Hozefa Ujjaini
Youth leader, Founder Buniyaad, Gujarat
Laying the foundation for Communal Harmony
“ I was very young, just passed my 12th exams when the 2002 Gujarat riots happened. I started visiting a relief camp right behind our house, and started volunteering in relief work , playing with children there. Slowly, I, like other young people around me, got connected to organisations and started doing work on relief, rehabilitation, livelihood. We saw that what happened was the result of long term communal hatred, and decided to work on this as a ‘peace group’, a project supported by Action Aid. After this, I joined Jan Vikas, working with internally displaced people due to riots, on issues of rights, entitlements, conflict transformation with youth. To address different needs we used cultural mediums like street theatre to engage with the community and mobilise young people . And what emerged eventually was Buniyaad, an organisation to work with youth from marginalised communities of Muslims and Dalits at the ground level, to build their socio-economic rights and leadership. When I saw the riots, it hit me personally. I had questions as to why this violence happened. Working with people, I constantly asked myself, what could be my role in this ? I kept wondering - That so much had happened, where is God ? In the quest for these questions my journey began.”
During the pandemic, when the propaganda against Muslims started, Hozefa went back to the communities to put an end to the blame game.
“It was so sudden, people couldn’t understand what was happening. Secular forces were much smaller in comparison to the level at which communal hatred was spreading. Today there is so much ‘ghettoisation’ of communities, that the new generation living here has no exposure to intercultural exchange between people of different castes and religions. This economic interdependence would have connected them, given some opportunity for cultural exchange and could’ve decreased communal hatred. But the pandemic made even that exchange impossible.Gujarat is consistently projected as this great place where communal riots haven't happened after 2002, but there have been so many incidents of communal hatred and violence in smaller pockets that aren’t talked about in mainstream narratives.”
Hozefa and his friends Praveen and Ashok, all from different identities and faiths, came together in solidarity, and started visiting communities and helping people who were Covid positive.
“It was impossible to get cars, public or private or an ambulance because people didn't want to give a ride to covid positive patients. We used the help of auto drivers in the community to ferry Covid positive patients- Hindu, Muslim or Dalit to the hospitals. These auto drivers didn’t understand big words like communal harmony but they understood that they were contributing in their own small way by helping us. We also joined hands with Alpsankhyak Adhikar Samiti, an organisation that started an online campaign to report hate speech directly to the DG, IG of Gujarat police through the cybercrime cell and got many groups spreading propaganda, banned. As a part of this campaign people were trained to write and register an FIR and almost 700 FIRS were filed against hate speech. Everywhere, we tried to make alliances and reach people through relief. In a ‘Valmiki’ community, one young person befriended us, and told us that it's great that you gave food to people who needed it, but the virus has spread more because of these Muslims’. He was left speechless when we told him that we are Muslims too! We also joined a ‘dignity community kitchen’ which was run by and for migrant labourers. The kitchen fed 4000 people.”
Hozafa mentions that one of their programs takes them to different villages to celebrate cultural diversities through performance and arts, like adivasi dances, sufi music or the local ‘Bhawai’ folk music. “ Once we held this program in ‘Anand’, a Muslim dominated area. We tried to get others (non-muslims) from outside as well, to dispel the fears of a muslims and to challenge the stereotypes about them. Since we work largely with youth, we also sometimes get asked strange questions like, ‘Do you get Hindu girls married to Muslim boys ?’ But we keep connecting to as many young people as possible because it’s important to keep conversations going. They are important to bust stereotypes. Sometimes small riots also happen. During these riots, in villages where Muslims are in minority, they're often forced to leave. So our work also involves re-establishing these families back in these villages, so that they can live there again without fear.”
Hozefa feels that everybody can play a role in building communal and inter-community harmony. Even art plays a big role as youth gets form connections through entertainment and talent.
“Theatre artists, painters, writers, poets, musicians, all of them can galvanise change! Even the mighty are scared of artists for they are powerful ! We need spaces where diverse cultural exchanges are accepted, respected and enjoyed. Simple acts like sharing food can also bring people together and enjoy the diversity in food. But Hozefa feels that young people who are trying to bring change need community support, “So that we don’t feel alone!”
Interviewed and Art directed by Nida Ansari
Collage by Shreya Roy Chowdhury; Embroidery on Collage by Singhleton