this article was in Paktribune.
Sarkaar Raj - India going towards Hindu Talibanization?
The idea was to castigate the Muslims using terror tactics and blame the militants and Pakistan for direct involvement. But the methodology used was terror against Muslims. Swami, Sadhvi and an Indian army officer who was commanding a unit in Kashmir were involved. It was the army officer who was providing the arsenal to terrorize the helpless Muslims staying in slums of Malegaon. The biggest disclosure was that it all happened because of those who preach Ram Rajjya in India.
But who are these Muslim victims? ArenТt they Indians?
Sordidly speaking it is a chilling reality!
Backdrop
When bomb blasts on the Samjhauta Express, a УfriendshipФ train between Delhi and Lahore, killed 68 people mostly Pakistani passengers on February 17, 2007, many conspiracy theories made rounds at that time.
The Indian authorities even released Сsketches of suspectsТ after Samjhauta Express blasts suggesting Pakistan being the perpetrator for the incident while Indian media and officials were terming it an attempt by ISI.
The reaction was not different from that which had been shown in the past for every bomb blast within few minutes of such incidents without a shred of evidence. Similarly when in 2006 Malegaon town in the Nashik district of the Indian state of Maharashtra, located at some 290 km to the northeast of state capital Mumbai, was rattled by a series of bombings, the blame was being put on groups having links with Pakistan and Bangladesh.
The Maharashtra Police claimed that blasts are the handiwork of Student Islamic Movement of India most of the time linked by India with Lashkar-e-Taiba and ultimately with ISI.
But recently the arrest of 10 people, including a serving Lieutenant Colonel Prashad Srikant Purohit and a Hindu monk and nun for their alleged involvement in bomb explosions that killed six people in the Muslim-dominated town of Malegaon, this year had sent everything upside down.
Ten people, including a self-proclaimed Hindu seer and a serving lieutenant colonel, have so far been arrested for the Sep 29 bombing.
Besides Purohit, the other accused include Sadhvi Pragya Singh Thakur, Shivnarayan Singh Kalsangram, Shyam Bhawarlal Sahu, Major Ramesh Shivji Upadhyay (retd), Sameer Kulkarni, Rakesh Dattaram Dhavde and Ajay Rahirkar.
The suspicion is now directed towards the extremist Hindu movement Sangh Parivar while entire network is linked to another arrested former major Ramesh Upadhyay who represents the terrorist organisation Abhinav Bharat.
The chilling part of the entire episode is the involvement of accused Lt Col Purohit in bomb attack on the Samjhauta Express to which he confessed.
During investigation Col Purohit has also confessed to training Hindu terrorists for attacking Muslims, besides training them for attacking Samjhauta Express for which he had also supplied them RDX.
He further confessed that it was intended to cause armed conflict between Pakistan and India so that anti-Muslim passions could be nurtured in India, leading to violence.
The Anti-Terrorism Squad (ATS) claimed that Purohit supplied RDX to one УBhagwanФ for Samjhauta Express blast.
Public prosecutor Ajay Misar said Abhinav BharatТs treasurer Ajay Rahirkar had handed Rs2.5 lakh to Lt Col P S Purohit.
Mahant Amritanand Dev alias Dayanand Pandey, the self-styled pontiff who was arrested from Kanpur has revealed that it was under his instructions that Lt. Colonel Shrikant Purohit procured RDX from an army depot that was used in the Malegaon blast.
According to reports Pandey was present in all the pre-blast meetings in Bhopal, Jabalpur and Faridabad, monitored operations meticulously and was also responsible for arranging the finances that came in through illegal channels.
It is believed that Pandey, a dropout from the National Defence Academy, was in touch with two other accused who are on the run - Ramji Kalsangara, who allegedly planted the motorcycle owned by the Hindu ascetic Pragya Singh Thakur in Malegaon, and Sameer Dange.
The suspects are also questioned for May 2007 blast at Mecca Masjid in Hyderabad and the April 2006 twin blasts at New Delhi`s Jama Masjid.
In the Mecca Masjid blasts as many as 14 people were killed and over 50 injured. The case was investigated by the city police special wing and was later handed over to the Central Bureau of Investigation which could not come to any conclusion.
Investigations into the Samjhauta Express explosion and the Jama Masjid blast also failed to make headway and police could not across on any tangible leads.
Police have already established a strong link between Pandey and some of the suspects in the Kanpur blast case through surveillance. On Aug 24, two members of the right-wing Bajrang Dal were killed there while assembling bombs.
After the arrest of Panday police is expecting to get some breaking clues in the 2006 Nanded blasts in Maharashtra as well.
The arrests have reinforced growing suspicions over the last few years of a potential threat from Hindu extremists.
Interrogation of Major (retd.) Ramesh Upadhyay revealed that the Bhonsla Military School in Nashik was used as a training ground by the conspirators. The school has denied its involvement in the blast but it is under the scanner for allowing Bajrang Dal activists to hold training sessions in the use of arms and martial arts.
The schoolТs links to the RSS is an open secret as it was founded by B.S. Moonje, who was SavarkarТs close friend and who assisted in creating the RSS.
The arrest of the serving army officers and former officersТ link to the recent terror activities has led to a worrying aspect among the Indians that these revelations show how deep the infiltration of fundamentalist ideas into Indian army is.
The critics believe that the constant indoctrination of Hindutva ideology over decades by the VHP, the RSS, the Bajrang Dal and the BJP has resulted in this kind of violence.
Besides they are infiltrated into crucial areas like police force, army and the education departments.
Ram Punyani, secretary of the All India Secular Forum and a human rights activist, said that the deep and widespread ideological indoctrination began years ago but was propagated thoroughly during the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) regime.
It placed its members in the bureaucracy, particularly in the education department, and in the cultural arena, he said. УRSS people who once headed a department may have retired, but they have ensured that the damage continues, as they would have hired a number of like-minded people. So you can imagine how deep the penetration is. It will take generations to root this out,Ф said Punyani.
It is a well known fact that once George Fernandes had asked the army chief, the Air Marshal, and the Admiral to report the Kargil war to MPs. When the three went to the place it was the party office of BJP.
That is how the Saffron Brigade interferes in the affairs of the armed forces, directly.
The involvement of serving lieutenant colonel of the Indian army in blasts and supplying 60 kg of RDX for terrorism further casts a shadow over position of the army.
In the past BJP has been offering tickets to the former army officers, (many of them are former generals) for contesting elections for Lok Sabha on behalf of the party and to an extent it has been successful in wooing them.
One such retiree is the chief minister of Uttarakhand B C Khanduria retired Major General. Another retired officer Sabyasachi Bagchi who is member of BJP proudly says that RSS develops the character of the young people.
SS Raikar of Bhonsla military school is also a retired person from the army. He allowed the school premises for terror, hatching conspiracy as well as arms training and providing accommodation.
The former governor of Jammu and Kashmir Lt General (Rtd) S K Sinha has allegedly allowed Dyanand Padey to stay in the official residence.
Daynand Pandey was hosted by him in Raj Bhawan and the two had held a meeting in a famous temple in Kashmir.
