JOIN USUnion home minister Sushilkumar Shinde’s letter to all state governments and UTs to make sure that innocent Muslims are not wrongfully implicated in terror cases is an attempt to take political advantage of a real and unfortunate situation.
It is true that members of the minority community are often victims of institutional and personal biases and are discriminated against. The bias works against them not just in social and economic fields but in the administration of justice also. The number of Muslims in jails, as undertrials and convicts, is much more than their share in population. This is not just in terrorism-related cases but in the case of all other crimes too. The widespread impression in the community, as shown by many surveys, is that they are easy targets of the police in the investigation of cases.
This bias has been especially noted in terrorism investigations. Inquiry commissions have found that police and other agencies reflexively act against Muslims on the basis of suspicion. Many are arrested and kept in jail for years on wrong charges. Courts have freed such detainees after years and criticised investigative agencies for their actions. Nine persons who were put in jail for the Malegaon blasts were found innocent and freed after five years. Seventy Muslims who were wrongly implicated in the 2007 Hyderabad blasts were compensated recently.
While all this is true Shinde has highlighted it the wrong way. Governments are expected to protect the rights and freedoms of all citizens, irrespective of religion, community and other categories. In fact poor people and those belonging to the weaker sections are also very prone to harassment and persecution by the law-enforcement agencies. Wouldn’t it have served the purpose of unbiased enforcement of the rule of law and good governance if Shinde had asked the state governments not to detain and implicate any innocent person on wrong charges?
But that does not help the government and Shinde’s party in the elections. He wanted to write the letter specifically about the Muslims and, more importantly, be seen as writing that letter. Even criticism of the letter, especially from the BJP, and a controversy over it are welcome, because the intended message of the letter would then be more forcefully driven home. Shinde now says he is doing his job as home minister, but he acted only as a Congress man. He has tried to communalise the problem and the sincerity of his purpose is questionable.