When history gets Modi-fied

Narendra Modi does not know that by putting Gujarati Muslims under pressure he may have activated a powerful and, thus far, very decent, India friendly global diaspora, which had never seen itself in communal terms.

Mahatma Gandhi spent 21 years of his life from 1893 to 1914 in South Africa largely at the hospitality of and in friendship with Gujarati Muslims. If we revere Gandhi as the greatest Indian since Buddha, surely every detail of his life should have been documented by now.

Did independent India develop deliberate amnesia about Gandhi’s extended Muslim association? Except for some popular incidents in his South African years which Shyam Benegal developed in his film, based on facts provided by historian Fatima Mir very little work has been done on the Mahatma’s years in Natal and the Transvaal.

I am not only referring to the hopeless neglect of his ashrams in South Africa, but the details of his life obtained from people whose parents lived and worked with Gandhi.

And an overwhelming majority of these people were Muslims from Gujarat. Why did Gandhi lovers never document this priceless bit of history? Pardon me, but the question has occurred to me in the context of the carnage of Muslims who may, by blood or association, be linked to Gandhi’s friends.

The person who introduced me to Nelson Mandela the day he was released from Victor Voerster prison was Yusuf Cachalia. Yusuf was a handsome, large-hearted man, straight as an arrow and a great friend of ANC leaders like Mandela and Walter Sisulu. He had marvellous anecdotes of Gandhi too, which his father, Mohammad Cachalia, had told him.

Cachalia’s name figures glowingly in Gandhi’s memoirs. Indeed, he had come to South Africa at the invitation of Gujarati Muslim businessmen, the leading spirit among whom was Baba Abdullah, whose legal case he had come to defend.

Yusuf had a vast collection of letters and other documents which would shed light on the Mahatma. He has a theory which he often put across with some pain, ‘‘Do you think the Indian Gandhians are shy of playing up Gandhi in South Africa (except, only selectively) because every alternate frame would show Gandhi in the company of a Gujarati Muslim trader?’’ Then he would add,‘‘I thought pictures of his friendships in South Africa would go a long way in harmonising ties between the two communities. I wonder why his deep Muslim associations here and in Mauritius are never played up in India.’’

Subsequently, when the battle against apartheid gathered momentum, guess who provided the leadership? As Mandela put it, ‘‘remarkable men like Yusuf Dadoo’’.

There is a very elementary reason for the preponderance of Gujarati Muslims in leadership positions in the battle against apartheid. While an overwhelming majority of the 1.5 million Indians arrived in South Africa as indentured labour, Gujarati businessmen — predominantly Muslim — came as traders and were able to provide their children the best education, a large number at the Inns of Court in London.

There was a sort of logic in the fact that when Mandela constituted his first cabinet, there were 11 persons of Indian origin in high cabinet positions — eight were Gujarati Muslims; two, Hindus and one, Parsee. Ahmad Kathrada, another Muslim of Gujarati origin, was the minister in the presidency.

When Thabo Mbeki became president, Ahmad Kathrada was replaced by Esop Pahad, whom many Communist leaders remember because, in the earlier days of Indian leftism, Pahad’s regular accommodation in New Delhi was Ajoy Bhavan — the CPI headquarters in Delhi!

Have we taken advantage of these associations or have we screened off cabinet ministers like Aziz Pahad, minister in the foreign ministry; Kader Asmal, minister for water resources; Dulla Omar, minister for law, because they are Muslim?

Go through the foreign office files on South Africa during Mbeki’s government formation and you will find an answer. Mac Maharaj, Laloo Chiba, Jay Naidu were also fairly high up in the Mandela-Sisulu arrangement.

The sad point, of course, is that neither Mandela nor Mbeki are probably aware of the religious denominations of the various cabinet colleagues but some elements in our foreign office are. Modi is only a cherry on the communal cake which has been baking for quite a while in the national oven.

There are influential Gujarati Muslims spread across East Africa and other parts of the world. What is likely to hit the Indian government in a most unexpected way are the legal remedies being sought by the 15,000 Gujarati Muslims settled in the UK, many of whom have been great assets to the Indian High Commission in London.

Cases of genocide against Modi are being filed in Britain, the International Court of Justice at the Hague and some Belgian courts. Reports on Gujarat compiled by various bodies, including in NHRC and some women’s groups, are only supplementing first hand information collected by British officials inquiring into the murder of British citizens in the Gujarat genocide.

It will be interesting to see how the Indian government mounts a counter offensive to keep Modi from the fate that caught up with Milosevic. And, mind you, in Milosevic’s case, evidence is not so clear of his having personally organised pogroms.

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