Perhaps it is the times we live in. Tragedies now engender anniversary celebrations. There’s a new social class of vocal, visible victims. And publicly parading pain is the new thing. So in Gujarat on August 26, a month after the Ahmedabad blasts, there were functions, official and NGO-sponsored. One of the latter variety was organised by the Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) in Quresh Hall, Ahmedabad. There, 2002 riot victims met 2008 terror victims.

What was the idea? Fostering secular bonding? Who can argue against that? But one can and must point out that life, and life in Gujarat, is not Amar, Akbar, Anthony. Manmohan Desai had the three brothers of different faiths united via an impossible conjunction of medicine and maa — siblings simultaneously donating blood to their mother, tubes running from their arms to their mother’s. Such ideas of the heroic potential of inter-faith bonding seemed quite apt when the organisers of the Quresh Hall meeting said that the attempt was to “bridge the gap” and “get them talking to each other in empathy, with sympathy”. “Our grief is same, our pain is same, our tragedies are similar, even if our faiths are different.”

Read the subtext. Riot victims of 2002 are Muslims who were victims of the state, the system and the majority Hindus. Victims of the Ahmedabad bombs in 2008 are Hindus, the perpetrators are Muslims. So, Muslims are victims, Hindus are victims, the bad guys may be different, but we all stand united — in fear, in tragedy. In Gujarat, it seems only fear and tragedy can secure the bonds.

... contd.