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| Photo by Tomichan Matheikal at Jim Corbett National Park (some years ago) |
“A terrible beauty is
born,” lamented poet W. B. Yeats when the Irish rebellion against the British
in 1916 was suppressed brutally by the Empire. Though Yeats supported the
independence movement, like all enlightened souls he was against violence. When
the fighters insisted on using violence, Yeats could only pass by “with a nod
of the head / Or polite meaningless words.”
Many people including me
in Modi’s India find themselves in Yeats’ position: incapacitated by mindless
violence and hatred. In spite of the totally vitiated atmosphere, a formidably
sizeable section of the country seem to be labouring under a monstrous delusion
that they are living in a beautiful period of the country’s history. It is a
terrible beauty indeed!
Someone like Shashi
Tharoor cannot even express his opinion by making a metaphorical comparison
about that terrible beauty. His office was attacked a criminal case was charged
against him. Yet what he said is the obvious truth. Mercifully, he has refused
to backtrack. I hope he continues to be brave to the end of this black drama
that is unfolding in the country with more sound and fury than any normal citizen
can endure without taking recourse to poetry and metaphors.
A genuine sage like Swami
Agnivesh is attacked, beaten and kicked by some self-appointed guardians of the
nation’s ethos. Swami Agnivesh has always been a voice of sanity. He has
advocated fraternity and compassion. “We must liberate people from religion,”
he has rightly said again and again. The assault on him by religious people
vindicate his stand vis-Ã -vis religion.
The institutions run by
the Missionaries of Charity are being raided because an employee of theirs
committed a crime. The motive behind the raids is too obvious: tarnish the
image of a particular minority community and make them the targets of the kind
of assault that Swami Agnivesh suffered and Shashi Tharoor would have suffered
had he been available on the street ruled by thugs donning the garb of
nationalists.
Amnesty International reports that in the last
six months alone 100 hate crimes have been committed against Dalits, adivasis
and minority communities in the country. Uttar Pradesh with a Yogi as its Chief
Minister leads the list while the Prime Minister’s own state of Gujarat follows
close behind. There undoubtedly is a clear game plan: elimination of certain
sections of the country’s population by hook or by crook.
And then the terrible
beauty will be born, perhaps: the beauty of a homogenised nation much like the
Hindu Pakistan that Shashi Tharoor mentioned. In the meanwhile, I would have
liked to pass “with a nod of the head / Or polite meaningless words.” I tried,
in fact. But my neurons rage within me. There is a man within me who refuses to
buckle under the monstrous stupidity that is being peddled as nationalism.
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