‘Don’t want to join Dabholkar-Pansare list’

AHMEDABAD: The murders of rationalists Narendra Dabholkar and Govind Pansare are still fresh in the public memory. Apprehending a similar fate, a rationalist from Rajkot, Jayant Pandya, rushed to the Gujarat high court complaining about police inaction on finding out who was behind the assault on him on the night of January 31.
Associated for three decades with Vigyan Jatha, an organization working on the eradication of superstition and blind faith, Pandya is demanding that the probe be transferred to higher officers, so the culprits are found.He has become apprehensive, because he has lately been branded ‘anti-Brahmin’ and ‘anti-Hindu’.
“For 30 years, I have been exposing people who dupe others in the name of religion and divine power. In last couple of years, groups have accused me of being anti-Brahmin and anti-Hindu. These people can target anybody. The murders of Dabholkar, Pansare and others are not instances from the distant past. I don’t want my name to be on that list,” he told TOI.
After the assault, an FIR was lodged with Malviyanagar police. However, police did not probe the case and Pandya had to make a representation before the police commissioner, expressing apprehensions that a similar attack could happen again. When police did not trace the culprits, Pandya approached the HC, complaining about police inaction in finding them.
After hearing his advocate Akash Pandya, Justice S H Vora ordered the concerned investigator to present himself before the court on April 2 with all the case documents.
In the wake of attacks on a few rationalists in other parts of the country, Pandya’s anxiety does not appear misplaced. A Brahmin group organized a yagna in Jamnagar a month ago and performed rituals aimed against Vigyan Jatha, for its alleged activity against religion.
Three years ago, Pandya had to move the HC as police charged him with abetment to suicide after a tantrik in Padadhari town committed suicide leaving behind a note saying he had taken the extreme step due to threats from the rationalist. The HC had quashed the FIR against the rationalist.