I feel so confused when I read something that says “Growing intolerance in India” What is the growing intolerance in country all about?Is it about the suspicious murder of veteran Kannada writer MM Kalburgi? Is it about the ‘Award Wapsi’ which was started all the way by Sahitya Akademi award winner of 1986, Nayanatara Sehgal? Is it about the man in Dadri who supposedly ate beef being killed by an unidentified mob? Is it about the other writers, film makers, historians, scientists and artistes that joined the “Award return” club? Is it about the minority killings? Is it the silence of our Prime Minister over these attacks? Is it about the “Durga Puja” ban in West Bengal? Or is it about the recent attack by ISIS in France? What is it?
Though it’s no less than heart wrenching that a person could be killed for having his own ideology, isn’t it equally disrespectful to return the award of honor bestowed on them? Nayanatara Sehgal being the niece of our first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, can we rule out the possibilities of her protest being completely apolitical? Why then a lot of other people follow that path? Every person may have had their own personal motives for that. It might be their film promotion, book release, or to become known, gain popularity etc. Didn’t any untoward incident happen in the Congress era? Did our former prime minister speak a word? Did Mr. Modi speak a word on the “Durga Puja” ban prevalent in West Bengal past 3 years? What’s wrong if he didn’t speak on these issues? A killing is a killing. What’s majority and minority in it? Aren’t we aware of honor killings happening in many remote parts of our country every single day? Aren’t we aware of dalits who are treated in the most horrible ways by the so called village headmen? Aren’t we aware of the khap panchayats delivering the cruelest of judgments?
All these happen every single day across the country whether we accept it to be true or not. There’s nothing to do with religion here. There’s certainly nothing about majority, minority, men, women here. No religion preaches evil. Crime has no religion. It’s just the people. And there's no intolerance!!
We, as Indians have been harmoniously coexisting with one another on the same land since centuries. We may profess different religions, belong to various economic groups, speak different languages, and may have lots of diversities among ourselves. But a single thing that has kept us all united is being “Indian”.
If we start dividing ourselves on the lines of religion, region, caste, majority, minority, race, sex etc, it would not be any less than a disaster. Since we all don’t have anything in common, apart from “Being Indian”!
Though it’s no less than heart wrenching that a person could be killed for having his own ideology, isn’t it equally disrespectful to return the award of honor bestowed on them? Nayanatara Sehgal being the niece of our first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru, can we rule out the possibilities of her protest being completely apolitical? Why then a lot of other people follow that path? Every person may have had their own personal motives for that. It might be their film promotion, book release, or to become known, gain popularity etc. Didn’t any untoward incident happen in the Congress era? Did our former prime minister speak a word? Did Mr. Modi speak a word on the “Durga Puja” ban prevalent in West Bengal past 3 years? What’s wrong if he didn’t speak on these issues? A killing is a killing. What’s majority and minority in it? Aren’t we aware of honor killings happening in many remote parts of our country every single day? Aren’t we aware of dalits who are treated in the most horrible ways by the so called village headmen? Aren’t we aware of the khap panchayats delivering the cruelest of judgments?
All these happen every single day across the country whether we accept it to be true or not. There’s nothing to do with religion here. There’s certainly nothing about majority, minority, men, women here. No religion preaches evil. Crime has no religion. It’s just the people. And there's no intolerance!!
We, as Indians have been harmoniously coexisting with one another on the same land since centuries. We may profess different religions, belong to various economic groups, speak different languages, and may have lots of diversities among ourselves. But a single thing that has kept us all united is being “Indian”.
If we start dividing ourselves on the lines of religion, region, caste, majority, minority, race, sex etc, it would not be any less than a disaster. Since we all don’t have anything in common, apart from “Being Indian”!
No comments:
Post a Comment