[Reader-list] Karan Thappar Interviews Arundhati Roy

[Naeem Mohaiemen]

Interview with Arundhati by Karan Thappar in IBN
Communal Profiling of 150 Million Muslims in India

*Karan Thapar:* * Hello and welcome to *Devil's Advocate*. Why is Arundhati
Roy angry with the police and upset with the press? That's the key issue I
shall explore today. Arundhati Roy, let's start with the recent encounter in
Jamia Nagar in New Delhi. You've called for an independent judicial enquiry
headed by a Supreme Court judge. Why do you involve yourself into this work?
What's your locus standi? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Well, I am just one of those thousands of people who are
asking some very serious questions of the police. The trouble is that you
know, even if you wanted to believe this police version, you don't know
which police version to believe. Does one believe the Bombay police, the UP
police, the Gujarat police or the Delhi police? All of them have different
versions. There's a blizzard of masterminds. The Additional Commissioner of
Mumbai police, Rakesh Maria recently said that Tauqeer, who is the Delhi
police's mastermind of Indian Mujahideen, is a media creation. The point is
who creates the media creations? Is it the media or the police or do they
work together?

*Karan Thapar:* * So, you are motivated by these contradictions. Is that the
sole reason you need a judicial enquiry headed by a Supreme Court judge?*

*Arundhati Roy:* Again, it is not just me. It was thousands of people who
are saying one thing, you know. When the police have killed people, it
ceases to be a neutral party. It cannot have an impartial investigation in
its own actions. And there are so many serious questions about what happened
at Batla House.

*Karan Thapar:* * But before we come to those questions, let me point out
what many people will be thinking at this moment. They are going to ask why
do you think will an encounter, when a senior police officer like MC Sharma
is killed and another injured would be fake. The police would not endanger
themselves in a fake and fraudulent incident. *

*Arundhati Roy:* Well, historically the police and security agencies the
world over have done things like that. I am not saying it is fake. I am
saying lets have an enquiry because this matter of MC Sharma, for instance
would be cleared up if they would only produce the post-mortem report.
Instead the post-mortem report is leaked in various ways and *Mail
Today*says that he was shot from behind. Praveen Swami (of the daily
*The Hindu*) says he was shot from two sides. The residents say that the
police arrived and that there were drills and that they are making holes in
the flat now. Why cannot all this be cleared up? If they would just produce
the reports, which even the Magistrate asked for, and has put out a warrant
for investigating officer and they still haven't produced it.

*Karan Thapar:* * As you speak, I get the impression that your whole premise
is that you don't trust the police. Millions of Indians do. Is it fitting
and fair that you should question their veracity in this way when you know
that it would not just demoralise them but it would seriously undermine
their struggle to contain terror? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Well. Millions of Indians do not trust the police. Is our
choice not to question them because here we are talking about the communal
profiling of a hundred and fifty million people, demoralising them,
radicalising a whole generation and asking serious questions of a story that
is told to us that is full of holes? Especially because such a senior police
officer died in the incident, why should we not clear it up for the sake of
police itself?

*Karan Thapar:* * Let me for a moment play Devil's Advocate and point out to
you evidence that you are deliberately ignoring. AK-47s were found in Batla
House, so were two pistols. Policemen were shot at, policemen were killed.
Atif's name appears in the Ahmedabad, Mumbai and UP police findings. Now,
most recently, it transpires that Atif's degree from Allahabad is a fake.
Why aren't you giving the police, as anyone else will, the benefit of the
doubt? The evidence suggests that there is something suspicious, that there
is a case. Why do you doubt it? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Let enquiry clear it up. Even in the case of these
recoveries, you know, there is a serious procedural lapse. When the police
make recoveries at the scene of the crime, they should have independent
witnesses corroborating it. They didn't, like in the case of the Parliament
attack.

