Did I hear it correct? Yes, perfectly correct. They, the experts say that any administration who wants to bring a disturbance or a law and order situation under control can do that in about a few hours in a city if they wish. A truth is said in this.
That means all the troubles and disturbances which India witnessed recently for days had the tacit or explicit support of the administration otherwise they would not have continued for days. There has always been an unholy connection between the police and the politicians. But the Delhi example is the most brazen.
Delhi was allowed to burn for three days before police intervened finally to quell it. Though it has not yet been quelled fully. Nidhi Razdan of NDTV put a question the other day in her talk show which was also uppermost in my mind. Why did this trouble take place when Donald Trump, the American President was in the national capital? Someone answered it convincingly.
Trump and Narendra Modi belong to the same brand of ideology. They are both Muslim haters. May be this riot was presented to Trump to show him that in India too Muslims were creating all kinds of troubles and nuisances. Another thing perhaps was to teach a lesson to the Muslims who didn’t vote for the BJP in the Assembly elections which was held recently. They allowed it to happen to an extent and then controlled it. But already more than 40 people have lost their lives and around 500 people were injured, some of them grievously.
Certain things have come out clearly from the Delhi riot. The ruling party is absolutely shameless and they have shown us how they can mesh up with the law enforcing authorities and make it completely ineffectual. All of us have been saying that the BJP has scant respect for the rule of law and constitutional democracy. And they have been proving it time and again. The Delhi riot is the latest low.
The police administration knew that since the assembly elections the BJP did a number of things which were fuelling tensions in certain parts of Delhi. But they did nothing to prevent it. And when the troubles started they did nothing to stop it, rather in some places they collaborated with the rioters. Many reports have already established this.
Inside and outside the country the police inaction was criticized and condemned by many. In the international arena the Central government and Delhi Police have come under severe criticism. Even, the UN Secretary General has criticized the Delhi Police for its role in the violence.
There is no doubt that this is a big blow to the Delhi Police. Delhi Police has been made totally subservient to their political masters. Though successive police reform commissions and committees in the past recommended that police be insulated from political intervention we have seen just the opposite of that in Delhi.
But it is not only the BJP and the Police, the Delhi Government headed by Kejriwal must also share some responsibility of the sin. When Delhi was burning what did Kejriwal and his Government do? Nothing, absolutely nothing. He went to Rajghat to pay tribute in the samadhi of Gandhiji. What a shamelessness?
Gandhiji would have been horrified had he been around to see such misuse of his message. Gandhiji would have never supported and sanctioned such shameless inaction by Kejriwal. Kejriwal’s reading of Gandhi was wrong and fallacious. If Kejriwal wanted to stop the violence couldn’t he have gone to the affected areas with thousands of his supporters?
The presence of peaceful people would have certainly stopped the rioters. No, he didn’t do anything of that kind. We didn’t see any actions by the Delhi government accept expressing their helplessness. Kejriwal did the same thing when the JNU came under attack by the Hindutva goons.
His only plea was that as Delhi police is under the Union home ministry he was helpless to do anything. So through his inaction in the crisis, Kejriwal let us know his ideology and true character.
Who is going to tell Kejriwal that social peace is one of the basic things of the good governance? Offering free booties, and goodies is not good governance. Creating conditions for people’s empowerment is the sole of good governance.
Where is the autonomy of the individual and a community, if a government cannot ensure the basic rights of an individual? May be Kejriwal should also have a look at the preamble of our constitution.
The Hindutva forces did it with the help of police. AAP expressed its helplessness. Did the other political parties play any significant role in quelling the violence? No, they also did nothing much, Congress included. But real heroes were the people and the members of the civil society.
Yes, that is the great lesson. When the Central government helped the perpetrators of the violence and the State Government withdrew its responsibility what would people do? The people had to fend for themselves. That is what the Hindus and Sikhs did to save their Muslim brothers and sisters in the moment of crisis. The civil society groups urgently intervened and worked round the hours to offer support to the affected people. So when they look other way and ignore us, we have to forge an understanding and bond among ourself and protect ourself.