Having tabled the report in the state legislature two months ago, the Shiv Sena-BJP government promptly rejected it for its indictment of Shiv Sainiks, including their leader Bal Thackeray, for inciting and indulging in communal violence.

For the human rights activists, their work was cut out. Almost every week, a public meeting is held in some part of Mumbai to demand punishment of the guilty. Counsels and lawyers, who fought for five years to help the Commission reach itsconclusions, are now fighting on another plane -- in the courts -- demanding that the report yield some action. Dedicated journalists, who have followed the Commission's deliberations day in and out, have compiled and translated the report into Marathi, Hindi and Urdu and are making it available to the public at subsidised costs. Muslim organisations, battling to hold back passions, are considering street-corner meetings to spread knowledge of the report.

``It's all in the courts now,'' says Abdussattar Sheikh, secretary of All India Milli Council, which was represented in the Commission. ``We haven't lost faith in the judiciary,'' he said, adding the report, detailing each black day of the riot, is as good as a chargesheet ``for the orphaned and widowed in the riots.'' The organisation, along with Bombay Aman Committee, has intervened in a petition filed in Supreme Court for implementation of the report. The two organisations have also filed a writ in Bombay High Court.

``We're also consideringtransferring the case to SC,'' says senior advocate Yusuf Muchchala, one of the counsels defending Milli Council at the Commission. Muchchala today addresses public gatherings on difficulties in getting convictions in riot cases, where witnesses suddenly disappear or turn hostile, and on the importance of prosecution.

``Most people would want the report implemented,'' says Muchchala, ``in the extreme sense of justice and fairness. Nobody except for the truly loyal party workers are justifying the report's rejection.'' He admits the provisions of the Commissions of Enquiry Act don't force the state government to accept the report, but advocates these reports because they bring the truth to the public.

``The rest is to build up public pressure,'' he says. The petitions in HC have also challenged the optional alternative for the state. ``There's no reason why such reports shouldn't be accepted, considering the amount of public money and time spent,'' says Teesta Setalvad, editor of Communalism Combat,a monthly magazine that was started as a succour for the communally-torn masses after '93.

Setalvad observes that even if accepted, no recommendations of commissions of enquiry have been implemented by any political party, even the Congress. In her compilation of the Srikrishna Commission Report, which has hit the stands at a subsidised price of Rs 60, she has published the Justice Madon report on the Bhiwandi riots of 1970, which the Congress had `accepted' and consigned to the shelves.

``In this case, the present government isn't as sophisticated,'' she says, adding that the government's rejection has fuelled interest in the report. Of the 3,600 copies published, 1,700 have already been sold, she informs. ``In terms of raising public consciousness, Mumbai needs to have more demonstrations and rallies. Unless the city can reconcile itself to the riots, which it hasn't been able to yet, large sections of the people won't be able to live peacefully,'' she says.

``In the end, protests are important.History will record that the government's rejection of the report was not accepted by people,'' says P A Sebastian, secretary of Committee for Protection of Democratic Rights, which has also filed a petition in the court.