NEW DELHI: A day after opposition leader Sonia Gandhi called for the resignation of Home Minister Amit Shah for failing to curb the communal violence unleashed since Sunday, the government responded on Thursday by transferring the judge who named ruling party politicians for instigating the bloodletting.

As the official death toll in four days of violence climbed to 38 with at least 200 injured, the Modi government issued the order to transfer Delhi High Court’s Justice S. Murlidhar to the Punjab and Haryana High Court.

Justice Murlidhar had rapped the Delhi Police for inaction against politicians of the Bharatiya Janata Party and had played their videos for the police officers to watch how they poisoned the air with hate speeches against Muslims.

Thousands of Muslim women have been staging protests against a communally framed citizenship law, and the videos showed the leaders asking supporters to shoot them.

The chief justice who took over the case from his transferred colleague gave the government a comfortable four weeks on Thursday to respond to the charges.

Justice Murlidhar had also ordered police to accompany ambulances that were unable to reach predominantly Muslim localities to rush the dead and the injured to hospitals. As rescue operations swung into action, Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal demanded strict punishment for the instigators of violence “and twice the punishment if they are members of the Aaam Aadmi Party.”

Alleged complicity of the police in the communal violence has been likened to the 1984 anti-Sikh pogrom that killed over 3000 in mob lynching in Delhi. Justice Murlidhar said he was not going to allow 1984 being repeated. Subsequently, Naresh Gujral, sone of former prime minister Inder Gujral and a Rajya Sabha MP for the Akali Dal used a similar imagery.

In his letter, to the police chief, Mr. Gujral slammed the Delhi Police for allegedly not acting on his complaint requesting them to help out 16 people of the minority community.

“No action was taken on my complaint and those 16 individuals received no assistance whatsoever from the Delhi Police. They, fortunately, managed to escape only because some Hindu neighbours came to their rescue,” he wrote. “When a member of parliament’s complaint is not paid heed to, one can imagine the plight of the common man. No sane Indian wants a repeat of 1984,” Mr. Gujral told Press Trust of India.

While the government dispatched National Security Adviser Ajit Doval to take stock of the situation, he was quoted as saying peace would be ensured promptly.

However, the foreign ministry took exception to criticism from the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) that said Muslims and their places of worship were targeted in three days of violence.

“OIC statement is factually inaccurate, selective & misleading. There is an effort on the ground to restore normalcy & create confidence. We urge these bodies not to issue irresponsible statements,” external affairs ministry spokesperson Raveesh Kumar said in a media briefing.

But the foreign ministry seemed to have its plate full anyway. A day after US lawmakers reacted sharply to the violence in the Indian capital, Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders accused US President Donald Trump of failing on the issue of human rights.

Failure of leadership

Slamming the US president, Mr. Sanders said the Trump’s statement regarding the violence in New Delhi during his India visit was a “failure of leadership”.

Asked about incidents of violence during his India visit, the US president had said, “As far as the individual attacks, I heard about it, but I didn’t discuss that with him (Modi). That’s up to India.”

Reacting to the issue, Sanders on Wednesday tweeted: “Over 200 million Muslims call India home. Widespread anti-Muslim mob violence has killed at least 27 and injured many more. Trump responds by saying ‘That’s up to India’. This is a failure of leadership on human rights.”

At home, along with a screenshot of the transfer letter for Justice Murlidhar, Congress leader Priyanka Gandhi tweeted: “The midnight transfer of Justice Muralidhar isn’t shocking given the current dispensation, but it is certianly sad & shameful. Millions of Indians have faith in a resilient & upright judiciary, the government’s attempts to muzzle justice & break their faith are deplorable”.

Published in Dawn, February 28th, 2020