India will have a
subdued Independence Day celebration on August 15, 2020 because of the
unprecedented spread of Cornovirus and the untold suffering, fear and anxiety
unleashed by the pandemic. Devastating flood in different parts of India has
added to the woes of the people. The Prime Ministers used to address the nation
from the ramparts of Red Fort in Delhi on the Independence Day in which they
used to narrate to the people the achievements of their respective governments.
I do not know what would be the accomplishments P M Modi would be recounting on
that day for the consumption of 136 crore Indians.
Irrespective of what
PM Modi declares as his achievements, what would be lingering in the memories
of many people of India are the tragic stories of nationwide protest against
Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) and the violent and brute suppression of
peaceful protests by the BJP governments; East Delhi communal riots trigged by
the provocative hate speeches of the BJP leaders and intensified by the
omissions and commissions of the Delhi police; the Supreme Court of India
gifting the disputed land at Ayodhya to those who were indulged in the
demolition of Babri Masjid, an act which the SC described as criminal, illegal
and unconstitutional; imposition of a totally unplanned and sudden lockdown and
the saga of migrant workers walking hundreds of kilometres without food and
water and being killed by exhaustion and in accidents; and Narendra Modi, the
Prime Minister of secular India, participating in the Bhoomi Pujan of the Ram
Temple as the chief guest and
identifying a blood stained mandir movement with India’s non-violent
independence movement.
When the
Constitution of India was adopted and promulgated on January 26, 1950, the preamble
of the constitution has succinctly put the dreams and the ideals of independent
India. They are 1) secularism 2) democracy 3) justice 4) liberty 5) equality
and 6) fraternity that assures individual dignity and unity and integrity of
India. Every year celebration of Independence Day offers an opportunity for all
Indians to introspect how far India could achieve its vision and ideals. The 74th
Independence Day celebration will surely remind many Indians the distortions to
the ideals of the Indian republic that have taken place since the Bharatiya
Janata Party came to power at the Centre in 2014, especially during the last
one year.
After the
Bhoomi Pujan ceremony of Ram temple at Ayodhya, in which the P M Narendra Modi
was the chief guest, many people said that secularism in India is buried in the
foundation of Ram Mandir. The event that was held on 5th August
during the unprecedented spread of Coronaviurs in India with the aid and
support of the Indian state was symbolic of the death of secularism in India.
The decision of the Supreme Court to allot disputed land in Ayodhaya to the
miscreants who illegally and unconstitutionally demolished Babri Masjid was
nothing but pronouncing the death knell of secularism. The passing of Citizen
Amendment Act (CAA) that provides citizenship on the basis of religion and the
failure of the Supreme Court to pronounce its verdict on the constitutional
validity of the CAA even after seven months is an open declaration of the death
of secularism.
Some BJP leaders have openly declared that
India has become a Hindu Rashtra.
“India
is already a Hindu Rashtra”, said the BJP MP and former Union Minister
Subramanian Swamy while talking on the topic “Life after Ayodhya: What's Next?”
at TNIE's ThinkEdu Conclave 2020.
The implication of secularism in a country is that the religious
minorities can live in peace and security without being discriminated. Ever
since the violent Ram Janambhoomi agitation started by the RSS and the BJP, the
Muslims in India have been experiencing insecurity and discrimination. This
insecurity and feeling of being discriminated has been heightened since the BJP
came to power at the centre under the leadership of Narendra Modi in 2014. The
promise of Narndra Modi,
sabka saath
sabka vikas and vishwas proved to be hollow. On the contrary, what the
minorities have been seeing and experiencing for the last six years is the
triumph of majoritarianism.
It is a fact
that India remains the largest democratic country in the world in its external
features like periodic elections, functioning of the parliament and the state
legislatures and separation of judiciary from the legislature and executive
etc. But the spirit of democracy is slowly being evaporated. As Yogendra Yadav
says, an “authoritarian capture of democracy” has taken place in India in three
ways. Firstly, the ruling party captured the referees in a democracy like
Election Commission, investigation agencies, Comptroller and Auditor General
(CAG) and the apex judiciary. Secondly, it has sidelined the various players in
the democracy like the opposition parties, media, corporate leaders, etc.
Thirdly, The BJP has changed the rules of the game by passing new laws that
amend the constitution of India. With the support of a pliant judiciary it is
able to violate the spirit of the constitution without changing the words of
the constitution.
It
is pertinent to quote what the V-Dem Institute, based at the University of
Gothenburg in Sweden, says in its
annual Democracy Report (2020) “India is on the verge of
losing its status as a democracy due to the severely shrinking space for the
media, civil society, and the opposition under Prime Minister Modi’s
government.”
The Indian
state has miserably failed to provide justice to its citizens.
Politician-bureaucrat-criminal nexus is the cancer that has infected the
criminal justice delivery system in India. When more than 3.5 core cases are
pending in different courts of India how can the citizens of India get justice?
Justice delayed is justice denied.
As per the
data presented by the Union Law Minister Ravi Shankar Prasad on 27th
November 2019, there are 59,867
cases
pending in the
Supreme
Court, and 44.75 lakh
cases in
various high
courts. At the
district and subordinate
court levels,
the number of
pending cases stands
at a shocking 3.14 crore. No political party in India has given priority to the
issue of ensuring justice to the people through the reform of criminal justice
delivery system.
A disastrous consequence of the slow moving justice system is the huge
number of under- trials languishing in the overcrowded Indian prisons.
According to a report of
National Crime Records Bureau, at the end of
2017, 68.5 percent of the total prisoners in India were
under-trials, 30.9 percent were convicts, and the remaining other inmates.
