Death of Democracy? Gilead? Will the flowers still bloom?
We have killed it.
Please stop lying to yourself. Stop feeding your fake Hindu nationalism, lets stop with pretence. I am tired. And everybody else is tired. There are people who are paying a heavy price for this stupid, fake nationalism. There is a state that we have killed and we are dancing around the pyre, laughing while they are burning, drunk on the idea of a country that is losing its meaning sooner than we are losing our morality. I don’t even know if we have a compass anymore, forget about it pointing right or wrong.
There is something inside me that hurts. Something that pulls on all the strings that I had never imagined that I had. There is a silence, not unlike the state’s that we have been partying for, rejoicing while they were rendered speechless, mouths sewn shut.
Is this the kind of country that we are proud to call home?
Are these the ache din that we were promised?
Did we know that these ache din will be ache selectively? And are we okay with it, happy in-fact because those unfortunate ones aren’t us.
Yet.
Remember this.
Its just a matter of yet.
Ever since I was a child and had learnt about the second world war, I couldn’t comprehend one thing. I obviously couldn’t wrap my head around the brutality of it all. But there was something else. Not as to how hitler could be so cruel. There will always be fucked up people. (Bad code, I had heard them refer to in a movie.) But what completely baffled me, (baffles me still), was how THOUSANDS OF OTHER PEOPLE ALLOW SUCH THING TO HAPPEN?
My ten year old mind couldn’t understand, that if something so borderline senselessly gruesome, just plain, sheer madness with not even a shard of reason to it was happening to anybody, how, just how, could other people not say something about.
Allow that to happen.
It may have been one person’s madness but thousands, millions others stood by, rejoiced even in the beginning at the situation of others. What was it? It wasn’t something that they had done to not be in the same position as the others. It was sheer chance that Hitler swung this way.
And after fourteen years, here I am, witnessing the same thing here. Right ib my life’s time. Right in the time when we are trying to reach the Moon and the Mars.
In our country.
What is this madness?
I remember as a child, while religion did come up in discussions, it wasn’t so severe a thing. The lines weren’t drawn in blood. There wasn’t happiness for the other person’s misfortune.
What is this joy over Kashmir’s fate?
Schadenfreude.
Happiness derived from somebody else’s pain.
Thats the only word that comes to my mind.
Are we really so cheap? So base?
‘No human being or group of people has the right to pass a death senetnce on a city.’
Yes, killing their right to communicate IS passing a death sentence. If it’s a genuinely good decision, taken for the good of the PEOPLE, then why are they being shushed down? Why are they not allowed to speak?
This is not taking decisions for the country. This is NOT democracy. The only reason people were dancing was because this was not happening in their state. This is a coup. An occupancy. Possession. Colonisation.
Democracy IS dead.
It is so strange to see how happy people can be, how easy it is to look the other way when the one suffering is not you.
Or the ones you love or care about.
Maybe, the only reason that I am also able to empathise is because I, too, belong to a community that could easily be silenced, shushed up as easily as the others have been.
Women.
There could be Handmaid’s tale like situation tomorrow and for all I have seen from this country, nobody would bat an eye.
Hell, there might even be people dancing on the road. Rallies celebrating it.
This is getting scarier day by day. And if this doesn’t scare you guys, I don’t know what will.
After all this, we don’t deserve Kashmir.
Would you be okay with your Mum being collateral damage?
This is what people in power have always said to people in distress, that someone will be upset in the process of doing something good. This is what people have always said to justify their actions. The unfortunate thing is that we are fucking buying this half assed shit that they think is a justification.
It is the MOST MILITARIZED ZONE IN THE WORLD. In the fucking world. Our paradise on earth is worse than fucking Afghanistan. We have more people with guns there than fucking Taliban.
I don’t know how such people sleep at night. What vile, selfish thoughts would make one happy at such a decision. Its utter and sheer death of people’s voice. We don’t deserve to call ourselves a democracy because democracy is not fucking selective.
One soldier for every ten people. When you had needed to add more military in the most militarised zone in the world to pass an order, its a siege. And if you believe otherwise you are fucking kidding yourself.
There is a quote from Kite Runner that has been etched in my heart ever since I read the book. Even the story has faded little but the words have stayed, clear as crystal, etched in my heart as if with blood.
“There is only sin. Only one. And that is theft.
When you kill a man, you steal a life… you steal his wife’s right to a husband, rob his children of a father. When you tell a lie, you steal someone’s right to the truth. When you cheat, you steal the right to fairness… there is no act more wretched than stealing.”
We have stolen and entire fucking state’s right to speak. Forget about the right to exercise their wishes, we have stolen their right to even voice them. Forget about even wishes, in this country, we have stolen their right to even voice their complaints. Their hurt, their cries. And we have the balls, the fucking audacity to celebrate this sin in the most glorious of manner.
I have always loved India. Loved to be a part of this country. But now, I feel ashamed. Ashamed to my core as to this is what I am a part of. I feel helpless and broken. Which reminds me more of the despair that the people in Kashmir would be feeling and what I am feeling is nothing, nothing, nothing compared to what is going through them.
Empathy. We have forgotten to empathise with our fellow country-people. With the fellow humans that we share our planet with.
I don’t know what we are becoming. Or maybe I do, but I am too scared to admit to myself what it is.
“Now I’m awake to the world. I was asleep before. That’s how we let it happen. When they slaughtered Congress, we didn’t wake up. When they blamed terrorists and suspended the constitution, we didn’t wake up then, either. Nothing changes instantaneously. In a gradually heating bathtub, you’d be boiled to death before you knew it.”
I don’t know if we would still be dancing on the streets if tomorrow communication was shut down in our home cities. When you couldn’t take your dad to the hospital to get his medicines. Or wouldn’t know that you Mum who had gone to the pilgrimage has been dead for ten days.
Our country is shut. Zipped up about this and that is what is scary. Not that the government is doing this, but we are happy that they are doing this. Are you shitting me?
Maybe my denial is too strong or I am just plain stupid, but I am still in disbelief that something like this has happened in our country and we are still stuck as to which new movie is coming or what is the next thing trending on Netflix.
Is this what we have become?
Maybe I am selfish. But I am scared. I am scared tomorrow I will wake up in a Gilead-ish regime and people will be happy.
I will be the collateral damage then and will be told, well isn’t there always some?
Something for the greater good?
Can we please stop lying to ourselves?
Can we please just open our eyes and see whats is really happening?
What is the point of anything, all the scientific development, education, art if in the end our mentality is still like dogs. Occupation. Modi might as well pee all over Kashmir to mark it as ours.
This is disgusting.
A disgusting joke of the system these people dare to call democracy.
‘The city from where no news can come
Is now so visible in its curfewed nights’
