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Arundhati Roy

(TOI Photo)

Mohammed Wajihuddin narrates how an intellectual debate suddenly turned ugly when the masks came off some men.

Last Sunday at Delhi���s Press Club, there was an attempt at a debate on the theme���Fascism and Terrorism: Two Sides of the Same Coin. This writer was invited to be one of the speakers. Over fifty people had sacrificed the India-Australia cricket match and they looked forward to witness an informed, dispassionate debate on an important issue. It began well.

After a brief introduction of the Urdu Press Club, a forum that organises debates on current issues, the panelists were invited to the podium. Surendra Jain of the Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP), historian Amaresh Misra, National Conference MP A R Shaheen and Qaumi Party���s Mohammed Hasnain reached the stage. Arundhati Roy was in the hall but she did not go to the dais. She sat among the audience. It would emerge later that she had not been warned that there were going to be politicians. ���I don���t share stage with politicians. I am ok here,��� Roy whispered to��the Urdu Press Club���s��general secretary Tariq Faizi.

Amaresh Misra spoke first. And he spoke at length. The predominantly Muslim audience cheered him with frequent applause. He blamed terrorism in India on the growing Indo-Israel relationship and India���s pro-West policies. He lambasted the Sangh Parivar and the Congress-led government for Muslim ���persecution��� across the country. Shaheen looked at his watch and gently told Misra, whose fat book on 1857 was launched recently by vice-president Hamid Ansari, to shorten his speech.

Meanwhile Roy, who by now had moved to a sequined sofa from the bare plastic chair in the back row, appeared restless. She wanted to leave. But then she was offered the mike. ���My Hindi is bad. Can I speak in English?��� asked the celebrated writer who was clad in a sleeveless kurti. A shawl was wrapped around her thin shoulders. Speaking in broken Hindi, generously interspersed with flawless English, Roy confessed, ���I spoke on the same subject in Turkey recently.���

She kept her speech on Muslim persecution short. At the same venue a week earlier, Roy, along with Girish Karnad and many other intellectuals, had battled for Bangladeshi writer Taslima Nasreen. Now seated among a predominantly Muslim crowd, Roy described Taslima differently������She is not a great writer. Don���t waste your energy on her.���

The presence of VHP���s Surendra Jain and journalist Manoj Raghuvanshi did not comfort her. She knew they would not stomach her diatribe against the ���fascists���. She clearly wanted to leave, but was persuaded to hang around for some more time. So she stayed and heard Raghuvanshi slam ���pseudo-secularists���.

He claimed that he was the first journalist in the world who, as a reporter for

Newstrack

in the late 1980s, had reported the arrival of terrorism in Kashmir.

He invited the wrath of the crowd when he tried to justify the Hindu backlash after the attacks on Akshardham and Varanasi. Actually, he was responding to S A R Geelani���s speech in which he had said that democracy was endangered as Dalits and minorities felt insecure in the country. Geelani, who spent months in jail on charges of abetting the terrorist attack on the Parliament, claimed that he was a victim of state oppression. Though acquitted by the Supreme Court, Geelani carries the terrorist tag as an albatross around his neck and moves around with a private security guard.

Raghuvanshi���s speech made many in the crowd, mostly young college boys, restive. They wanted him to change the tone of his speech. Unruffled, the belligerent Raghuvanshi said, ���You are 20 crore while Hindus number 80 crore. Imagine what will happen if the majority gets angry.���

Raghuvanshi then dropped a bombshell when he asked clerics to remove the verses of jihad from the

Quran

. This was a line straight from Hindutva���s hate book. But the boys had reasons to cheer once Mohammed Hasnain of the little-known Qaumi Party came to speak.

He played to the gallery. He pooh-poohed Lord Ram���s conquest of Sri Lanka. ���For the alleged kidnapping of Sita, Ram and his army attacked Lanka,��� Hasnain thundered. The debate had reached a dangerous zone, with battle lines clearly drawn. The discussion was no longer about fascism and terrorism. And Arundhati Roy had long left the hall.

���Hasnain has insulted Ram,��� Surendra Jain screamed, ���Shall I talk about the

Rangeela Rasool

?��� That was the last nail in the coffin of the debate.

Rangeela Rasool

is a blasphemous Hindi book which describes the Prophet���s private life in lurid detail.

The Muslim boys were now on their feet. Many of them lunged towards Jain to thrash him. Misra stood on the table to calm them down. Now that the situation had gone out of control someone called the police. There were rumours that VHP goons were already on their way to the Press Club.

Jain, meanwhile, was escorted��out safely. And the question whether fascism and terrorism were two sides of the same coin remained unanswered.

mohammed.wajihuddin@timesgroup.com