Politics of Hate Speeches

(Published in the weekly magazine ORGANISER in its May 24, 2009 issue. You can visit http://www.organiser.org/dynamic/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=292&page=25 )

I am surprised to see the likes of Javed Akhtar and others who on one issue are always visibly vocal in support of ‘freedom of expression’ but on another incident are now strangely advocating to curb the freedom of speech. There is no doubt that Varun Gandhi’s utterances qualify for being a hate speech but I equally fail to accept the ‘freedom of expression’ associated with the hate-paintings of Hussain or Hashmi. How can their paintings be considered as ‘expressions of respect’ or ‘depiction of truth’ and not hate. A lecture on ‘gender discrimination’ turns into an accepted hate speech against men, a lecture on 'social reforms' gets morphed into a hate speech on the upper cast minority, 'concern for worker’s cause' manifests itself in the spontaneous eruption of naxal-like hate towards capitalists. But these are valid and accepted hate campaigns. Throwing shoes on George Bush creates hero out of a man but spitting on a Kashmiri separatist leader qualifies for being an unacceptable and thoroughly condemnable behavior. Pragya qualifies for being hanged without interrogation but Afzal needs to be freed even after conviction. I am fed up of noticing for so long that attributing unproven intentions to Narendra Modi ( ‘Firaaq’ is the latest in the series and many others are destined to follow) is not a hate campaign against a democratically elected popular government but is unveiling the hitherto un-established truth.
Are we trying to establish that there are some 'justified' hate expressions and some 'unjustified' hate expressions? Are these not justifying the blame often hurled on us that a hate expression against majority is justified whereas a hate expression against minority is unacceptable?
We all know that Pakistan is a creation of a hate campaign, Babri structure demolition was a culmination of another such hate campaign, Gujrat riots were the result of an ultimate hate campaign and 1984 riots are yet another example of such campaign. Cases are far so many and instead of accepting the need to investigate the causes of successive successes of such hate campaigns and try for its removal we try to take an ostrich-approach! We must understand that hate speeches do not manufacture or create hatred out of nothing, they just try to cash on the existing hate present in the society and uses the differences prevalent in our society in its favor. The solution lies in identifying the root cause of the differences and addressing them face to face. This problem is not going to die on its own and is actually aggravating with our attitude of 'ignoring the real issue'.
And please for God’s sake do not advise me to find a solution within the constitutional framework since our constitution has never been treated as sacred and has conveniently suffered several hundreds of amendments. We already have a provision of Article 370 in the same constitution which justifies solution beyond our constitution (it is really confusing!!!). Instead let us first investigate the problem completely and then find a convincing solution after that we would try to get it implemented by all means.

Ragging the menace

Ragging exposes the truth behind the argument that students studying in colleges are mature enough to decide what is good for them and there is no need to have moral policing on them. Some meaningful corrections are required in the statements such as that they are mature enough to decide whom to vote, what to wear, how much and what to drink, when to party, when to have sex and how to have it. Main argument in favor of this is that if they are indulging in something that is not illegal then no one has the authority to stop them. It is disturbing to notice that these days every issue in a 'civilized?' society is getting decided by its legality but not for setting a moral standard. In the cases of ragging, the fact is that some students cross even the legal border while exercising their freedom to have interaction with juniors. They are unable to restrain themselves while enjoying their freedom. And this is the point where we all feel that there is a need to frame a law to restrain them.
Incidences of ragging are now going too far. There is no doubt that some immediate steps are required to be taken in this respect. A promising life coming to a sad end is a huge loss to our society and country. At least now UGC is in the process of framing some regulations that would make the law against ragging effective.
As a matter of fact our society is based on hierarchical structure. We believe in senior-junior concept. Stability of our society is based on this model. We expect juniors to respect seniors. Ideally this respect comes from within when juniors observe the sacrifices of their seniors for them. However the age at which students get admission to a school or a college, they happen to be in an impatient state of mind. They want to earn respect from their juniors at any cost and that too in a very short time. Ragging is the manifestation of this attitude.
It is well known law of physics that a system finds its equilibrium by finding a state of lowest energy. In the language of science a chaotic state is the most stable state having lowest energy and largest entropy. And every system wants to achieve this state if left to its freedom.
It is therefore, one must understand that freedom can never insure a civilized society. You need laws to make any society civilized. Arguments such as that college-going students are mature enough to decide what is right and what is wrong might help a group in achieving their sick agenda of pushing sex, wine and violence into this age but the hard fact is that the society should never abdicate its responsibility of telling them the difference between right and wrong. Now the time has come when they must be told what is legal and what is not.
Our society has a responsibility to frame laws and regulations to help all of us, irrespective of our age, in distinguishing between right and wrong. Nothing is illegal till it is decided by a rule of law. What is legal today may become illegal tomorrow and vice-versa. The society has the responsibility of identifying issues on which rules are required to be made to declare an act illegal. In the absence of such legal moral policing the "illegal moral policing" has started gaining ground in alarming proportions.
Since we never bothered to have teachers with high moral values, we have crossed the stage where we can expect to curb this menace of ragging with the help of moral policing by teachers and authorities in any educational institution. We are left with no option but to have a tough law which must be strictly observed to eradicate this menace.

