Haren Pandya's testimony Before the Concerned Citizens Tribunal - Crimes Against Humanity Gujarat 2002 
1.7. The Tribunal received direct information through a testimony from a highly placed source of a meeting where the chief minister, two or three senior cabinet colleagues, the CP of Ahmedabad, and an IG police of the state were present. This meeting took place on the late evening of February 27. The meeting had a singular purpose: the senior-most police officials were told that they should expect a "Hindu reaction" after Godhra. They were also told that they should not do anything to contain this reaction.
1.8. The Tribunal also has evidence of a secret meeting, held late in the evening of February 27, in Lunavada village of Sabarkantha district. Between 3 and 6 p.m., a call was made from the house of Dr. Yogesh Ramanlal Pandya, in Godhra to Dr. Anil Patel (a member of the Gujarat Doctor’s Cell), intimating him about the meeting. A call was also made to the police housing corporation chairman, Dr. Chandrakanth Pandya (from Kalol). Shri Ashok Bhatt, the state health minister who was then sitting in the Godhra collectorate, was also intimated about the meeting. Transport minister, Shri Prabhat Singh Chauhan, who hails from Panchmahal, was reportedly also called to attend. One AP Pandya was also present at the meeting. The phone calls were made to invite 50 top people of the BJP/RSS/BD/VHP and the plan was to assemble them at someone’s house in Lunavada (Sabarkantha). Fifty top people, the Tribunal was told, met at this undisclosed destination and detailed plans were made on the use of kerosene, petrol for arson and other methods of killing. The state intelligence did not or could not track such meetings and preparations for the gruesome violence that was to follow.





One of the IMPORTANT REPORTS THAT NEEDS TO BE RE VISITED IS THE CONCERNED CITIZENS TRIBUNAL REPORT - GUJARAT CRIMES AGAINST HUMANITY RELEASED ON NOVEMBER 21, 22 2012

IT IS BEFORE THIS TRIBUNAL THAT THE FORMER MINISTER HAREN PANDYA HAD DEPOSED. HE WAS ASSASSINATED THEREAFTER.
JUSTICES KISHNA IYER, PB SAWANT AND HOSBET SURESH HEADED THE PANEL

URL: http://www.sabrang.com/tribunal/vol2/index.html


To make it easier have excerpted certain sections and marked the paras
STATE COMPLICITY

