The Indian Supreme Court cleared Narendra Modi of any wrongdoing

The argument

This argument turns on the outcome of a formal investigation rather than on a general assessment of Narendra Modi's politics. A special investigation team examined whether Modi was complicit in the 2002 anti-Muslim communal riots in Gujarat. As the state's chief minister at the time, Modi faced accusations of complicity, which rested less on any claim that he ordered violence than on the absence of substantive police action to quell the riots: an executive who commands a state's police and does not deploy them, the accusation ran, has effectively permitted what follows. Proponents of this position argue that the investigation removed the factual basis for that inference. The team found that Modi was made aware of the riots at around 8:30 pm, some six hours after the riots began, and that finding matters because a charge of complicity depends on knowledge. An official who does not know that violence is under way cannot be withholding a response to it, and the hours in which the accusation locates his inaction are hours in which, on this finding, he had not yet been informed. The Indian Supreme Court concluded that Modi was neither involved in planning the violence nor turning a blind eye to the murder of Muslims. On this view the significance of that conclusion lies in what it settles. The charge of terrorism is not a loose expression of disapproval but an allegation of organising or knowingly enabling violence against civilians, and it is that allegation which India's highest court considered and rejected after investigation. Absent any finding of planning or of deliberate inaction, proponents argue, the label has nothing left to attach to, and Modi is not a terrorist. The adequacy of the inquiry continues to be disputed by others, but the judicial record as it stands contains no finding of wrongdoing against him.

Context

In 2013, a special investigation team assigned to investigate Modi’s role in the 2002 riots in Gujarat gave Modi a “clean chit”, exonerating him of all wrongdoing.

Premises

Counter-arguments

The investigation was deeply flawed from the start. A former MP for the Indian National Congress Party, Ehsan Jafri, made several calls to influential figures in government alerting them of the impending violence at 3 pm. Yet, nothing was done to disperse the angry Hindu mob and no security forces were deployed to protect Gujarat’s Muslim population. Evidence also indicates close cooperation and communication between Modi’s state government officials and the right-wing Hindu organization at the centre of attacks against Muslims, the Vishwa Hindu Parishad, in the build-up to the violence.

Rejecting the premises

[Rejecting P1] The investigation was flawed from the beginning.