Tavleen Singh - Modernity or murder, Mr Modi? // Vipin Tripathi: Funds to help Pehlu Khan's family
A joke popular on
social media these days goes like this. ‘Dear Pakistanis we as a nation have
become immune to the martyrdom of our soldiers because they are paid to die,
you just try and kill one of our cows then we will show you the fun.’ I begin
with this joke to make the point that India is in danger of becoming a laughing
stock in the rest of the world because of our new, violent obsession with cows.
So enough is enough, Hindu fanatics. Stop! Stop right now if you really love
Bharat Mata.
It is hard to
understand why a Prime Minister so passionate about making India a modern,
digital, prosperous country has seemingly not noticed that hunting and killing
Muslims on the pretext of cows and love jihad does not sit well with modernity.
The PM talks about a ‘new India’ built with the energy of the
largest population of young people on the planet. Has he noticed that hunting
Muslims is serving mostly to distract these same young Indians from far more
important tasks?
India's ruling party is sponsoring an assault on the Indian state / Tavleen Singh - Is this Hindutva
Why are armies of them
not already deployed for Swachch Bharat? Why do we not see educated young
people going into villages to help teach skills and basic literacy to
disadvantaged children? Why are they not helping solve problems of rural
development? Why, on the lines of the American Peace Corps, do we not see an
Indian Development Corps? Is it because too much of the energy of our young
people is now being used for supposedly saving cows?
Personally I have
nothing against a national movement to save cows. It breaks my heart to see
abandoned cows living on the edge of open garbage dumps, eating plastic bags to
fill their stomachs. I support totally cow shelters being built in towns and
cities. And I support jailing Hindus who throw cows out of their homes when
they become useless. We could begin by immediately locking up the monsters who
poured acid on the backs of a pair of bulls who strayed into their fields to
eat their crops. What I do not support is the madness and murderous barbarism
that have been unleashed on the pretence of saving cows. It is being led by the
same young Indians who the Prime Minister hopes will help build the modern
India of his dreams.
It is possible that Mr
Modi no longer spends as much time on Twitter as he once did, but he should pay
attention to the kind of abuse that is directed daily at those who oppose cow
vigilantism and love jihad. Last week, Ghulam Muhammad, 55, a farmer in the
Bulundshahr village of Sohi was beaten to death by young men in saffron
scarves, said to be from Yogi Adityanath’s Hindu Yuva Vahini. He was killed
because these Hindutva killers suspected that he had helped a Muslim neighbour elope
with a Hindu woman.
It is cowardice of the
worst kind for young men to gang up and kill an old man, so I tweeted against
this latest lynching and was immediately subjected to an onslaught of abusive
tweets. Tweeters used words that cannot be printed in a family newspaper to
attack me. They defended their abuse and threats on the grounds that I had
never written against RSS workers murdered by Marxist killers in Kerala. Is
that a defence? What frightens me most
is the pride Hindutva tweeters plainly take in every new lynching. They make it
clear that the squads of Hindu vigilantes that roam about these days in search
of Muslims to kill are in their view heroes avenging centuries of repression by
Muslim rulers. Like the cowardly cow vigilantes, these tweeters remain
nameless, but from their language it is obvious that many of them are linked
directly to the RSS or one of its sister organisations. I know this from having
learned to recognise their names from earlier occasions when I have written
something in this column that they did not like.
My reason for
repeatedly drawing attention to Hindutva violence is because I believe it is
motivated not by some twisted nationalism but by uncontainable hatred of
Muslims. This hatred is what persuades young Hindus to go out in gangs and hunt
for the poorest, most vulnerable Muslims to beat to death. It is true that
there have been almost no communal riots in the past three years, but it is
also true that there is an insidious new kind of violence that takes the form
of hate crimes. Senior BJP leaders say
these hate crimes are not being committed by ‘our people’ but by ‘agents
provocateur’ from secular parties who have infiltrated the ranks of Hindutva
organisations. Hard to believe. Our secular opposition parties today lack the
strength even to rise out of the doldrums.
NB from Vipin Tripathi: Funds to help Pehlu Khan's family
Friends,
Behror incidence of April 1, 2017 was a grave tragedy. Five farmers of Jaysinghpur (Mewat) village were carrying milking cows from Jaipur Animal Fair to their village when they were stopped by militant cow vigilantes and brutally thrashed. Pehlu Khan (55) succumbed to injuries on April 3. Azmat (24) is still confined to bed. Rafiq (23) and Pehlu's sons Irshad (23) and Arif (19) are recuperating. No relief has so far been announced by the government despite the severity of the tragedy nor prime suspects have been arrested. The cows have also not been returned to the families. The 3-Day Dharna organized by Kavita Srivastava, Sumitra Chopra and others in collaboration with several organizations at Jaipur Vidhan Sabha and the initiatives by Meo Panchayat have not succeeded so far in gaining any relief or justice from the government.
Nevertheless the efforts must continue. The Insaaniyat March organized by Sadbhav Mission in collaboration with 4 schools in Tauru on May 6 with 150 participants was in this direction. In the meantime may we raise Rs. 40,000 for Pehlu Khan's family and Rs. 10,000 for Azmat as a token of support to them. I wish these contributions to come from friends living in India.
You may send cash or check in the name of V.K. Tripathi (Physics Department, IIT Delhi, New Delhi 110016) in next few days. I have SBI account, IIT Delhi branch (A/C 10773627618).
Best regards
Vipin Tripathi
9717309263
See also
WHY THEY LYNCHED MASHAL KHAN AND PEHLU KHAN - by Pervez Hoodbhoy