The
JNU row has taken a disturbing trend. It stirs your soul with negative energy
now. Politicking has become worse but the worst part is - the issue, the JNU
row and JNU, all have become a hotbed for conspiracy theories - going as far as
Hafiz Saeed involvement or Intelligence Bureau input or so-called foreign designs.
Someone
is busy labelling someone as anti-national. Someone is busy proving his
nationalist credentials. Someone is crying hoarse over a Constitutional hara-kiri.
And
everyone is busy settling in political scores and seeking political mileage.
Yes,
anti-India protests and sloganeering are unacceptable but there is nothing that
makes case for #CleanUpJNU, the hashtag that was trending at top throughout the
day. And in fact, even at this hour, a Twitter hashtag - #StopAntiIndiaCampaign
- is trending at top on Twitter's India interface.
Yes,
there are some misled JNU students but then society is first about counselling
the misled - trying to take them in the social flow - especially when there are
first time offenders. It has to give
them the chance to undo some wrong first.
By
simply saying put those students behind bars, we cannot rid the society of this
malaise. It goes much beyond. And in fact, as the situation has become now, and
as it is rapidly spreading, the anti-social and anti-national elements may
exploit the sentiments to perpetrate some anti-society, anti-national plot.
You
cannot say the counselling and mainstreaming are going to happen in an impulse.
Counselling takes time. You cannot use force everywhere, especially on
students.
Even
the Supreme Court says mere sloganeering cannot be the ground for imposing the
charge of sedition on someone unless the sloganeering incites some action. The
top court had declared in 1962 - "Words
and speech can be criminalised and punished only in situations where it is
being used to incite mobs or crowds to violent action. Mere words and phrases
by themselves, no matter how distasteful, do not amount to a criminal offence
unless this condition is met."
Let
JNU be JNU, an academic institution. Let's not make it a place to settle
political scores and seek political mileage. The intense level of politicking,
senior political leaders holding briefing sessions and consistent marches and
rallies - these leave us in bad taste and are totally uncalled for.
That
takes us to this natural question - has
politics failed us?
It
both ways.
Politics
has failed us. But politics also makes us the world's largest democracy.
Decision is for us to make.
There
cannot be utopia, the ideal situation for a country, a society and the system
that prevails there. It's always a mixed bag - with negatives and positives. Yes,
negatives are looking to prevail in our country but one cannot dismiss
positives.
There
are disparities and they are growing. But that is the case even with the US.
The fact that we can openly discuss JNU row tells us a lot.
Europe
had its Westphalian and renaissance moments. The US had its civil war and
abolition moments. But they go back to centuries in making while sovereign,
independent India is just 68 years old. Europe and US reformation took some 300
years or even more.
And
if it has not happened in 68 years, the reform in our political system, then we
need to accept that it is not enough time yet, even if we are at a cusp of
technology revolution. We need to remember that technology revolution also
brings information chaos and 'access chaos'.
And
there is no option but to struggle, persist and fight as long as what has been
a practical universal norm for a good society is reached - as Vivekananda says
- arise, awake, and stop not till the goal is reached.
Arvind
Kejriwal's coming to power in Delhi is indicative of that, even if he is
failing us now. That experiment by people tells people are ready to speak, even
if symbolically.