Hate as a Unifying Force

Hate has always been a powerful unifying force. It is also a productive force, in the sense it produces hysterical mobs, indiscriminate violence and mindless destruction.It produces irrational killings machines. It produces hysterical mobs which kill and ravage mindlessly among Hindus, Muslims, Sihalas, Tamils and well, Maharashtrians. It doesn't mean every Hindu or Muslim or Tamil or Marathi is a fanatic, but it means that most of sensible people in these communities can do very little apart from protesting, to stop these killing machines on rampage. You cannot obviously reason with these fanatics. It also mean that there is a wide-spread implicit and unexpressed support to these killer mobs from the people who are not directly involved in these crimes. As a sensible and rational member of these community, the only choice you have is to avoid being part of covert supporters.

The reason for my recent despair is obviously the lynching of a North Indian person on a Mumbai suburban train.It follows the violent agitation by the Maharashtra Navnirman Sena under inspiration of Raj Thackeray and to say that there is no real link between the two things is to pretend and to prevaricate.The lynching may not have been the act of MNS workers, but the hate campaign against the North Indians launched by the party is definitely a motivating influence.

You saw it in Gujarat of 2002, you saw it in the anti-Sikh genocide of 1984, you saw it in the bloody Tamil- Sihala conflict since the eighties.

What we need to do is to probe deeper into why we love to hate. One school, like psychoanalysis would say that it is instinctual to hate and kill and there is very little we can do about it. The other would be the Leftist approach which would put all the blame of desire to kill on the social inequality. The first one comes closer to `nature' school of personality psychology and the other comes closer to `nurture' school.

I would say that hatred is because of BOTH the things: aggressive instinct and the social context. As if the problem is not simple enough.

Aapla Raj, the Truth behind Democracy and the Good Ole Bill

Aapla Raj Thackeray has played his cards like a seasoned Indian politician. He has courted arrest and hogged plenty of media attention and become a sort of hero and a martyr for the `masses'. From the times of the Mahatma, going to jail was a surefire way of becoming a hero and a martyr and thus winning sympathy. If a politician goes to jail, he is bound to win elections. Raj Thackeray is a pain in the old fat asses of the Congress, the BJP and last and the most of all, the Shiv Sena. He has hijacked all the tricks of Shiv Sena and robbed them of originality. Democracy is usually a veneer. Our Good Ole Bard Bill Shakespeare saw through the whole thing quite early. The justly famous Julius Caesar exposes how democracy works. Democracy is nothing more than mobocracy and the person who knows how to sway the sentiments of masses wins the day. Democracy is usually demagogueocracy. Raj Thackeray has plenty of support from Maharashtrians and Maharashtrians are usually looking for a scapegoat. They need someone to vent out their frustrations which are usually brought about due to their own limitations like laziness, boorishness and non-enterprising nature. The poor North Indian people were sitting ducks. Aapla Raj has not only eaten into Shiv Sena vote bank but also has emerged as the next `bhai' of Mumbai. The worst hit by this rise of New Hitler is the Old Hitler, his uncle. He has shown that what his uncle can do, he can do better. And what about the hapta rates now? Have they gone up after the arrest?

Sania, Patan, Raj Thackeray, Current Affairs and the Case of Dysfunctional State

Probably, India as a nation-state is too old to rise to the occasion, it has become senile and dysfunctional. That too in the times of late globalization. Sania Mirza refuses to play in Banglore Open as she is afraid of more fatwas and controversies. The Secular Republic which could not protect the poor innocent Muslims of Gujarat is incapable of protecting one of the best tennis players in the country from religious fundamentalists. A student in Patan, one of the famous towns of Gujarat, was gang raped repeatedly and the gang consisted of none others than her teachers! This is our lauded `Guru Shishya Parampara'. The state is unable to protect anyone it seems. The poor North Indian immigrants in Mumbai are targetted by the members of a political party headed Raj Thackeray who is trying to imitate his illustrious uncle in fanning anti-North Indian sentiments. Dozens of children and women in Nithari, a place near Noida were raped and killed and probably eaten and the Hindustan Hamara watched helplessly in horror. Pogroms and riots of Gujarat in 2002 or Nandigram violence, what emerges is the face of the nation which is simply incapable of protecting anyone. India Shining? I think we are living in one of the most insecure periods in the history of India.