*Karan Thapar:* * Isn't it possible that people are scared to come forth? *

*Arundhati Roy:* No, but they have to get the seizure memo signed, right?
And even the magistrate is asking for all these documents, for the FIR, the
post mortem report, for the case diary not being produced. Now, let me ask
some questions about Atif. The reports in the media given out by the police
say that they have had him under surveillance since July 17. If so, then how
was he allowed to plant these bombs in September? And even when they say
that they had him under surveillance, they say that his number was called by
a number, which was called by another number. I mean, c'mon, that's a lead,
not proof that someone is a terrorist.

*Karan Thapar:* * Maybe the surveillance wasn't effective. Maybe the police
are exaggerating that they had him under surveillance. What about the other
evidence that the police have brought into the public domain? It transpires
that clips of the car that was used in the Ahmedabad bombings were found
inside Atif's mobile, it transpires that literature of al-Qaeda was found at
Batla House. It seems that even Saif has been using an assumed name. He has
been travelling under a false identity calling himself Rohan Sharma. He even
had that gentleman's voter identity card with him. None of these is
suggestive or corroborated but you are dismissing it as otherwise. *

*Arundhati Roy:* I am not dismissing it. If there is an enquiry, all this
will also be a part of it. I am not dismissing they may be real terrorists.
There are real terrorists, who are they? Are these boys the real ones? While
the police are giving us evidence, there are also strange stories floating
around. The police have been using the media to put out stories. All this is
very disturbing and all this could be cleared out.

*Karan Thapar:* * See, if I understand you correctly, there are two things
you want clarified. One is that you want the questions and the
inconsistencies in the police stories clarified because they suggest that
the police hadn't got a clear cut case. And the second thing is that you
want to try and get at the proof that establishes that the police had good
reason to suspicious of the people. *

*Arundhati Roy:* Exactly! Even their own versions are contradicting each
other. On the one hand they say that you know, we did not know that they
were terrorists and that is why we went in, in this casual manner. But the
minute something came up they come out and say that these were the
masterminds. There are so many things, you know. They say that people were
killed in the crossfire but the proof is that these two men were killed
while they were kneeling with shots in their head.

*Karan Thapar:* * That's an assumption, I must point out! *

*Arundhati Roy:* No, there are pictures.

*Karan Thapar:* * Suggested. But we do not have the corroboration from the
police. *

*Arundhati Roy:* The police should show the post mortem report but we see it
from the photographs.

*Karan Thapar:* * You know what? Listening to you, people will say, and I am
repeating what I have said to you earlier! They will say that her problem
arises from the fact that she does not trust the police. Is it right that
you should have such serious doubts about them? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Not just rights, I think its our duty to have serious
doubts and especially today, when we are sliding quickly into fascism and
terrorism. It's our business as members of civil society to ask hard
questions.

*Karan Thapar:* * In which case, what are you suspecting the police…or let
me put me more strongly and bluntly. What are you accusing the police of, on
this issue? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Well, primarily of giving us a story that doesn't hold
together and insults our intelligence.

*Karan Thapar:* * Why would they do this? *

*Arundhati Roy:* I don't know. That's what we would like to know.

*Karan Thapar:* * Is it not possible that they have got it right and you
have doubts about them? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Maybe! But an enquiry would show that, wouldn't it? The
more they block it, refuse to produce the post mortem. The more they
subterfuge and obfuscate their way through this, the more people will get
suspicious of them.

*Karan Thapar:* * An enquiry at the end of the day, would be in their
benefit as well! Is that what you are arguing? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Absolutely!

*Karan Thapar:* * What then do you say of people who argue that this is
typical Arundhati Roy. She's been against dams and developments; she's in
favour of secession of Kashmir. She's attacked nuclear weapons and is now
she is defending terrorists? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Well, to being accused of being typically oneself is not an
accusation. But if you are accusing me of having a world view that I do not
believe in…I mean I do not believe in neo colonial military occupation, I
don't believe in nuclear weapons and I don't believe in ecological
destruction; then I am guilty as accused. Raising questions does not amount
to supporting terrorism. I raised questions on the Parliament attack along
with the people; we want to know who the terrorists are. We don't know. Now,
of the people we defended, two of the four 'masterminds' of the case were
released. Afzal has been convicted by the Supreme Court which says that says
that we have no evidence to prove that he is attached to any terrorist
groups but in order to satisfy the collective conscience of society, he is
being sentenced to death. Excuse me Karan, its my case that the collective
conscience of society is also a part of media construct and a part of the
judicial imagination constructed by these stories that being put out.

