Srikrishna report blamed for letting Cong go scot-free

“Sporadic outbursts of communalism are not a seizure of epilepsy but a cancer of our society,” he added. Commenting on the role of the police, Godbole expressed concern over the use of police as an instrument of convenience for political gains by the political parties in power.

Journalist Teesta Setalwad described the commission’s report as one-sided. “Justice Srikrishna has done injustice by restricting the destructiverole played by the then Congress government to just three paragraphs,” she remarked.

She described the breaking of riots after the demolition of disputed structure at Ayodhya as a well-orchestrated plan of the Shiv Sena and the Bharatiya Janata Party.

“By rejecting the commission’s report, the Sena-BJP government had only established its fundamentalistic approach,” she said. Noted legal expert Satyaranjan Sathe said although according to law it is not binding on a government to accept the commission’s report, it is morally binding on it.

“Democracy does not always run on law alone, it requires the support of morality of the political party,” he said. He said curbing of communal ways in the majority community was vital as it was more dangerous — often incorrectly linked to nationalism and patriotism.

Holding the Congress equally responsible for the riots, Sathe said the party with a great legacy had lost its ideology, which was in turn a great loss to the nation.

Former deputy chairman of thePlanning Commission, Mohan Dharia, expressed concern over the outright rejection of the Srikrishna report. “Judges should refuse to chair such commissions given the way the inquiry reports are handled by the State Government,” he said.