Bhakti and violence are, under ordinary circumstances, like chalk and cheese. Worryingly, New India seems to have invalidated the distinction. A shooter — a self-proclaimed devotee of Ram — had turned the gun against a march organized by students of the Jamia Millia Islamia University. This heinous deed has, evidently, been a source of inspiration. Another man opened fire on unarmed women and children at Shaheen Bagh who have been protesting — peacefully — against the passage of the controversial Citizenship (Amendment) Act. On both occasions, policemen decided to play the role of mute spectators. But then, men in uniform are renowned for their devotion to their political masters. Human perversity, not divinity, lies at the heart of these transgressions. Student marchers had been targeted merely two days after the Union minister, Anurag Thakur, urged an election rally in poll-bound Delhi to chant the slogan, ‘shoot the traitors’. Mr Thakur is in illustrious company when it comes to incitement. Two other senior leaders of the Bharatiya Janata Party, Parvesh Verma and Kapil Mishra, have made intemperate remarks about the Shaheen Bagh protests, forcing the Election Commission to crack the whip. Mr Thakur and Mr Verma have found their names struck off from the star campaigners list and have been barred from campaigning for a specific time period; Mr Mishra, too, has been served a ban. But such mild penalties cannot be expected to deter the BJP’s venom-spouting leadership. The chief minister of Uttar Pradesh is now on record, alleging that Shaheen Bagh endorses terrorism and ‘speaks the language of Pakistan’.
Electoral propriety seldom weighs upon the BJP’s conscience. The party is an old hand when it comes to creating communal schisms that lead to the polarization of the electorate. This pattern is palpable, once again, in the concerted attempts to vilify the protests. Whipping up hate and anger prevents the public discourse from engaging with the BJP’s monumental failures on several fronts: India’s stuttering economy is only one example. Incitement, the BJP believes, is also potent when it comes to discrediting dissenting narratives that are capable of exposing the hollowness of the BJP’s rhetoric. The people must be sensitized about this chicanery and the role of India’s squabbling Opposition is crucial in this context. The leaching of the toxins from the body politic of the republic is a collective responsibility of citizens, politicians and regulatory institutions.