Understanding Terrorists’ Production

(Edited version of this has been ublished in the Reader's Forum column of January 3, 2010 issue of Organiser weekly. To view it please click on the link http://www.organiser.org/dynamic/modules.php?name=Content&pa=showpage&pid=325&page=23 )

How are terrorists created? We must understand this in order to tackle the menace of terrorism. One popularly acceptable view is that one who suffers a lot becomes a terrorist; when somebody is left behind with no option, he resorts to the path of terror; when a person notices that nobody is supporting what he thinks is the right cause then he is left with no other option; when a person fighting for a cause feels helplessly isolated or finds himself in a minority, he takes the terrorist’s approach. The reality however is that there are innumerable sufferers in this cruel world but not all of them follow terror-line. Why only some of these become terrorists?

Another equally strong view is that religion is used to produce terrorists. To what extent religion actually play a role in this? There is a huge misunderstanding on this issue and that is the aim of my initiating this discussion. Lord Rama resorted to war against Ravana and killed him since He exhausted all other approaches to convince him. Kansa, HiranKashyap and Duryodhan were all killed since they refused to follow the ‘right line’ and gave no other option to their respective opponents. Does this teach a Hindu believer to become a terrorist?

Unfortunately the fact is that we all actually use our religion only to justify what we consider is the right line. What is right and what is wrong actually is not decided by any Book but comes from within you. When an act is appreciated it encourages others to follow. Glamour of being appreciated and probably worshipped as heroes makes a person what we consider to be a terrorist. What is going to be appreciated is learnt by everybody while observing his social surroundings, interacting with close friends and living with his family. When we like the way our father takes care of his ailing father we understand that this is what is to be done when we come across the same situation. When we appreciate somebody sacrificing for his family we know what is to be done in a similar scenario. This is how we learn to understand what is right and what is wrong in our formative stage.

Once we get to know what is correct then we use our respective Holy book only to furher confirm that. It gives us an immense satisfaction when we come across a line which even tangentially supports our thinking and we ignore all other lines that directly contradict that.

This is why reciting a line from Koran to convince a terrorist that he is contradicting Koran’s preaching with his acts is a waste. Telling the correct meaning of ‘JIHAD’ is not going to be understood by him since he never understood its meaning through reading Koran. He has got it through persons and society around him to which he is attached to. He has got the meaning of Jihad through examples in real life. The line from Koran that means that 'Jihad is a war against your own evil within you' only convinces those who are already convinced with that. You can win hearts with your behavior but can never change it by preaching. You appreciate an argument only when it favors your conviction. Those who think that a fatwa announcing that there is no need of Jihad in India or denouncing a terrorist’s act by a community in print and visual media would restrain others from taking up terrorism, are either living in a fool’s paradise or are playing some kind of dirty politics.

Unless the neighbors, acquaintances and surroundings change, terrorists will continue to be produced. Unless even in their own small world they stop considering them as martyrs and stop worshipping them as hero-militants, terrorists would be produced for the sheer glamour and excitement that are associated with it.

Terrorists live in a small world created by them wherein they are the ultimate imitable heroes. Unless their world is expanded I cannot see these terror-factories being shut.

Let us not treat our cricketers differently

Did terrorists mix politics with cricket in their recent attack on Sri Lankan cricketers? Did they shatter the faith of Imran Khan, Javed Miandad ( and his daughter’s father-in-law ) and many other Afridi like Bhais who always advocated for not mixing politics with cricket? I remember Imran Khan assuring the cricket world ( on behalf of the terrorists!!! ) that cricketers will never be attacked in Pakistan. Javed Miandad has asked for ban on match referee Chris Broad (and not the terrorists!!! ) for his irresponsible statements that might 'Damage' the 'Image' of Pakistan (Mail Today, 7th March 2009 page 42). Rmeez Raza has claimed that Broad's comments have hurt Pakistan cricket. And Tauqir Zia (former chairman, PCB) has urged not to welcome Broad for any cricketing assignment in Pakistan (Mail Today). (I sincerely hope, the terrorists who attacked the cricketers were not on some such welcome assignment).

I am convinced terrorists have done nothing unexpected. In fact these Shiv Sena-Bajrang Dal-BJP-RSS combine have always tried to mix politics with cricket. They always try to spoil Pakistan-India cricket encounter by mixing politics with cricket. Unfortunately this time even UPA is doing what they always opposed when NDA was in power. Our government is not allowing our cricketers to tour Pakistan. For God’s sake ask them to leave sports in their scheme of politics. Cricket should continue irrespective of these incidences and we should be able to show them that we can produce more cricketers than they can kill. After all we have exhibited the same skill in case of other citizens so why play politics with our innocent cricketers? When terrorists do not differentiate between cricketers and the other citizens then why should we differentiate?

And just to add onto this, when musicians and singers from Pakistan come to India the same notorious set of groups oppose them and in turn mix politics with music too. On the other hand just notice how Pakistan never allows our musicians and singers to mix politics with music at their place.