The Mouth of Small Things

I feel like crying out loud because I have the freedom granted by the Constitution so I can do that without a care.  I could shout from the rooftops saying nasty things about religions, about God, about everything that hurts people to a point where a mass riot is started; all because I have the freedom of speech and expression.

Remember, Harold Laski in Grammar Of Politics says: “The freedom to swing your arm ends where your neighbour’s nose begins”.

Similarly, the freedom of expression must be curtailed by one’s own responsible behaviour when any utterance made by using the basic right to expression threatens to hurt others’ emotions.

This is what has happened when Booker Prize-winner Arundhati Roy expressed what she thought was her right to do so and announce to the world that Kashmir is not an integral part of India.

No doubt that everyone and anyone in India is granted the right to express whatever he or she feels like expressing; but expressing one’s heartfelt ideas should not hurt any other to such an extent that it leaves a bad taste like what has happened now.

If we are living in society, then social living (responsible one at that) must involve some degree of control exercised by ourselves on our own whims. Otherwise, each one of us will be zipping about like free radicals in the social domain hurting each others’ emotions only because we have been granted a certain kind of freedom, called the freedom of expression.

Arundhati is right in her defence that she was just exercising her freedom of expression and that people should be allowed to exercise that right.

But the point here is not about the freedom of expression but the responsibility with which that freedom is exercised.

The Booker Prize winner may also do well to remember that freedom of expression exercised by a personality of her stature comes with another responsibility – the accuracy of facts on what she is expressing.

By stating that Kashmir was never an integral part of India she has placed both her feet in the domain of speculation rather than truth.

Does she forget in what manner the Kashmiri Pandits were driven out of the Valley over the years? Why has she turned her head away from this bitter chapter in Kashmir’s history? Probably because it is not politically correct to even give a hint if support to the Kashmiri Pandits who have spread across the rest of India in search of home and secure living.

For her, probably it means more to give a word of support to the perpetrators of this mass movement away from the Valley while ignoring the fact that the Pandits left their native land only because they felt threatened to continue living in Kashmir.

Whatever happened to the other constitutional right, Ms Roy; the one that gives us freedom to settle anywhere in India with the right to work and live?

I wonder why one who is been perceived as an “intellectual” harps on only one kind of a freedom while ignoring (consciously?) a whole range of other freedoms which our Constitution grants us.

Kashmir is a touchy topic, Ms Roy, not just for Indians, but obviously for Kashmiris (including the Pandits) and (for your knowledge) even for the Pakistanis.

Just thought I should make Ms Roy aware about why her statements have wounded the emotions of many an Indian.

May be – just may be – she doesn’t know that at all. Ignorance can be bliss, Ms Roy.

WE VOTED TO BE CHEATED BY THOSE WHO WE VOTED FOR

Former chief minister of Karnataka and state JD(S) president, HD Kumaraswamy, on Saturday, said “a surprise awaits the people of Karnataka” on Monday.

Well, is it surprise, or is it disappointment for the people of this state?
It's not because it is the BJP government which is falling; it is because the people of this state have forgotten what political stability means.

So sure was Kumaraswamy on Saturday that the BJP government will fail the October 11-scheduled floor test that the vanishing act by the 13 of the 14 rebel MLAs holed up in a 5-star hotel in South Goa appears nothing less than intriguing.

Surely, it was all planned as an instrument to trigger the fall of the Yeddyurappa government. It was no coincidence that Kumaraswamy's statement about people being surprised was timed about the same time as when these dissident MLAs were taken by his close aide and Chamarajpet JD(S) MLA, Zameer Ahmed, to Chennai to keep them away from changing their mind and supporting the Yeddyurappa government.

BJP leaders wasted no time to scream “foul play” while accusing the JD(S) leaders and their close aides of masterminding an operation to abduct the 13 MLAs.

The Yeddyurappa government is on the brink of collapse. But even if it doesn’t, what the dissidents have done shows in ample measure that the people of the state have been taken for a ride…and what a ride it has been!

Then, what surprise was Kumaraswamy talking about in an almost sadistic tone  about pulling the government down, as if it is in the best traditions of the state's political culture.

During the run-up to the state election in May 2008, political activists were all over to appeal to people to come out in good numbers and vote, and “bring in a change”.

Is this the change that the people of this state were promised, that too mid-way through a five-year term?

What a way the people of Karnataka have been cheated! And the cheating has not stopped there; the JD(S) continues to brainwash people to justify what Kumaraswamy is doing is right as it is no less than a revolution to usher in the good for the people, because the BJP-ruled government has been “corrupt” and “neglecting” the people since they came to power on May 30, 2008.

If that is to be seen as sincere, then why is Kumaraswamy gunning for a ministerial berth at the Centre by delivering a fall of a BJP government to the Congress high command, and expecting to be rewarded like a good boy in the form of a Union ministerial berth?

Why are the rebels being wooed with promises of ministerial berths in the state to ensure that they do not return to the BJP fold?

Doesn’t ideological values, political ethics, and respecting the trust of those who voted for them, mean nothing at all?

Do not be surprised when many among the voters will be so disillusioned with the political processes and the present demonstration of political behaviour to bring down government after government in Karnataka, that they will shun anything political altogether to look for “other means” to have their problems redressed.

They already are; that's why activists run from one corner to the other pleading to the people to vote and not "neglect their responsibilities as good citizens of the country".

But for having carried out our responsibilities, this is what we get -- a government voted to power by free and fair means being run down by a bunch of morons who are showing how well-meaning they are towards the society at large, but actually are trying hard to satisfy their own lust for power.

So, people will shun the political processes.

Where then will these netas run with folded hands pleading for votes? Of course, they will still get those from their ardent followers who will vote for them in exchange for promises from their political bosses for jobs or some rule-bending help here and there to get them out of their troubles, criminal or otherwise.

This is what our political parties have come to -- agents of the Devil himself.