre in 2014, the then special prosecutor Rohini Salian came out publicly to say that there was pressure on her to ‘save’ the accused. Salian was transferred and the NIA started its attempts to derail the case by ultimately stating in court that all the witnesses had told the agency that they were forced to implicate Thakur and others.

Also read | Is the National Investigation Agency Sabotaging the Malegaon Blast Case?

The only problem was that all these witnesses had recorded statements before the magistrates and had made no such complaint at the time. Magistrates record statements only after ascertaining that there is no police pressure, yet these were sought to be ignored. In fact, there was a point in time when certain crucial witness statements were simply found to have disappeared from the court records.

Considering the history of this case, it is clear that nominating Thakur from Bhopal is a political move by the BJP, not necessarily because they think she is innocent, but because she is a useful tool for polarisation.

An undertrial can certainly contest elections, this is legal, but it is unethical and immoral to nominate somebody undergoing a trial for the murder of six persons and injuring over a hundred.

This is a message to the people and to the courts as well that the BJP will do as it pleases without taking into consideration the legal process or the victims of this bombing and their families. Internationally, when we are trying to isolate Pakistan, it gives the country an excuse to question India’s government and its legal system.

Such acts were earlier not given as much attention because they were being carried out by the fringe. Now, the fringe has become mainstream. The BJP’s attempt is that in a little more than a month, a woman facing  trial for terrorism should be sitting in parliament. Perhaps Thakur is innocent and if she is, she should certainly be free but that is a matter for the courts to decide.

The BJP has just shown the country how much it respects the legal system.

Sarim Naved is a practising lawyer in Delhi.

In Fielding Terror-Tainted Pragya Thakur, What Message is the BJP Sending?

The saffron party’s move is a part of a concerted electoral tactic that is premised on riling up majoritarian sentiments against other communities.

The 2019 Lok Sabha election campaign has set many alarming precedents. Fielding a candidate accused of terrorism is the latest one among them.

After turning Hindu majoritarianism into a key poll plank, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) fielded Pragya Singh Thakur, an accused in the 2008 Malegaon blast, as its nominee from the Bhopal Lok Sabha constituency in Madhya Pradesh. Thakur, facing trial under the draconian Unlawful Activities Prevention Act (UAPA), is currently out on bail. She has been pitted against Congress leader Digvijaya Singh, who has, on several occasions, accused the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) of promoting “Sanghi terror.”

On September 29, 2008, a bomb went off near a mosque in Malegaon, Maharashtra, killing six people and injuring dozens of others. Maharashtra’s Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) labelled Thakur one of the “principal conspirators” in the violence. Arrested in 2008, she spent nine years in jail. In 2015, a year after Narendra Modi became prime minister, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) changed tack and sought to drop the charges against her. However, the trial court refused to go along with the agency’s decision on the grounds that Thakur’s motorcycle was used in the blast.

Also read: Sadhvi Pragya Was First Arrested in Terror Case by BJP Government, Not Congress

Much like the Samjhauta Express blast case (which killed 68 people, of whom 43 were Pakistani citizens), the Malegaon case is marked by suspicious twists and turns gesturing towards institutional and political complicity. Nearly four years ago, Rohini Salian, a senior law officer and the special public prosecutor in the Malegaon case, made a public statement alleging that the Modi government was putting pressure on her to “go soft” on the case.

This is the first time a mainstream political party – that too a party ruling at the Centre – has fielded a candidate implicated in a terror case.

It may be argued that Indian politics is no stranger to fielding candidates implicated in incidents of violence, many of whom later go on to become legislators. We are well aware that political parties of all ideological stripes field candidates suspected of having a hand in riots, communal killings and various other acts of violence, which are collective as well as individualistic in nature.

In fact, these tainted candidates are picked as nominees for the very reasons that make them criminals in the eyes of the law.

It’s this very legacy of violence they carry that endears them to the party leadership and adds to their winning potential. The systemic perversion and popular acceptance of such candidates is a comment on the state of the political system, on those who preside over it as well as those who help them to get them to this position of supremacy. Pragya Singh Thakur’s candidacy is born out of this murky lineage.

It would be facile to compare and measure the degree of heinousness involved in riots or acts of terror. It would be cynical – even perverse – to ask which kind of violence is more heinous than others, which perpetrators are guiltier, which victims more traumatised, more deserving of justice. Yet, these are questions that have assumed urgency in the absence of political morality.

Moreover, the BJP has chosen to field a terror-tainted candidate at a time when the party is running a shrill campaign on the issue of national security. In fact, if there’s any dominant theme noticeable in the BJP’s campaign, it’s the prime minister’s repeated projection of himself and his party as the only guarantors of India’s national security. The contradictions underlining the BJP’s strident anti-terror campaign and the party’s deliberate move to field Thakur, who is herself implicated in an act of terror, are too glaring to ignore.

On the other hand, it may be argued that Thakur’s candidacy and BJP’s campaign around majoritarian nationalism are a chip off the same block. Throughout the Lok Sabha campaign so far, BJP leaders have played upon the “hurt Hindu” sentiment and tried to turn that sentiment into resentment and anger against Muslims. The poll narrative scripted by the BJP has been dominated by a “saint” and a “villain” situated at two ends of the political and ideological spectrum, each seeming to stand in for two religious communities. It’s necessary to locate Thakur’s candidacy within this larger BJP/RSS narrative to understand its implications.

Pragya Singh Thakur’s candidacy also comes on the heels of last month’s acquittal of Swami Aseemanand and three others in the Samjhauta train blast case. Significantly, Jagdeep Singh, the special judge presiding in the case, said he was constrained to acquit the accused in the face of the NIA’s failure to furnish the best evidence.

