Syed Hurairah
Hyderabad: It is the curse of several Muslim-majority areas in Indian cities – large or small – that their names are conveniently interchanged with ‘Pakistan’. The Old City in Hyderabad has been called ‘mini-Pakistan’ by the Bharatiya Janata Party’s senior and junior members alike. But there is more. The Delhi elections and the Aam Aadmi Party’s victory has ensured that this vile epithet is now slapped across the face of the National Capital.
While some might dismiss this as a case of sore-losers-unable-to-digest-defeat, the malaise is deeper. Consider this: the Muslims have ideologically and electorally been the Bharatiya Janata Party’s opponents. The ‘mini-Pakistan’ jibe comes from a document penned by then Rashrtiaya Swayamsevak Sangh’s M S Golwalkar, who in his book Bunch of Thoughts states that Muslims are sitting in their areas with ‘transmitters’, working as informants for Pakistan. While many may not have read his book which makes sweeping statements, relies heavily interfacing between Golwalkar and anonymous mullahs, and is allergic to producing empirical evidence, his rhetoric clearly has served its purpose.
Both before, during and after the Delhi exit polls, which showed AAP forming the next government, the ‘Pakistan’ jibe, reserved solely for Muslim areas, was conveniently extrapolated to the Capital of India. And when the results were declared newsrooms and anchors of news organisations with a pro-BJP tilt lost their nerve. At least two declared that if Pakistani Prime Minister Imran Khan contests from the National Capital, and announced ‘freebies’, he too would win.
While some viewers could not control their mirth and termed the reaction of these anchors as them ‘having a meltdown’, the issue, if looked at closely is dangerous. It implies that the BJP, which has an umbilical connection with the RSS, and its supporters (anchors included), will go to any length to declare individuals, and in this case, voters, as traitors by associating them with Pakistan. All this, only because they rejected the BJP’s hate-goli-gaddar politics.
The slapping of a false Pakistani identity to Delhi and its voters in just one of the several vicious attempts of the BJP and its crores of supporters to cast aspersions on law abiding citizens. From Maoists in the forests, the BJP recently gave legitimacy to a failed film director’s book called Urban Naxals. So, an urban, educated individual who disagrees with the BJP is an Urban Naxal. To reiterate, the Ministry of Home Affairs on several occasion has noted that Maoist and Maoist-related violence remains a key concern.
Before this, it was the allegation that a ‘tukde-tukde gang’ exists which wishes to see the Balkanisation of India. Home Minister Amit Shah in one of his speeches blamed the Congress party for leading this gang. Interestingly, it was only recently in the Parliament, that his own Home Ministry said that it has no information about a ‘tukde-tukde gang’.
So, whether it is Muslims being labeled Pakistanis, or dissenters being slapped with an ‘urban naxal’ or ‘tukde-tukde gang’ member title or the National Capital being called Pakistan, what matters in just one thing: aap chronology samajhiye.