Government of Gujarat
1. The post-Godhra carnage in Gujarat was an organised crime perpetrated by the state’s chief minister and his government. The state’s complicity is evident from the various acts of commission and omission of the government and its officials.
1.1. It was the chief minister who declared that the Godhra incident was pre-planned when the investigating agencies had not reached such a conclusion. Shri Modi’s cabinet, notably the minister for home, Shri Gordhan Zadaphiya, reiterated strongly that Pakistani hands were behind the Godhra act. These statements were irresponsible, given the sensitivity of the situation and the anger that they generated. Once they generated a climate ripe for apportioning blame, for the acts of a few criminals, the entire Ghanchi Muslim community of Godhra was branded. This led to a feeling of justifying the systematic massacre, plunder, loot and cultural decimation of the entire Muslim community in Gujarat thereafter.
1.2. It was the chief minister who decided that the charred, unidentifiable dead bodies be taken from Godhra to Ahmedabad in a motor cavalcade. As the cavalcade headed for Ahmedabad, senior members of his party and organisations affiliated to it shouted slogans and incited mobs to retaliate. The CM’s role in condoning this behaviour, and in using official machinery to propagate the unsubstantiated view that the Godhra tragedy was a sinister conspiracy, is condemnable. Thus, it was the chief minister who was primarily responsible for the spread of violence, post-Godhra, in the rest of Gujarat.
1.7. The sectarian approach of the government and the inaction on the part of the administration allowed the violence to spread. According to dozens of testimonies before the Tribunal, even some ministers of the Gujarat government led the carnage and rapes, in many cases. The CM did not take adequate preventive measures, nor did he keep the army on stand-by. Though the situation was grim, and tension was at its peak, Shri Modi falsely claimed on March 2 (Newshour, Star News, 2/03/2002): "Gujarat mein bahut tezi se shanti prasthapit ho rahi hai, normalcy aa rahi hai… Ahmedabad ek prakar se kal raat ke baad, puri taraha incident-free raha hai." ("Gujarat is well on the road to peace and normalcy is slowly returning here… Ahmedabad too has been largely peaceful since last night.") This, while the attacks in Panchmahal district, Mehsana, Kheda, Nadiad, Bhavnagar – which included hacking, lynching and burning alive of people— continued. This was done deliberately to mislead the rest of the country and the world, though what was going on in Gujarat was clear to the whole world through the print media, radio and TV.
1.8. Shri Modi claimed on March 3 (Talking Heads, Star News, 3/03/2002), that the Army was called for on the evening of February 28, and joined duty from the morning of 1st March.
(Although 12 columns of the Army (approximately 600 troops) had reached Ahmedabad and other sensitive areas on March 1, they were kept on standby. Military intelligence puts the blame on the state government. News reports maintained that the initial delay was due to the absence of clear instructions from the Gujarat government. (The Times of India, Ahmedabad, March 11, Pg. 7). (See chapter on Godhra, Volume II).
1.10. Other ministers in the state cabinet displayed the same attitude. Electoral constituencies of ministers in the state cabinet were more prone to violence; in some cases, ministers themselves were leading the mobs. It may not be a mere coincidence that Bapunagar, home constituency of the minister of state for home, Shri Gordhan Zadaphiya, witnessed one of the worst communal scenes since the 1969 riots, when the area was the hardest hit. Some of the senior BJP leaders and ministers in Shri Modi’s cabinet were also alleged to have participated in the destruction of minority places of worship. Minister for revenue, Shri Haren Pandya and health minister, Shri Ashok Bhatt led the mobs enthusiastically in Ahmedabad. Shri Bharat Barot, a sitting MLA, was also at the forefront. Residents of Paldi, from where Shri Pandya was elected, actually saw him lead arson attacks. Shri Pandya’s election promise the last time was "to wipe any trace of Muslims out of Paldi." Smt. Maya Kotdani, an MLA, has also been named by a few dozen witnesses as an active participant in the violence. Gujarat ministers Shri Nitin Patel and Shri Narayan Laloo Patel led violence, arson and even sexual violence against women in Kadi and Unja in Mehsana respectively.
2. Role of Chief Minister and His Ministerial Colleagues
2.1. The facts mentioned in this report clearly establish that chief minister Shri Narendra Modi is the chief Author and Architect of all that happened in Gujarat after the arson of February 27, 2002. It is amply clear from all the evidence placed before the Tribunal that what began in Godhra, could have, given the political will, been controlled promptly at Godhra itself. Instead, the state government under chief minister Shri Narendra Modi took an active part in leading and sponsoring the violence against minorities all over Gujarat. His words and actions throughout the developments in Gujarat show that he has been openly defying the Constitution and indulging in actions which are positively detrimental to the interests of the country.
2.2. Shri Modi was the one who took Godhra to the rest of Gujarat. He was the one who directed the police and the administration not to act. He was the one who refused to help the likes of former member of Parliament, Shri Ahsan Jafri and the large number of people in Shri Jafri ’s home, who were all butchered later on.
2.6. It is unfortunate that all his ministerial colleagues have toed his line with no regard to the oath that they took under the Indian Constitution. They are, therefore, equally guilty of the commissions and omissions committed by the chief minister. These rabid, communal, anti-national and anti-constitutional statements and conduct on the part of the chief minister of Gujarat, Shri Narendra Modi and his cabinet colleagues make them unfit to hold any public office. The interests of the people of this country are not safe in their hands.

Haren Pandya Testimony refererd to in the Section of the Concerned Tribunal Report-Crimes Against Humanity Volume II sub-titled 
"Police Misbehaviour Section"
1.7. The Tribunal received direct information through a testimony from a highly placed source of a meeting where the chief minister, two or three senior cabinet colleagues, the CP of Ahmedabad, and an IG police of the state were present. This meeting took place on the late evening of February 27. The meeting had a singular purpose: the senior-most police officials were told that they should expect a "Hindu reaction" after Godhra. They were also told that they should not do anything to contain this reaction.
1.8. The Tribunal also has evidence of a secret meeting, held late in the evening of February 27, in Lunavada village of Sabarkantha district. Between 3 and 6 p.m., a call was made from the house of Dr. Yogesh Ramanlal Pandya, in Godhra to Dr. Anil Patel (a member of the Gujarat Doctor’s Cell), intimating him about the meeting. A call was also made to the police housing corporation chairman, Dr. Chandrakanth Pandya (from Kalol). Shri Ashok Bhatt, the state health minister who was then sitting in the Godhra collectorate, was also intimated about the meeting. Transport minister, Shri Prabhat Singh Chauhan, who hails from Panchmahal, was reportedly also called to attend. One AP Pandya was also present at the meeting. The phone calls were made to invite 50 top people of the BJP/RSS/BD/VHP and the plan was to assemble them at someone’s house in Lunavada (Sabarkantha). Fifty top people, the Tribunal was told, met at this undisclosed destination and detailed plans were made on the use of kerosene, petrol for arson and other methods of killing. The state intelligence did not or could not track such meetings and preparations for the gruesome violence that was to follow.
1.9. On the night of February 27, some companies of the State Reserve Police (SRP) were rustled into action: one was sent to Godhra from SRP Group-III Naroda, and another to Ahmedabad rural. Some more companies from Ghodasar were moved into parts of Ahmedabad by early morning. But they were split into groups of four or five jawans each, which rendered them largely ineffective against the mobs that went on the rampage on February 28.



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Teesta Setalvad
'Nirant', Juhu Tara Road,
Juhu, Mumbai - 400 049