Lynchings: Dastardly act in a civilised society

Lt Gen Bhopinder Singh (retd.)

Let’s start by negating the usual narrative – the lynchings of the Sadhus in Palghar district, and that of a Mohammed Akhlaq in Dadri are equally despicable and shameful. Neither is justifiable nor needs any rationalising context, as the law simply cannot be taken into individual hands. Period. It is, simply put, savage vigilantism. Neither justifies the other. The latest incident is from Punjab – a day after a man who attempted to desecrate the Guru Granth Sahib was killed by a mob at the Golden Temple in Amritsar, another man was beaten to death by locals in Kapurthala district of Punjab for disrespecting the Sikh flag.

We Ascribe Differential Value to Lives

Resorting to ‘whataboutery’ by voluble partisan elements, as has been the wont following each incident, is the most successfully abused storyline that has ensured that we do not introspect the barbarity of lynchings beyond partisan prisms. Worryingly, we have increasingly normalised the differential value of individual lives, depending on the victim’s religion/ethnicity/political affiliation, or any other societal ‘divide’. Such a polarising and discriminatory attitude is akin to the concept of diya or diyat (blood money) in authoritarian environments like Saudi Arabia, where the worth of life or death depends on the religion of the individual.

Directionally, the world’s largest democracy cannot be normalising and heading in the direction of the suffocatingly regressive and majoritarian instincts of some illiberal Sheikhdoms in the Middle East – for such societies, picking up a disagreeing voice like Jamal Khashoggi in a foreign country, and strangulating, dismembering, and dissolving his chopped body in acid, may become par-for-course. When a society accepts barbarism for ‘others’ (out of a misplaced sense of historical revenge), it inadvertently becomes barbaric for everyone, eventually.

Across the Line of Control (LoC), Pakistan had ‘bettered’ India in racing towards intolerance with its headstart of General Zia’s project of Shariaisation in the 80s – the irretrievable curse of societal revisionism, puritanism and ‘othering’ had been sown.

Most Victims Are the ‘Othered’ Group

Today, the phenomenon of lynching is a natural pro(re)gression, and most victims are indeed the ‘othered’ citizenry. Willy-nilly, officially sanctified by a combination of legislation, leniencies and political pandering, the monster of religious intolerance recently led to the horrific lynching of a Sri Lankan expatriate in Pakistan. Insincere condolences and platitudes notwithstanding, the political class across the line was complicit in poisoning the environment by infusing religion into politics, deliberately facilitating so-called ‘fringe-elements’ with dog-whistles and echo chambers, and above all, by remaining mealy-mouthed or silent, when the situation demanded explicit condemnation and action.

In partisan politics, silence is an invaluable tool of dangerously nudging the cadres to persist with a wrong, with the plausible option of official deniability should the lid get blown. But because Prime Minister ‘Taliban Khan’ has consistently run with the hare and hunted with the hound in tackling religious extremism, not only does he have to face the ignominy of FATF officials for sponsoring terrorism, but lynching numbers become a cold statistic.

The way hundreds of gleeful people around the burning body of the Sri Lankan were taking smiling selfies and the police loitered around helplessly ought to frighten an average Pakistani, irrespective of his/her societal denomination. Ancient lands of the sub-continent and its relatively new nations have a complex and undeniable history of religiosity in politics. There are beliefs with real and imagined fault lines that need to be healed, and certainly not invoked or scratched by the State or politicians towards electoral ends. However, these subliminal faultlines are political goldmines that have been routinely abused by all political parties without exception.

Politicians Reap the Dividends

Relatively speaking, Bangladesh and its politics (with all its shortcomings) have done a more honest job of positing socio-economic development over religion, and the consequential socioeconomic trajectory of Bangladesh visa- vis Pakistan or India is hardly surprising. Bangladesh, as the youngest of the three nations, is now ahead of India and Pakistan in per capita terms, growth, and many other social metrics. A cursory look at the conversations, aspirations and factors besetting the ensuing Indian state elections and its ‘manufactured emotions’ should tell us whether we truly put development over matter