*Karan Thapar:* * So, you are saying to me that as a citizen, as a
conscientious democrat, it is your duty to question. And if the questions
are awkward and unsettling, so be it and that they must be answered, none
the less? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Yes, absolutely!

*Karan Thapar:* * Arundhati Roy, lets come to the wider issue about how the
police treats the people it has arrested and it is holding in detention. You
are extremely upset by the fact that India Today journalists were given an
access to the young men arrested at Batla House so that interviews could be
done. Why do you call this a terrible thing? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Well, look this phenomenon of media confessions is becoming
a standard operating procedure with the Special cell and the Delhi police.
The point is that neither the courts nor any kind of international law
allows you to say that people who are being held in police custody under
torture.

*Karan Thapar:* * How do you know that they are being held under torture? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Well, the possibility of torture…maybe that day, they were
not tortured. It was the first day.

*Karan Thapar:* * You are saying that Human Rights laws and values do not
permit people under detention to be interviewed when they are not willing to
be interviewed? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Yes! And even the courts do not accept these as confessions
or evidence. But the reason these are done is because they have a propaganda
value.

*Karan Thapar:* * The assumption when you say that such incidences have
propaganda value is that these are forced confessions…that the young men
interviewed did not give the answers they did, willingly and voluntarily.
How can you conclude that that's the case? *

*Arundhati Roy:* In this case it is very easy to be sure. Those young men,
before they were caught, Zeeshan went to *Headlines Today*, Saquib
went to *Mail
Today*…both these (media units) are owned by the India Today, as you know.
They were all people who came out in support of Atif and Saquib and said,
look we know this guy. We know who he is.

*Karan Thapar:* * Then how come you are calling those so called confessions
when they are incriminating themselves and that when they went
willingly to Mail
Today or India Today, there are inconsistencies. *

*Arundhati Roy:* Yes, so which version are we supposed to believe? The
custodial one or the non-custodial one?

*Karan Thapar:* * All the three men named by India Today and I will name
them, Zia-ur-rehman, Saquib Insaar and Shakil admitted to planting bombs.
You are denying or doubting the veracity of the so called confessions. *

*Arundhati Roy:* Obviously! Its absurd not to, because they are in police
custody. The same guys, Saquib went to *Mail Today* saying that I have known
Atif for years. I got him this house. I mean it's hardly the behaviour of
terrorists.

*Karan Thapar:* * I assume that the point you are making is that any
interview that is granted in police custody is not a willing and voluntary
one and therefore any confession made in that interview is a forced
confession and not acceptable? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Well, it is not admitted. Even in the Parliament case, the
courts admonished the police for parading these people before the media and
giving these media confessions. They didn't do anything to the police which
is why the same police; in fact Mohan Chand Sharma was a part of that cell,
that same cell did it to theses people and it served the purpose. The
propaganda value has been achieved.

*Karan Thapar:* * You are saying that the Courts had admonished the police
at the time the Parliament attack had happened for arranging such alleged
false confessions and the police disregarded that admonishing and did the
same thing again. *

*Arundhati Roy:* That's right.

*Karan Thapar:* * In your eyes, is the police guilty of violating
fundamental human rights by arranging what you call false confessions to be
made in forced interviews? Is this a violation of basic human rights? *

*Arundhati Roy:* It is a violation of all kinds of rights. I say it again,
that in this atmosphere of communal profiling, this kind of propaganda is
essential for them. It is the keystone to this whole enterprise. They have
achieved what they set out to, regardless of what the court says.

