‘The conviction that carries me through is that finally we will win’

Teesta Setalvad speaks to Sadaf Modak

What prompted you to write a memoir?

A book I have written on the 2002 Gujarat riots hasn’t gone to press for various reasons since 2007. While the work that Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) has been doing has got national and international attention, people were concerned about the kind of targetting that it is facing, including attempts to discredit the work we have done. My publishers got in touch with me and said that you must write a memoir. I was not keen on writing anything personal, but they felt that there were clear efforts to vilify me as a person by the powers that be. That was one of the impulses for the book.

How do you look back at the contribution of CJP?

The contribution of CJP has been three-fold. In terms of the judiciary, its role has been in achieving convictions in criminal cases in the 2002 Gujarat riots from the trial court stage to the Supreme Court. There has been 172 convictionsin68criminalcases inthe 2002 Gujarat riots. In the country, perpetrators of communal riots have not really been convicted, be it the 1984 riots, the Mumbai 1992-93 riots or the Hashimpura massacre. So, our involvement in the actual trial in 15 cases, where most sentences are life imprisonment, is pathbreaking. In addition, systemic inroads have been made when it comes to witness protection through the court orders CJP cases have got. Around 570 survivors of the Gujarat riots have got paramilitary protection due to the threats received from perpetrators. An amendment to the Criminal Procedure Code in 2009 was made for the first time, where the victims got the statutory right to assist the prosecution.

How do you respond to the criminal cases that undermine the legitimacy of your work?

The cases against us have been one of the prices we paid as an organisation andindividuallyinpursuingcasesforvictimsofcommunalviolenceagainstpowerfulperpetrators.thecriminalisationof ourworkisdirectlyrelatedtothat.ihave had to face charges for so-called perjury, tutoring of witnesses and have received anticipatory bail in nine different cases. Sections of the media have assumed an adversarialrole.thewaytodealwiththis targetting is to ask yourself whether the vilification by the powerful will win, or, thehugeamountofsupporters,willthey win? The conviction that carries me through is that finally we will win.

What about the FCRA case (a chargesheet has been filed against Setalvad, her husband and a company run by them for alleged violation of foreign funding rules)?

The government has cancelled 20,000 FCRA licences and no one is questioning the grounds on which that was done. Should there not be a question to the government for taking such an arbitrary decision? When human rights work is stopped in this fashion, no one is trying to find out which are these organisations and why are they being targetted.