When it comes to regime changes, Leftists, it would seem, make common cause with Islamists, little realising that the latter only think of them as useful idiots, easy to dispose of after the expiry of their use-by date. As we have seen in the recent violence in Bangladesh, when not just Hindus or Awami League supporters but Leftists were the targets of systematic, even murderous, ferocity.
But what we may not have realised is how seculars are similarly corralled and marshalled to silence violence against Hindus, not only in Bangladesh or India, but in the US, Europe, Australia, or elsewhere. The “H” word is anathema and, under all circumstances, must be camouflaged.
If Hindus are attacked, killed, abducted, raped, held for ransom or extortion, the appropriate substitute is ‘minorities’. If their temples are attacked, objects of worship or reverence vandalised, then other victims of murderous mobs, such as Christians or Buddhists or ‘tribals’ must also be mentioned in the same breath. The civilised antidote to the spilling of Hindu blood, it would seem, is not black ink but whitewash.
The same illogic is applied on both sides of the subcontinent. Take the case of Anubhav Sinha’s Netflix series on the hijacking of IC 814. A leading media person and commentator, by no means a Hindutva-supporter, has called it “an expensive PR job for the ISI”. The BJP media cell outraged over the falsification of the hijackers’ names. This, however, is not entirely true. The hijackers did use fake Hindu names, such as “Bhola” and “Shankar”. Also non-religious, even nonsensical, nicknames such as “Doctor”, “Chief”, and “Burger”.
But this only ends up masking the real identity of the hijackers. Naïve viewers may think they were Indians or Hindus. Why were the real names of the hijackers—Sunny Ahmed Qazi, Shakir, Mistri Zahoor Ibrahim, Shahid Akhtar Sayed, and Ibrahim Athar—not revealed? Or that they were Pakistani operatives, controlled by Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) or its proxies? Several fact-checkers who weighed in on the side of Anubhav Sinha and his team do not reveal this. The geo-political, strategic, Pakistani, Islamist angles in the story are suppressed.
On the other hand, leading Muslim opposition leaders have even asked why people are objecting to IC 814 when they accepted fiction as fact in The Kashmir Files. Surely they don’t expect terrorists and victims of terrorism to be treated in the same manner? But, who knows, perhaps they do. One man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter, as the cliché goes. Or, to cite another cliché, terrorism has no religion. Perfectly true, except when it means never mention the terrorist’s religion, especially if it is Islam or Sikhism.
The whitewashing, let us admit, is there for all to see, but not exactly in the manner that it has been called out. Instead, the ploy that we observe in many previous Bollywood blockbusters is to humanise terrorists, gloss over the Islamist religious ideology that supports their actions, mitigate their murderous violence and disregard for human lives, and instead amplify their gestures of kindness and friendship. The sharp sword held over the neck of the victim is invisibilised, as is the threat to kill one hostage at a time if demands are not met. Instead, the singing, joking, or calling a hostage sister and gifting her a shawl, is what is emphasised.
Today, a similar whitewashing is playing out in another yet-to-be released movie, Kangana Ranaut’s Emergency. Because Sikhs can never be terrorists or assassins of those they were paid and pledged to protect—according to Sikh religious authorities who have asked for its banning. As for Hindus? Remember Gulzar’s Maachis (1996)? The Khalistani terrorists, backed by ISI, are shown as romantic and misguided heroes.
The “real” culprit, who plants bombs in buses, played by Om Puri, is called “Sanatan”. I’ve never heard anyone being named thus, but Gulzar decides to use it to mark the source of evil. No one noticed or objected to it then. But today, it shows the bigger anti-Hindu ecosystem that supports and promotes filmmakers and writers. From early “progressives” like Khwaja Ahmad Abbas and Mahboob Khan to our own Salim-Javed and, yes, later to lesser mortals like Anurag Kashyap and Anubhav Sinha.
The common target of Islamists, Leftists, and seculars alike is what used to be called “Hindu communalism” and is today known as Hindutva. But in the end, it is not the ideology of political Hinduism that suffers as much as ordinary Hindus all over the world. It is they who bear the brunt of violence and hatred; it is they who are demonised and dehumanised; it is they who become expendables, cannon fodder for violent ideologies and ideologues.
Now the seculars in Bangladesh are pressuring the seculars in India not to use the “H” word when it comes to the violence and atrocities of the regime change. Don’t talk about the killing of Hindus, they say, don’t tarnish the popular movement against Sheikh Hasina as either Islamist or CIA-sponsored. Portray it as a peaceful, progressive and secular people’s movement, led by brave students from all communities, against an unpopular dictator. The dirty secret that is being denied is that Jihadis are oftentimes paid for their mercenary atrocities by being permitted to loot, kill, rape, or hold to ransom Hindus and other targeted groups like the Yazidis or Armenians.
We fell for this earlier, by not publicising or internationalising the genocide of Hindus in Bangladesh during the 1971 liberation of the country from Pakistan. Today, leading journalists are asking India not to take up the cause of Hindus in Bangladesh. But this is wrong both morally and strategically.
Victims must be accurately named, not only for reasons of historic veracity, but also to expose and apply pressure on their oppressors and aggressors. Wherever and whenever Hindus are targeted, we must name the victims and speak up for them. We should do this whether we are communalists, seculars, or leftists—as we should for all victims of religious, ethnic, and other forms of violence.
(Views are personal)
(Tweets @MakrandParanspe)
Makarand R Paranjape | Author and commentator