Also read: Samjhauta Express Bombing: With a Prosecutor Like the NIA, Who Needs Defence?

Those defending Thakur’s candidature invoke the “innocent till proven guilty” principle to buttress their argument. But the question is: how would the BJP respond if a mainstream opposition party chose to field rights activists, charged under UAPA in the Elgar Parishad case, even if they manage to get bail?

Consider for instance what Narendra Modi said at an election rally in Korba, in Chhattisgarh, earlier this week. Pointing fingers at the Congress-ruled state government for the suspected attack by Maoists which led to the killing of BJP legislator Bheema Mandavi and four others on April 9, the prime minister asked: “Question is why did the attack happen?” Accusing the Congress of encouraging Maoists who want to split the country, Modi went on: “Does the Congress ‘hand’ favour development or destruction?”

A report in the Indian Express draws attention to the statement of Yashpal Bandana, an RSS member, who claimed to have attended two meetings in Bhopal on April 11, 2008, where the Malegaon blast was planned. Among others attending the meeting were Col Purohit and Pragya Thakur. Quoting from Bandana’s statement on the second meeting, the Express report says:

“Col Purohit said that we must do something quickly to take revenge against Muslims… In Maharashtra’s Malegaon the population of Muslims is very high. If we explode bombs there then we can avenge the atrocities against Hindus. On this, Sadhvi Pragya Singh said that she would arrange for men for the work.”

Some may even argue that if Kanhaiya Kumar, charged with sedition, can contest an election, why can’t Pragya Thakur? The charges levelled against Thakur and those against Kanhaiya are hardly comparable in terms of content and gravity. Kanhaiya, then JNU students’ union president, has been accused of raising slogans threatening to “break” India. The authenticity of the video purportedly showing Kanhaiya raising such seditious slogans, is in serious question.

In April 2016, the Delhi government lodged a criminal case in the Patiala house court against two Hindi channels and one English channel, charging them with telecasting doctored videos. Besides, the Delhi government is yet to give its sanction to the police to prosecute Kanhaiya, currently contesting from the Communist Party of India (CPI) in Bihar’s Begusarai constituency. Moreover, the frequency with which the present dispensation has started slapping sedition charges on more and more people, particularly dissidents of all hues, has stripped the charge of the gravity it was originally meant to carry.

Also read: Kanhaiya Kumar: This Election is About the Struggles of Past and Our Hopes of the Future

Then there is the issue of Thakur’s torture in jail. The use of torture on prisoners has to be condemned in no uncertain terms and without exception. And Thakur’s imprisonment under a law such as the UAPA must also be wholeheartedly condemned. However, we are all too selective in our condemnation of what happens to people in prisons. To cite just one example, take the case of Soni Sori, arrested on the charge of working as an intermediary for the Maoists. She was sexually assaulted in jail in 2011. A Supreme Court inquiry confirmed the sexual assault in jail. What fallout befell her torturers?

Or take the case of professor G.N. Saibaba, undergoing life imprisonment in Nagpur central prison after his conviction under the UAPA as a Maoist in 2017. Formerly a professor of English at Delhi University, Saibaba is bound to a wheelchair due to post-polio paralysis. Suffering from severe ailments, Saibaba’s medical condition has worsened in jail. The Nagpur bench of Bombay high court last month rejected a petition seeking suspension of life imprisonment and bail on medical grounds under section 389 of Code of Criminal Procedure. We need scarcely make mention of Binayak Sen too in this context.

So where does this leave us? Arguably, by fielding Sadhvi Pragya, the BJP is sending a very clear message that it does not consider some acts of violence to be terrorism if those acts are committed by members of the Hindu community. One hardly needs much imagination to speculate about what would happen if a political party fielded, say, a Muslim person accused of terrorism as a candidate in a general election.

Beyond the pale of whataboutery, we have to understand this move by the BJP not as an isolated incident of putting up a controversial candidate for a prestigious seat, but as part of a concerted electoral tactic that is premised on riling up majoritarian sentiments against other communities.

Sadhvi Pragya Apologises for Her Remarks About Hemant Karkare

“I felt that the enemies of the country were being benefited from it, therefore I take back my statement and apologise for it, it was my personal pain,” the BJP Lok Sabha candidate from Bhopal said.

New Delhi: Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur withdrew her statement on Hemant Karkare on Friday evening. Thakur had earlier in the day claimed that the Maharashtra ATS chief died in the 26/11 attacks after she cursed him, a statement criticised by the opposition and the IPS Association.

Malegaon blast accused and the Bharatiya Janata Party’s candidate for the Bhopal Lok Sabha seat, Pragya Singh is currently out on bail. “I felt that the enemies of the country were being benefited from it, therefore I take back my statement and apologise for it, it was my personal pain,” she told ANI

“He (Karkare) died from the bullets of terrorists from the enemy country, he is certainly a martyr,” Thakur said, a day after she accused the officer of torturing her in the jail

“I had told him you will be destroyed, and he was gone in less than two months,” she had initially said. Karkare had investigated the charges against Thakur in connection with the Malegaon blasts. He died in the November 26, 2008, Mumbai terror attack.

The BJP also released a statement, saying it considers Karkare a martyr. The comments made by Thakur was a “personal statement”, the party said, adding that she may have made them because of the “mental and physical torture” she faced.

“Ashok Chakra awardee late Sri Hemant Karkare, IPS made the supreme sacrifice fighting terrorists,” the IPS association had tweeted. “Those of us in uniform condemn the insulting statement made by a candidate and demand that sacrifices of all our martyrs be respected.”

The BJP leader is facing charges under the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act and other sections of the Indian Penal Code. The Bombay High Court gave her bail in April 2017, noting that she had been in jail for more than eight years and was suffering from breast cancer.