HVK Archives: The explosive mix in Tamil Nadu
The explosive mix in Tamil Nadu - The Pioneer
T N Gopalan
()
7 February 1997
Title : The explosive mix in Tamil Nadu
Author : T N Gopalan
Publication : The Pioneer
Date : February 7, 1997
Communal violence is a relatively new phenomenon in Tamil Nadu. It
is not as if the State is some kind of an Arcadia. Caste-related
violence, attacks on the Dalits especially, has been a. regular
feature since Independence, and even before that. There has also
been occasional religious brawls, turning murderous sometimes,
claiming a few lives here and there - but nothing more than that.
The kind of sustained violence which one has been witnessing in
Coimbatore, western Tamil Nadu, for nearly a week now, is a new
experience for the people and the administration. Retired Director
General of Police V R Lakshmi Narayanan, for one, would still not
concede that people of the two communities have been at each
other's throats. "Whatever is happening is indeed shocking. During
my long tenure, I never had to deal with a clash between the two
communities. There have been some disturbing trends, of late.
Vested interests could be at work. Still, I would attribute the
flare-up more to a singular lack of preparedness on the part of the
police... it only they had anticipated the violence when Palani
Baba was murdered, things would not have turned as ugly as they
did."
Since the murder of Baba on January 28, eight persons have been
killed - six of them in the Coimbatore belt, one in the southern
part of the State and another near Madras. Besides, there has been
sporadic instances of arson and looting in the south and the west,
raising visions of a communal divide and riots as in the northern
India. however, the rest of the State has been almost completely
normal and there is no sense of panic whatsoever in the State.
The media is underplaying the incidents, not in an attempt at
containing the violence but simply because it is generally felt
that conflicts will remain localised by themselves and that there
would be no serious law-and-and-order break-down.
Ahmed Ali - better known as Palani Baba in deference to his
scholarship in Muslim scriptures himself had been a notorious
rabble-rouser. He was a much sought after preacher and his
crisis-crossings were often marked by a trail of bloody clashes.
However, his murder came at a time when he had withdrawn into a
shell, apparently for the fear of his life.
If the Muslim youth today take to violent protests, it is less out
of solidarity with the slain Baba and more by way of giving vent to
their own frustration. "Lack of adequate employment opportunities,
foreign-funded and committed cadres, an insensitive and biased
administration and venom-spouting fundamentalists, that is a
classic explosive mix," points out a noted sociologist in the
State.
Dravidian scholars point out that because Tamil Nadu had never
experienced any Muslim invasion and also because Muslims had played
a vital role in the growth of the Dravidian movement, there has
been little animosity between them and the non-Brahmin backward
castes, which form an overwhelming majority of the State's
population.
It was Quidemillath Mohammed Ismail, leader of the Muslim League,
who first demanded in Parliament that Tamil be made India's
official language. He worked in close rapport language. He worked
in close rapport with leaders like Periyar E V R and CN Annadurai,
founder of the DMK, and hence a district was carved out in his
name.
The seeds of the communal hatred were sown during the Jayalalitha
regime when the Sate police let loose a reign of terror in the
Muslim pockets in Coimbatore in an attempt to flush out the
kingpins of an extremist group. The State unit of the People's
Union for Civil Liberties later came out with a damning indictment
of the police and the Jayalalitha Government.
The Hindu fringe groups, which protested the abuse of the Hindu
gods by the Dravidian leaders, also targeted Muslims. It was
because of the rabid Hindu Munnani that public celebrations like
the Ganesh Chathurthi rallies became a minefield of contending
communal forces. Vulgar slogans were raised and ruckus was created
before mosques en route, setting off clashes. Jayalalitha
indirectly patronised the Munnani and Rama Gopalan, who is the one
leader steadfastly refusing to denounce her corruption exacerbating
matters further.
It was in such a milieu that the blasting of the headquarters of
the State RSS unit took place in 1993, killing 11 persons,. It was
followed by the murder of a Hindu Munnani leader in Madurai in
October 1994. To this day, the assassins have not been apprehended.
Such lack of action helped little to check the increasing grudge
between the two communities.
The State capital was again rocked by a series of explosions
sometime ago. Hotels owned by Muslims which sponsored floor shows
were targeted. The bombings were meant as warning against
un-Islamic activities. And finally another group sought to forcibly
enter a mosque in the Raj Bhavan complex on the fifth anniversary
of the demolition of the Babri Masjid.
The murder of Palani Baba at this juncture worked as a flashpoint.
The riot-like frenzy which followed the murder caught the police
and the administration off-guard. The Karunanidhi Government's
current attempts to flaunt its solicitude for the minorities, even
while keeping quiet on other provocations may just aggravate the
situation. The Government would do well by keeping a strict vigil
on the activities of the various groups which may try to exploit
the situation.
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