The Dynamics of Conflict and Peace in Contemporary South Asia

The State, Democracy and Social Movements

Minoru Mio, Kazuya Nakamizo, Tatsuro Fujikura, Minoru Mio, Kazuya Nakamizo, Tatsuro Fujikura

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• Edition: 1
• eBook ISBN:
  9781000331363
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Democracy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book engages with the concept, true value, and function of democracy in South Asia against the background of real social conditions for the promotion of peaceful development in the region.

In the book, the issue of peaceful social development is defined as the conditions under which the maintenance of social order and social development is achieved – not by violent compulsion but through the negotiation of intentions or interests among members of society. The book assesses the issue of peaceful social development and demonstrates that the maintenance of such conditions for long periods is a necessary requirement for the political, economic, and cultural development of a society and state. Chapters argue that, through the post-colonial historical trajectory of South Asia, it has become commonly understood that democracy is the better, if not the best, political system and value for that purpose. Additionally, the book claims that, while democratization and the deepening of democracy have been broadly discussed in the region, the peace that democracy is supposed to promote has been in serious danger, especially in the 21st century.

A timely survey and re-evaluation of democracy and peaceful development in South Asia, this book will be of interest to academics in the field of South Asian Studies, Peace and Conflict Studies and Asian Politics and Security.

Part I
Democracy, state and religion

1 Democracy and vigilantism

The spread of Gau Rakshaks in India

Kazuya Nakamizo

The question: Indian democracy in crisis

Indian democracy is in crisis. Almost 30 years ago, Atul Kohli, an eminent political scientist, pointed out in his Democracy and Discontent that India was facing a crisis of governability (Kohli 1992). What we are witnessing now is not only a crisis of governability but also a crisis of democracy: the suppression of freedom of speech via the arrest of social activists who are critical of the government,¹ the oppression of freedom of thought and creed via control of educational institutions and the media,² and the violation of the separation of powers by interference in the judiciary.³ A human rights advocate describes these actions of the present government as worse than Indira Gandhi’s declaration of a state of emergency in 1975.⁴

Under this egregious situation, the activities of vigilante groups are gaining attention. In particular, Gau Rakshaks (cow protection groups) lynch Muslims, sometimes based only on rumours that they slaughter cows and eat beef.⁵ As Figure 1.1 shows, the number of violent cow-related incidents increased from 3 to 37 between 2014 and 2017, which is a change resulting from the accession to power of the Narendra Modi–led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government after the 2014 general election.

The emergence of vigilante groups, however, is not new in the history of post-independence India. In 1967, a group of radical leftists started a land grab movement at Naxalbari in West Bengal, which they believed would be the beginning of a violent revolution sweeping away poverty, inequality, and injustice. Referred to widely as Naxalites, their violent tactics and militarized actions spread to other regions within India. In response, non-state actors, such as landlords, formed their own private armies to defend their land ownership and prestige and defeat the ‘Naxalite menace’. Perhaps the most notorious of these private armies was that of the Ranvir Sena, which was formed in the north Indian state of Bihar in 1994.

Figure 1.1 Cow-related hate crime in India (2012–18).

Source: Compiled by author based on IndiaSpend database, quated in Alison Saldanha, ‘Cow-Related Hate Crimes Peaked in 2017, 86% of Those Killed Muslim’, The Wire, 8 December 2017, htt­ps:­//t­hew­ire­.in­/20­310­3/c­ow-­vig­ila­nti­sm-­vio­len­ce-­201­7-m­usl­ims­-ha­te-­cri­me/­ (last accessed on 8 December 2017) for 2012-17 data and Varun B. Krishnan, ‘The Cow vigilante menace: U.P. records highest number of incidents’, The Hindu, 5 December 2018, htt­ps:­//w­ww.­the­hin­du.­com­/da­ta/­dat­a-p­oin­t-t­he-­cow­-vi­gil­ant­e-m­ena­ce/­art­icl­e25­666­768­.ec­e (last accessed on 19 January 2020). Date for December 2018 is up to 4 December 2018. Articles of the Wire and the Hindu are based on same data set which was published by IndiaSpend. Now this data set is deleted from IndiaSpend. See, ‘FactChecker pulls down hate crime database, IndiaSpend editor Samar Halarnkar resigns’, Scroll.in, 12 September 2019. htt­ps:­//s­cro­ll.­in/­lat­est­/93­707­6/f­act­che­cke­r-p­ull­s-d­own­-ha­te-­cri­me-­wat­ch-­dat­aba­se-­sis­ter­-we­bsi­tes­-ed­ito­r-r­esi­gns­ (last accessed on 19 January 2020). FactCheker received Data Journalism Award in 2019 from this survey.

