WE ARE THE VIOLENCE peace- loving Indians have been killed more Indians these past decades than terrorists and insurgents http://www.tehelka.com/story_main33.asp?filename=op280707the_tehelka_view.asp
One of the most undeserving badges we insist on pinning on ourselves is that we are a peace-loving people. A nation of the loftiest apostles of non-violence. Buddha and Mahavira of Bihar, Gandhi of Gujarat. Any coincidence that on contemporary ratings the two also happen to be among the bloodiest states in the country? Any coincidence that the peace-loving Indian -- office-goer, shopkeeper, housewife, student, layabout -- has killed more other Indians these past decades than terror and insurgency put together? In Delhi and Bombay, in Ahmedabad and Baroda, and in a whole lot of other bloodied datelines, people like us have willingly turned manic and killed people like us. It's appropriate to blame those who exhort us to such mania -- the Bhagats and Modis and Thackerays -- but it's easy to do that too. We forget we did the killing; they only bid us to. Is it right to suspect violence is a repressed rage within most of us? Is it unfair to say Indians are quite the opposite of a peace-loving people, that they take criminally quick resort to violence? A car nudges a motorcycle in a busy Delhithoroughfare. There's an argument. It hasn't even exhausted itself when people are after each other's lives. Reinforcements are called as blood spirals to the head and spurts mayhem. A man is bludgeoned to death on the street with baseball bats. As a final act, a concrete flowerpot is smashed on his head. Someone cuts off the fingers of a little girl for snipping a few leaves of spinach. An entire family is done to death mid-village, mid-afternoon for demanding its rightful share of land. Father and son are stripped and dragged through lane and bylane for not honouring someone's notion of a caste hierarchy. All of this tells us a small thing about ourselves and a big thing. Small Thing: the State and civil society have a long way to go. Where was the beat cop when five goons were beating life out of a man on Delhi's high streets? Where were the people? Big Thing: for all our claims to high culture and civilisation, we remain opaque and unlearning about ourselves as a people easily seduced to barbarity. Which is why we take little cognisance of our sins, which is why we don't remind or remedy. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "Ours is a battle not for wealth or for power. It is a battle for freedom. It is a battle for the reclamation of human personality." - Dr BR Ambedkar ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ --~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~ greenyouth mailinglist is the activist support mailinglist for kerala To post to this group, send email to [email protected] -~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
