'Republic of India' at crossroads!

Republic Day this year is critically important for different reasons. The Constitution of India, that is Bharat, that is the bedrock of this republic, has been put to test in a way no earlier developments did. Events of last few months have raised doubts whether mobocracy will now overtake democracy. Doubts that whether contention of the anarchists that elections have no meaning and governments elected by people have lesser rights than the mobs on the street will be strengthened by the highest temples of rule of law? Whether the right to dissent means inconveniencing other law abiding citizens and holding them to ransom? Whether the tools like dharna used by Mahatma Gandhi against foreign rulers are valid for a free country ruled by people elected by the people through legitimate elections? Whether silent majority will be abused as majoritarian for electing a government because more vocal politicians and their agents who ruled India with permutations and combinations of various minor political groups?

 

Yes, Indian democracy is at cross roads on this republic day. How is it that conventions of governance that were perfectly fine till the other day, are now being sought to be overthrown because Left is losing its handles on power? It is sad that the party that initiated the constitution making and held the reins of power for almost 60 years directly or indirectly should today side with the forces of anarchy and try to weaken the constitution of this republic.

 

We are faced with a piquant situation where small section farmers from a small part of India are trying to stop a law that would benefit millions of farmers across India who are supporting new agricultural reforms just because they have not hit the streets. These farmers by sheer numbers are trying to overawe the government, the courts and the law abiding citizens. Sentiments are being whipped up with fake propaganda, the most vicious being that new acts will allow big money bags to take over farmers’ lands, though the new law actually protects their inalienable right to land much better than earlier laws. Enough has been discussed about the new agriculture bill so I will not get into it.

 

We have seen the sad spectacle of police going timidly to courts of law pleading them to evict a motley crowd in Shaheen Bagh after weeks of harassment of millions of citizens. Could responsibility of law and order be shifted to the courts? Then we blame courts for hijacking the business of governance! Same spectacle has been repeated now in case of farmer’s agitation. I have contended many times that Shaheen Bagh approach has convinced the anarchists that government will not resort to force, like the previous alliance of UPA propped up by motely small political groups that used brute force in the midnight to throw out anti-corruption crusaders ruthlessly. They are also convinced that the courts in their magnanimity will compare their challenge to duly passed laws by duly elected government of our own Indian people to the challenge of Mahatma Gandhi to foreign powers.

 

Each and every single law of this majority government since 2014 has been challenged in the courts or questioned in public space, like action against Pakistan. Every move has been challenged in the courts or on the roads. Rulings of the courts are welcomed only if they suit Left and wrongly labelled illiberal liberal; or abused or doubted if they go against their will. Ram Mandir is just one example. Thus, sanctity of the elected Parliament and courts of law is being slowly eroded in an irreversible manner. 

 

The anger and frustration of Left anarchists and their comrades in arms and new assertive Islamists has reached a level where they are undermining the hard work of scientists and medical fraternity by questioning the Covid vaccine that has been welcomed worldwide and appreciated by reputed foreign journals too. This seed of creeping suspicion against the state and the science is worse kind of slow poison that is designed to weaken the roots of this great civilisation that has always believed in democracy since the times of Gupta empire. The great traditions of panchayats of unknown antiquity established democracy at the grass root levels and saw peaceful existence of a society amid chaotic oppressive times of foreign invasions that destroyed our wealth and technology but couldn’t kill our spirit of peaceful co-existence.

 

 

 

This deep rooted faith in plural democratic society is being destroyed. The intelligentia and the opinion leaders need to sit up and find ways to get out of this urge for self-destruction by an evil axis that has for the first time has come together openly. The Maoists, the anarchists, the Islamists, the oldest fox – the organised Church with various avatars of Evangelists being ably assisted by so-called secularists are openly colluding with each other to undermine the democratic institutions.

 

Those intellectuals and politicians are rejoicing the new found power to undermine rule of law should realize that they too shall be victims of these same forces, just like Bolshevik revolution devoured its own children, its own writers, intellectuals, collaborators and leaders. The advocates of this mobocracy over democracy are the people who worship the false gods of Communism who killed nearly 100 million hapless victims to prove that Marx was right. They destroyed wonderful societies of neighbouring countries to force an ideology on them that destroyed their civilisations, their cultures and their humane existence. Forget the past, there are people who celebrate a crazy dictator like Kim Jong of North Korea in India!

 

Every form of governance has faults. But, as many thinkers including erstwhile RSS chief Shri Guruji noted, democracy is the best of all. This is the reason our founders of constitution never had any doubt that we shall establish a republic as that we have thrived on this system of governance for eons, despite many hiccups. Dr Ambedkar’s vision of Liberty, Equality and Fraternity was inspired by Tathagat Buddha, not French revolution. We cannot afford to lose the precious heritage of our great nation. It is the responsibility of we, the people, to rise in unison and stop the efforts of anarchist forces to damage the much treasured fabric of our republic. India was born in 1947 but Bharat is perennial and eternal. Let us rise to protect and nurture Bharat.

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