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Business News/ Opinion / Columns/  Opinion | It’s a testing time for govt as well as people of India
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Opinion | It’s a testing time for govt as well as people of India

Longest possible battles have been resolved not on the battlefields but through talk

Had protesters paid attention to govt's announcement, perhaps people might not have felt the need for such aggressive protests.. Pradeep Gaur/MintPremium
Had protesters paid attention to govt's announcement, perhaps people might not have felt the need for such aggressive protests.. Pradeep Gaur/Mint

Last Thursday night was spent in apprehension, confusion and irritation. This fear was being spread through social media that something ‘big’ may take place after the Friday prayers. My problem was that I had to cross Muzaffarnagar travelling by road with family. Those who know Uttar Pradesh know very well what ‘Muzaffarnagar model’ means politically.

To be on the safer side, we started early in the morning. As soon as we entered Ghaziabad, the mobile phone signal went off, and when the signal returned, it was only for voice call; the internet data had disappeared. At that moment, I realized how important the internet has become in our lives. Constantly incoming messages are alright but through Google map, getting information about which road is crowded and which can help us reach our destination fast makes the journey interesting and exciting. Very few shops were open that Friday morning. The crowd on the road too was one-fourth of the daily traffic. A peculiar tension could be easily felt in the air. It was clear we were not the only ones scared and anxious.

We heaved a sigh of relief when we reached the Uttarakhand border. By the time we reached our destination, we had come to know about the violent conflict in Muzaffarnagar. We were not very wrong. In Uttar Pradesh, six people were killed in the violence that day. Whatever was being shown on TV for the last five days gave a strange feeling. On the one hand, there were pictures of violence in Delhi’s Jamia Millia Islamia University, Lucknow, Kanpur, Sambhal and Hyderabad, and on the other, there were social activists, historians or film personalities holding various placards in their hands. Also, there were some people giving flowers to policemen. It was a unique and fascinating reflection of a filmi Gandhigiri swinging between violence and non-violence.

Meanwhile, Ramchandra Guha was one among the hundreds who were arrested. The arrest of the world-famous historian was shocking.

Although the government was flashing the baton and struggling to maintain law and order, there was also an effort to dispel doubts and apprehension through the publication of huge newspaper advertisements. But the announcements of the government are often left unheard amid the fury and seething anger. Had they been paid attention to, perhaps people might not have felt the need for such aggressive protests.

On the very Friday evening, the central government gave another clarification—if a person is born before 1987, or his parents are born before this year, then he need not worry. Not only this, the protesters were asked to give their suggestions and were assured that some of the suggestions would be accepted. On Sunday, the Prime Minister, in a public rally in Delhi tried to dispel doubt about the CAA and NRC. But it seems that the fog of mistrust is very dense. It seems that the government will have to make more efforts to reinstate that trust.

At the time these lines were being written, about 25 people had lost their lives. The burden of these many deaths is not good for any democracy. This may impact the international image of the country. The agitators will also have to understand that if not today then tomorrow, they will have to stop this protest on the streets. History is witness to the fact that the longest possible battles have been resolved not on the battlefields but through talk and discussions.

This should also be paid attention to -who was trying to instigate these peaceful demonstrations? A person was killed in Lucknow; the police claim that he was not killed by their bullets. The postmortem report reveals he was shot by a .32 bore bullet. The Uttar Pradesh state police do not use these bullets. Then who killed him? In the same way, how did the day-long peaceful protest in Delhi turn violent by the evening? Aren’t there some anarchic elements with sinister intent, out to take advantage of this atmosphere of sorrow and anger? In this time of mistrust, it’s not difficult to blame the police. But if the police had these intentions then why would it confirm the killing of 25 people?

Here I would like to request those who call themselves intellectuals. I read on the Facebook wall of an eminent person that an old member of his family commented that these circumstances very similar to those in 1947. I would like to humbly say it’s not at all like that. The people who think so may please look at the events of 1991 and 1992. In those days after the Babri mosque demolition, so many riots took place that many people felt the days of harmonious brotherhood in our society were over, but this did not happen.

If our country could forget the wounds of partition, it can forget anything. We should rely on the sanity of our people. It is a testing time, not only for the government, but for us too.

Shashi Shekhar is editor-in-chief, Hindustan. His Twitter handle is @shekarkahin

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This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text. Only the headline has been changed.

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Published: 24 Dec 2019, 07:44 AM IST
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