GUJARAT 2002: WHAT JUSTICE FOR THE VICTIMS?
Christophe Jaffrelot
Ten years after the 2002 violence, the results of judicial proceedings have been very few in Gujarat.
While the heaviest sentences have been handed down in cases where Hindus in Godhra had been victims of violence, a very large number of cases have been closed before prosecution and many others remain pending, with only a handful completed or near completion. The reasons for this failure of the rule of law – whose magnitude will have to be qualified since proceedings are still under way – lie in the grip that Hindu nationalism (as an ideology and a political movement) holds over the state machinery (including the police and the judiciary) in Gujarat and the central authority’s relative powerlessness (both at the executive and judicial level) to counteract it. This is so despite the repeated attempts that the Supreme Court has made (including the appointment of the Special Investigation Team), and the activism of non-governmental organizations and some media persons.
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