Cong’s politics over human skeletons backfires

SMA KAZMI

Tribune News Service

Dehradun, October 23

The attempts by the Congress-led state government, headed by Chief Minister Harish Rawat, to nail former Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna and the BJP on the issue of disposal of skeletons of Kedarnath victims of the June 2013 disaster seems to have backfired on the ruling party.

The recovery of human skeletons in some areas around Kedarnath has started a war of words between the Congress and the BJP. More than 5,000 pilgrims had perished in the June 2013 deluge at Kedarnath but only 376 bodies were found. It was common sense that thousands, who had died, were buried under lakhs of tonnes of debris which came with water. Since 2013, there had been reports that human skeletons were seen in various places around Kedarnath.

 Interestingly, with the state Assembly elections round the corner, the issue of human skeletons was raised by the ruling dispensation in a planned manner to hit at former Chief Minister Vijay Bahuguna, who has joined the BJP. The strategists of the Chief Minister, under the aegis of a mountaineering  society, organised seven treks to the Kedarnath temple with an aim to popularise an alternate trekking route to the revered shrine. The trekking was organised by people close to Chief Minister Harish Rawat. One of the trekking team, which went to Kedarnath from the Trigujinarayan area, reported the presence of human skeletons en route. The Chief Minister was quick to send the police and a team of State Disaster Relief Force (SDRF) to the area to collect the skeletons and organise the last rites of the victims of the June 2013 tragedy.

Harish Rawat attacked Vijay Bahuguna for the lapse and blamed him for stopping the search operations to locate the bodies of the victims. Bahuguna was quick to respond and questioned the Chief Minister on his inaction for the past more than two years. He said he never ordered stoppage of the search operations as he remained the Chief Minister only for seven months (till January 31, 2014) after the tragedy. What stopped Harish Rawat, who was the Chief Minister since Februay 1, 2014, till now, to locate human skeletons as it was common knowledge, he asked.

The Uttarakhand BJP backed Vijay Bahuguna and criticised Harish Rawat for doing politics on human tragedy. Ironically, in the game of one-upmanship, Harish Rawat probably forgot that even the state government headed by Vijay Bahuguna at the time of the Kedarnath tragedy was that of the Congress.

He was ill-advised to rake up the issue of skeletons to get even with his political opponents before the state Assembly poll.

 However, after raking up the issue, there was an adverse public reaction. The general masses and the social media criticised the attempts by the state government to do politics on skeletons and trying to portray as if something new has happened. The Chief Minister after initial outburst against Vijay Bahuguna was also on the defensive and ordered the SDRF to look for skeletons of the victims and arrange for their proper last rites. 

The politics over human skeletons indicated the tone and tenor of the electoral war in the run up to the state Assembly poll.