By Mahmad Sidat,
Chetan Bhagat once famously said that “To be good is new cool”, but reading his article published in Times of India on 22nd March 2014, it seems like “Bigotry is new cool”. The way he justifies the post Godhra violence in the name of retribution, one is reminded of the propaganda Hitler’s Minister Goebbels run in 1938 Germany.
He talked about Majority entitlement and how congress is more responsive to Muslim needs without bothering to look at Sachaar commission report. One in fact does not have to look at Sachaar commission report to know how Muslim goes through discrimination in Congress (mis)rule. The fact that such article was published in mainstream newspaper is evidence of how Muslim bigotry has been ingrained in mainstream narrative that killing and rape is being justified as majority entitlement and retribution.
This Minority appeasement propaganda of BJP and its right wing sympathiser is the stark reminder of how Nathuram Godse justified killing of Gandhi in the name of minority appeasement when in reality there was none. What he did not write but tried to convey is that Hindu majoritarian entitles them to push minorities to second class citizen status when law recognises everyone as equal. It’s about taking away equal citizen entitlement from minorities accorded to them by constitution.
For him, Law has Given Mr Modi clean chit but he fails to recognise that law does not take in to account pride March after the violence or how police officer with doubtful record in riot handling were rewarded. He tries to change the narrative from whether Modi is guilty or not to is was just emotional retribution.
Let’s face it , Modi is not popular among certain section of people and right wing sympathiser because he brought magical development to Gujarat or that he is not guilty but because he helped carry out that supposed retribution as part of Hindu majority entitlement. Where Pride is associated with retribution, fault line must lie with one’s upbringing.
The article is really an attempt to invent “majority Entitlement” using felicity of words over and above constitution. In the article if you replace Hindus with German and Muslims with Jews and the text would appear similar to what Goebbels would have written in 1938 Germany. The irony is not lost that Goebbels was not only a propaganda minister in Hitler’s cabinet but also a B grade novelist.
(Author works in an Australian Insurance Company.)