However, recent vigilante groups are distinct in character from these earlier militant groups of the 20th century. In the 21st century, vigilantism now appears to have created new relationships with the state by not only drawing on the latter for support but also increasingly targeting the Indian constitution and pressing for extra-legal actions.

How can we understand this changing character of vigilantism? What does it mean for Indian democracy? These are the questions I seek to explore in this chapter by examining the development of vigilantism in India.

Arguments on vigilantism in India

Before discussing the development of vigilantism, we need to define the term vigilantism. Defining vigilantism is quite a difficult task due to its complex, changing characteristics and varied range of activities, as noted by Ray Abrahams (1998: 6–10). After carefully examining this definitional problem, Abrahams, an anthropologist who pioneered work on vigilantism, defined vigilante and vigilantism as follows:

‘vigilante’ and ‘vigilantism’ have seemed to me ‘ideally’ to involve an organized attempt by a group of ‘ordinary citizens’ to enforce norms and maintain law and order on behalf of their communities, often by resort to violence, in the perceived absence of effective official state action through police and courts.

(Abrahams 2007: 423)

Emphasizing this last point, he added, ‘Vigilantism cannot exist alone but only alongside and, typically, on the frontiers—structural and/or cultural—of state power’ (Abrahams 2007: 423). In short, vigilantism can be described as (1) involving ‘ordinary citizens’, (2) taking place through organized actions and often violent means, (3) enforcing norms and maintaining law and order on behalf of citizens’ communities, and (4) being situated on the frontiers of state power. This chapter basically follows his definitions of vigilante and vigilantism.

In India, the emergence of these militant vigilante groups has been a subject of considerable academic debate and discussion. The most compelling arguments, however, have sought to suggest that violence has been a result of the failure of the state to perform its expected roles, which I would prefer to term as ‘state deficit’.⁶ In brief, state deficit means that the state fails to deliver the political goods of security, like the protection of life and property, economic welfare, and basic infrastructure like health services, educational institutions, and social welfare schemes – whether by design or otherwise. For instance, the emergence of Naxalite/Maoist movements could be potentially traced to the Indian states’ inability to meet a number of popular expectations and responsibilities to solve socio-economic problems, such as actions disregarding the social oppression of disempowered castes, aggravating the economic oppression of marginal communities by not implementing land reforms, and failing to implement meaningful schemes to promote economic development, in addition to the disinterest of parliamentary parties in solving these problems (Louis 2002; Banerjee 2006; Gupta 2006; Mohanty 2006; Sagar 2006; Singh 2006).

The links between such kinds of state deficit frameworks and growth in anti-Naxalite/Maoist vigilantism was also suggested in studies analysing the role and emergence of landlord militias in Bihar in the 1980s. Prasad’s excellent work on the subject, in fact, revealed how the prevalence of semi-feudal agricultural relations in Bihar was not solved due to the inaction of the state government to implement land reform laws (Prasad 1987). In a subsequent study, Kolhi illustrated how the declining capacity of political parties, especially the once-dominant Congress Party, further aggravated the political violence involving militant vigilante groups in the region (Kohli 1992: 205–237). Kumar’s (2008: 170–171) analysis of the Ranvir Sena similarly follows the state deficit framework.

However, recent vigilante groups have characteristics that are markedly different from those of past militant vigilante groups in the 20th century. In the 21st century, these vigilante groups appear to be acquiring their momentum and strength from tacit governmental support. That is, rather than state deficit, we are now witnessing a reversal in the sense that vigilante groups in India are increasingly drawing their impetus from state support. The Salwa Judum (Purification Hunt), for example, was organized by a local member of t...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Contributors
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• Introduction: Dynamics of conflict and peace in contemporary South Asia
• Part I Democracy, state and religion
• Part II Democratization and social movements
• Part III How does a conflict end?
• Index