2002 Gujarat Riots Debate
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Jim Shannon
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2002 Gujarat Riots
Jim Shannon Excerpts(2 years, 2 months ago)
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Kim Leadbeater (Batley and Spen) (Lab)
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the 20th anniversary of the 2002 Gujarat riots.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Davies. I am grateful for the opportunity to open this debate, which is my very first Westminster Hall debate.
The riots took place in the days following 27 February 2002 in the Indian state of Gujarat. The precise death toll remains a matter of dispute, even as we approach the 20th anniversary of the events. There is no agreement on the facts of what happened, never mind who was or was not complicit in instigating the violence or allowing it to continue. All we can say with certainty is that, at the very least, 1,000 people lost their lives and that the majority of them were Muslim.
There have been numerous investigations and inquiries, including by the Indian Supreme Court and highly respected organisations, such as the international Human Rights Watch. However, as far as I am aware, none of these has reached conclusions acceptable to all parties, communities and faiths. It is not my role here in the British Parliament—very distant in both time and location from those horrific occurrences—to pass judgment. I would not be able to do so even if I wanted to. What I can do, and what I very much want to do, is consider the legacy of what happened from the point of view of the families of those who lost their lives or were seriously injured. Today is about acknowledging the loss and hopefully providing some comfort, and maybe even some closure, for those families.
Every act of violence has repercussions well beyond those caught up directly in it. Some survivors and relatives will never fully get over the trauma of what happened. For others, while the pain may lessen over time, it will never disappear completely. As hon. Members will know, I have personal experience of this—not just of the loss and the hurt but, crucially, of the desire to never forget our loved ones and to try and learn something from the most horrific of events and so that we do all can to ensure they are not repeated.
Jim Shannon (Strangford) (DUP)
I congratulate the hon. Lady on bringing forward her first Westminster Hall debate. I have no doubt that it will be the first of many. Does she not agree that these devastating riots, which led to thousands of deaths, as she mentioned, hold lessons for us, and that we must continue to remember the 2002 Gujarat riots to teach our children the result of intolerance and anger?