Suhas Palshikar: Bhoomi pujan of the new republic // Pratap Bhanu Mehta: Political colonisation of Hinduism
If the BJP is guilty
of dismantling the republic, all other parties are silent approvers. Like in
the case of the most ardent opponent of majoritarianism, the epitaph for
India’s slowly dying republic could also be “Hey Ram”. .. The 5th of August,
2019 and 2020, constitutes a moment when, rather than shrill rhetoric, a sober
realism is necessary to grasp the meaning of the moment. Going by the
self-deceptive statements of some Congress leaders, one suspects that even
before the construction of the Ram temple begins, the BJP might have achieved
its grand project.
As the bhoomi pujan
ceremony unfolds at Ayodhya tomorrow, the prime minister may as well announce
the commencement of a new “republic”. During the past one year, India has
entered a new political arena. It is time to begin identifying the pillars on
which this new India stands and ask if the new arrangements qualify to be
described as a republic at all. ...
Electoral outcomes
occasionally introduce ruptures. That 2014 would be such a rupture was almost
foretold. Throughout the past six years, the BJP government went on
reorganising the polity. During its first term, the government was busy firming
its grip on the state apparatus. The task of preparing the ground for the new
republic was mostly conducted through orchestrated vigilantism and issues of
cow and conversion. Through the face-offs with students, the regime had
indicated two things: Its penchant for abrasive use of state power and its
ability to posit a binary of nationalism and democracy where the latter was
shown as the machination of the anti-national….
Ayodhya’s Ram temple is first real colonisation of Hinduism by political power
They will say Ram is a
national symbol, a symbol of Hindu pride. But did Ram consent to being
converted to something as banal and nasty as the symbol of an ethnic
nationalism? Ayodhya's Ram temple is a monument to exclusion, a brute
majoritarianism subordinating others. Ram. You can be
properly addressed just with that name. Any proclamation announcing your
triumph, like Jai Shree Ram, diminishes you. The necessity of proclaiming your
victory implies you could have been defeated. I must also make a confession.
You were the radiant and intimate presence in my life: The ground of our Being.
You were the Mind and the Senses. You were the Virtues.
You were Compassion
and Divination. Your name was uttered in the anguish of suffering and the
ecstasy of liberation. You were the householder, the son, the brother, the
disciple, the friend. You were the king, but also the renouncer. You were
Dharma. You were occasionally cruel and unjust. But your anguish seems to
recognise your own cruelty. You were divine. But your equivocations were human.
You were the last Refuge I woke to, and slept to, the reassurance Tulsi gave
us: “Raghuvar tumko meri laaj, sada sada main sharan tehari, tum ho garib
nawaz (I seek protection in you, protector of destitute souls)”.
Today, those who waged
war in your name will consecrate your temple at Ayodhya. They are describing
this as the ultimate act of devotion to you, the ultimate obeisance to your
sovereignty. They are, they say, reclaiming hallowed ground, desecrated by
barbarous invaders. They are describing this as a cathartic overcoming of Hindu
humiliation. They are describing this as a new renaissance for Ram Rajya. You
will now be the symbol of a community united in strength, full of a new found
pride. It will be said, secretly, this is restoring wholeness to a broken
culture….
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/columns/ayodhya-temple-ram-i-will-not-find-you-there-6539473/Colin Gonsalves: Refusal of bail to Sudha Bharadwaj is based on inadmissible evidence
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Julio Ribeiro - Burying Karkare: I cannot let these forces go unchallenged
Julio Ribeiro - Burying Karkare: I cannot let these forces go unchallenged