*Karan Thapar:* * The police have made a habit of this. It happened under
circumstances, in the Arushi murder case, practically everyday. They hold
press briefings, where half baked theories or at least unconfirmed details
they are repeated and revealed to the press. The press then prints them as
facts. The readers and the viewers of television then accept it as the
truth. Are you disconcerted by this? *

*Arundhati Roy:* I am utterly disconcerted by this because now it is the
combination of the media and the police…you do not know which ends where and
which begins where. In a situation where these encounter specialists are
going out and summarily executing thirty people, calling them terrorists…No
one asks questions once they are dead. We just accept it.

*Karan Thapar:* * Just a moment ago, you spoke about the collusion between
the media and the police. Are you saying that the press is itself in error
when it accepts what is given by the police and publishes it without
verifying or double checking it? *

*Arundhati Roy:* It is not just an error. It is outrageous to do something
like this.

*Karan Thapar:* * So the press' behaviour is outrageous? *

*Arundhati Roy:* It is outrageous. There are statements like…and this man
looked at me and he looked like a human bomb…I mean what kind of journalism
is that?

*Karan Thapar:* * So when as a result, like many people have said, this
collusion between the police and the press leads to Jamia Nagar or to
Azamgarh being thought as terrorist hubs or breeding grounds for terrorism,
how unfortunate is that? *

*Arundhati Roy:* It is not just unfortunate, its very dangerous. We now have
a situation where a hundred and fifty Muslims and an equal number of Dalits
and Adivasis in a different set of circumstances are being targeted in this
way. Even if half a per cent of them decide to stop putting their heads down
and decide to hit back, life as we knew it is over. A whole generation is
radicalised and India becomes a threat to not just itself, but to the whole
world.

*Karan Thapar:* * This is something very important that you are saying. You
mean that this behaviour of the police and the uncritical reporting by the
press is going to end up in alienation and breeding the terrorism that we
think we are controlling. *

*Arundhati Roy:* Yes, that and also that this is a recipe for sliding into
fascism. And we are bang in the middle of it now and this is how it works.

*Karan Thapar:* * Why does the Indian middle class society that is so proud
of calling itself a liberal democracy, accept this? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Well, I don't think we are anymore proud of this. We have
increasingly accepted that we are a police state and there is a sort of
sliding of the democracy into majority into fascism that is a real danger
now.

*Karan Thapar:* * So you are saying that the middle class no more stands up
for the liberal values it believes in. It is actually in a sense accepting
the horrible shortcuts and therefore colluding. It's a very strong
criticism, do you really mean it? *

*Arundhati Roy:* I do. In fact, I feel that some day like the Nazis in
Germany, we will be called upon to answer for what we have done and why we
kept quiet while this was happening.

*Karan Thapar:* * I get the feel that you are deeply disillusioned with the
Indian middle classes. *

*Arundhati Roy:* It is not just the middle classes, you know. It is the
framework that we are putting into action these days. I have spent ten years
writing about it. We are in a very serious situation. If we are to right it,
all of us should ask ourselves very serious questions about when we chose to
speak up and when we chose to stay quiet.

*Karan Thapar:* * But in keeping quiet, as you say suggesting, Indians today
are prepared to do, they are not just betraying essential values that they
claim they believe in, they are actually betraying themselves and letting
down their country. That's the case you are making. *

*Arundhati Roy:* I am making that case and I am saying that with these
policies that we are persuing, today every ordinary Indian's life is going
to be at risk and we will pay very heavily for the consequences of what is
going on now.

*Karan Thapar:* * So it is virtually the last moment to stand up and be
identified with the values that we claim to believe in otherwise those
values are gone and with that our lives are gone.*

*Arundhati Roy:* Absolutely!

*Karan Thapar:* * And that's not an exaggeration? *

*Arundhati Roy:* Nope! Absolutely not!

*Karan Thapar:* * Arundhati Roy, a pleasure talking to you on Devil's
Advocate*