This article is not about the eight-year-old's rape. It is not about the father beaten to death in Unnao, nor about the one beaten to his very soul in Kashmir. This is not about us and the lower-than-scum standards of humanity we have managed to achieve: the fake pride-taking in other people's achievements and senseless vengeance against an imaginary enemy. This is about language and its reckless overuse. Words which help us describe how we feel and what we wish for. Even though language fails us when we try to describe what happened in Unnao and Kathua, we here restrict ourselves to that which the language can actually convey. Slogans demanding justice, BJP members ridiculing the rapes, thereby losing the last smidgen of social worth, parents crying hoarse and corpses talking more than anyone else. Language also brings to us political propaganda and fake news. But like most things, language has its faults. The worst is when defensive arguments reach the realm of surreal stupidity and we are left wondering how low the human I.Q. can actually get!
These arguments range from "Where were you when Kashmiri Pandits were suffering?"; "Why must the Pradhan Sewak respond to everything?"; "Girls die all the time, what is the big deal?" This last one was actually an argument given by a member of the BJP.
Let us take the "Where were you when...?" argument. Each time I start talking about the 2002 Gujarat riots or the atrocities against Dalits, Muslim and women since 2014, I am faced with this pathetic non-argument from the blind bhakts and various tragic incidents from the history of India are pulled out and pasted quickly on my mouth with the glue of desperate zero-intellect. So, if I was not there during the Sikh riots in Delhi, I can't talk about any atrocities that are being encouraged against Muslims and Dalits? What is this logic? Should I be criticised for demanding justice for the crimes that are being done right in front of my eyes? Politically motivated murders have been a historical reality across the world but India is the first country which has instituted an even more heinous crime: political rape, assault and murder. And we are supposed to hold our tongues because we were either not born in 1984 or because we were too young to understand what was going on against the Kashmiri Pandits in the '90s but, most importantly, because there was no social media then and anyone who was pained had no way of letting the public know of that suffering!
The other side of this crooked coin is that of taking pride in historical achievements of those we don't even know. The way BJP is exploiting the name of Patel and Gandhi for their own benefit, they seem to have forgotten the role of their parent organisation's us-versus-them ideology in the Mahatma's murder! But changing history to suit their interests has been their area of expertise, and language is their tool of choice.
Only respite to this endless wrongful jabbering is the Pradhan Sewak. He remains silent as a mouse hiding in some frog-hole reading a cheap book titled "How to save bhakt-friends from rape accusations". Very unbecoming of someone who claimed to have a 56-inch chest! Had the chest been that large, he would have beaten it a million times mourning such painfully horrendous incidents!
Language gave us the shining but hollow slogans of Beti Bachao and " Bahut hua nari par vaar, abki baar Modi sarkar". Little did we know that the first one was a warning and the second, another misuse of language. The blind bhakts believed him. And when the public demands answers for Kathua, Unnao, the blind bhakts say that we can't blame him for what happened! Politically motivated and communally charged rape-murders deserve the Pradhan Sewak's attention. But he refuses to open his mouth - beyond cursory platitudes - in silent complacency with the accused. Then, there are those who say: "Why do you talk about the Pradhan Sewak for every issue?" Well, who are we to talk about? Hanuman and Dashrath??? As the leader of the country, the Pradhan Sewak has been missing in action and we have every right to demand active response from him. For everything!
A last one dedicated to language: The name of the mastermind in the eight-year-old's brutal rape and murder is Sanji Ram. Well, they did say they'd bring back "Ram Raj".
The writer is lecturer, Delhi University, and author of Voter Mata Ki Jai