About 70% of the under-trials have not studied up to class X. The poor people
who do not have money to employ a lawyer and get bail form the large majority
of the under-trials. Another worrying fact brought to light through a study by
researchers related to National Law University Delhi is that t
hree-quarters of
death row prisoners are from the lower castes or religious minorities.
One of the
goals of independent India as envisioned by the freedom fighters was ending
inequality in opportunities. Abolition of untouchability was a great step by
the government towards realizing this goal. Even after 73 years of independence
discrimination against the dalits is continued in spite of putting in place
stringent laws. The data collected by the National Crime Records Bureau (NCRB)
show that the rate of crimes against Dalits has risen in the last few years.
The conviction rate for such crimes has also declined substantially. In 2016,
an estimated 214 incidents of crimes against scheduled castes (SCs) were
reported per million SC populations, up from 207 the previous year. In all of
India, 40801 atrocities against Dalits were reported in 2016, up from
38670in 2015.
Although
there has been considerable reduction in poverty in India since independence,
the income inequality has been on the rise. According to Oxfam international,
the rich are getting richer at a much faster pace while the poor are still
struggling to earn a minimum wage and access quality education and healthcare
services, which continue to suffer from chronic under-investment. The pandemic
Covid 19 exposed the pathetic condition of India’s public health system. Some
of the findings of the Oxfam report are startling. The top 10% of the Indian
population holds 77% of the total national wealth. 73% of the wealth generated in
2017 went to the richest 1%, while 67 million Indians who comprise the poorest
half of the population saw only a 1% increase in their wealth. At the same time
India has 102 billionaires in 2020 with a net worth $ 8.7 trillion. Mukesh
Ambani has become the world’s sixth richest person with a net worth of $ 72.4
billion according to
Bloomberg Billionaires
Index.
120 million Indians have lost their jobs after the
lockdown in India started and now unemployment is the highest within 45 years.
The slogan of Bal Gangadar Tilak, “freedom is my birthright and I will
have it”, inspired millions of Indians to join the freedom struggle. The
independent India’s constitution has guaranteed to its citizens six fundamental
freedoms: 1)
Freedom of Speech and
Expression, 2)
Freedom of
Assembly, 3) Freedom to form associations, 4) Freedom of Movement, 5)
Freedom to reside and to settle, and 6) Freedom of profession, occupation,
trade, or business. Although these freedoms were curtailed or restricted by
governments from time to time, the period of BJP rule from 2014 has seen the
worst form of violation of freedoms guaranteed by the constitution.
Various write ups
that have
appeared in the national international media during the last one year have
highlighted the widespread suppression of freedom of expression and dissent and
violation of human rights in India, especially in Kashmir after the abrogation
of article 370 and 35 A and the bifurcation of the Jammu and Kashmir State into
two Union Territories.
As
part of the clampdown in Kashmir, the authorities implemented curfews and
communication blackouts and detained citizens and political leaders alike.
Despite some relaxations a good deal of them still remains in place today. In
the
latest World
Press Freedom Index, produced by the watchdog group ‘Reporters
Without Borders’, India ranks 142 out of 180 countries, its lowest score in the
past decade. It has become very common for the authorities to use sedition law
for stifling dissent. Journalists were harassed, even detained, for their
reporting or critical comments on social media.
Human rights
violations like extrajudicial killings by the police with impunity, Mob
violence against minorities, especially Muslims, by extremist Hindutva
groups affiliated with the ruling BJP, violent attacks on dalits, eviction
of tribal families under the pretext of development projects have increased
under the BJP rule.
Civil
Society Organizations and NGOs working for protecting the rights of the
underprivileged groups and environmental protection were harassed by cancelling
their registration under the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act and criminal
cases were filed against them. For example the authorities filed criminal cases
against the Lawyers Collective, a group that provide legal aid and service of
advocates for the rights of the marginalized groups. Nine prominent human
rights activists, who were arrested and imprisoned in 2018 under the Unlawful
Activities (Prevention) Act, are still languishing in jail, as they are denied
of bail.
According to the Indian constitution, it is the duty of the government
and of the citizens to promote fraternity among the citizens of India. But the
BJP government has proved that it doesn’t care for fraternity and harmony among
the various religious communities because of its failure to control hate speech
even by its own ministers and law makers. The communal riots in East Delhi in
which 53 people were killed started mainly because of the hate speech unleashed
by the BJP leaders and the failure of the Delhi police to take any action
against them. Where is the dignity of the individuals when innocent people are
lynched by the cow vigilantes with impunity or the Muslim vegetable and fruit
vendors are attacked being falsely accused of spreading Coronavirus?
Effective functioning of democracy requires a strong and vibrant
opposition. Unfortunately the opposition parties in India are not united and
the main opposition party, the Congress, has been struggling with leadership
crisis and internal conflicts ever since the BJP was re-elected with a thumbing
majority in the last Lok Sabha election. The entire opposition appears to be
helpless and voiceless. As a result, the BJP finds no challengers in its march
for implementing the Hindutva agenda that is diametrically opposed to vision
and ideals of the Indian constitution.
Although a large section of Indians have become blind admirers of PM
Modi and the BJP because of the brainwashing through the media, especially
social media, majority of the people do not seem to be the supporters of the
BJP. It is to be remembered that only 37% of the electorate voted for the BJP
during the last Lok Saba election. 63% of the voters do not support the
ideology and the agenda of the BJP. Unfortunately large majority of this 63%
has become silent. It is the responsibility of the enlightened citizens of
India to give voice to this silent majority and stop the efforts of the BJP to
drive India to fascism.
(The writer can be
reached at: jacobpt48@gmail.com)
(Published on 17th
August 2020, Volume XXXII, Issue 34)
