Press Release – Minorities Meet on August 10th 2008

ALL GUJARAT MINORITIES’ FRONT

Date : 10-8-2008

Over three hundred delegates participated in a day long seminar on minority issues organized by the newly formed All Gujarat Minorities’ Front. The seminar on ‘Minorities in India – Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow’ focused on the denial of social, economic, constitutional and human rights of minorities in India and particularly in Gujarat .

Charing the first session, professors of IIM Ahmedabad – Anil Gupta and Rakesh Basant – disclosed that neither the ruling party nor the opposition were seriously interested in the recommendations of the Sachar Committee since the findings of the Committee did not support their political objectives. Basant, who is a member of the Sachar Committee, appointed by the Prime Minister to research the social, educational and economic status of Muslims in India, revealed shocking statistical data in the minorities’ report.

Later, Ibrahim Sheikh enumerated the problems faced by the Muslim community. He lamented that the Muslim community suffered immensely during and after the Gujarat riots in 2002. “The Muslims were killed, their houses were burnt, they were picked up and arrested under POTA and finally jailed,” he said.

Mehrunissa Desai, Fr. George Kodi and Samsuddin Pirzada, a retired judge of the Sessions Court, who spoke in the second session chaired by senior advocate Mahesh Bhatt, emphasized that the legal judicial system had eluded the riot victims, and failed to deliver justice to the Muslims in Gujarat .

In the last session, chaired by Mukul Sinha, the chairman of the New Socialist Movement (NSM), several speakers stressed on the necessity of concerted struggle against the divisive politics of Gujarat . Advocate S.H. Iyer, who represents the Christian riot victims of Orissa before the Justice Panigrahi Commission informed the house that in Orissa too, the minority Christian community were the victims of riots in December 2007. “The Christians’ churches, houses and schools were burnt  mercilessly. The government of Orissa, however, is trying to establish that Christian Missionaries burnt down their own churches before going on to attack Hindus,” said Iyer.

At the end of the seminar, the house adopted a resolution rejecting the partisan investigation of the bomb blasts (July 26, 2008) in Ahmedabad by the crime branch of Gujarat police. The investigation appears to be directed against the Muslims without making any attempt to discover the involvement of any Muslim organizations. The house demanded a CBI enquiry in the bomb blasts in Ahmedabad and `recovery’ of bombs in Surat.

Samshad Pathan                                                                                                                                       Convener, Ahmedabad