The Way of the Goons

It is always painful to see the way the politics of hate and intolerance is regularly promoted and practised in our country. At the earliest signs of inconvenience, our politicians, regardless of the party they owe their allegiance to, promptly fall back on this trusted and time-proven ally of theirs. So did recently S. M. Krishna, our External Affairs minister, while officially responding to the unfortunate incident of Nitish Garg death in Australia. In a press statement, he quite peremptorily asked the Aussie Govt. to take at the earliest all necessary actions possible to bring to an end these continuing assaults, apparently of a racial nature, on the Indians living over there. That was worthy of a minister justifiably concerned over the fate of his exiled subjects. It is the appendage to this statement which was incomprehensible. For Mr. Krishna, in a bid to convey just how utterly miffed and serious he is this time, chose to add , to the customary appeal for immediate action, a not-too-veiled threat at the Australians living here or visiting the country for some purpose, in case the Aussie govt. failed to respond in a satisfactory manner. He maintained that the anti-aussie feeling these incidents are giving rise to back home may result in some similar incidents taking place here, as retaliatory gestures from the masses and that if it did, Indian govt. would be held in no way responsible. Apparently this borders on the irrational. Because it is in a way to say that what we, so self-righteously ask of the aussie administration is something we ourselves are incapable to perform. But then, rational is not an attribute one would too often attach to an Indian politician. What is really objectionable however is the goon mentality evident in such utterances (and is encouraged by them) and a complete disregard at democratic conventions they manifest. The only way I can convince others as to the absolute seriousness of my enunciation is by deviating from the standard rules of democratic behavior. That is Indian populist politics for you. Blithely oblivious of the harmful and adverse repercussions such gestures can have on a society already enough precarious as it is.

Little surprise that a week after Krishna rolled fists at the aussies, Bal Thackeray has now come out threatening the Australian cricketers coming over to play in India. He is right, too. While you are at threatening, why not threaten the more famous ones?

In a more somber note though, the violation of law and order in India is only too rampant to herald newer troubles. So is expecting some good sense and a somewhat greater discretion on the part of our venerated representatives of people asking too much?