March towards mobocracy

Photo from deepwarriors.com

Over the past 63 years of our experimentation (I would not call it existence) with liberal democracy in India, we have been slowly but surely moving away from those ideals and moving towards, what I like to call, a mobocracy. It's a situation where democratic institutions become defunct, and any dispute is settled by brute force. The more raw power a group has, the powerful they are in the society. Our exercise of franchise has also been moving in that direction, overtly and covertly. Overtly in the sense that political parties try to use their muscle power to garner support; covertly in the sense that political parties try to appease groups and communities, hoping to get their votes, by either directly supporting, or ignoring acts of goondaism by elements of that group.

The last point brings me to the case of the Kerala lecturer T. J. Joseph, who was recently removed from his job for hurting religious sentiments of a particular community. I do not know what exactly he asked in the Malayalam question paper which hurt the sentiments of some people. But that is not very relevant here. Let us assume, for the sake of argument, that he did ask a question that hurt some people. What would be a civilized way to deal with that? One could go to some grievance redressal body in the college concerned, or to a court or ... Instead, what happened put us at par with the most barbaric societies on the earth. Some memebrs of the Popular Front of India chopped off his hand. The police believes that some 49 people were involved, and it was a well-organized crime. What happened after this was even more shocking: No reaction from any political party condemning the attack.


As if there is no end to how bizzare things can get. In an absolute chocker (or is it, really? Should we prepare ourselves for more?) the New Man College dismissed Joseph from his job for hurting religious sentiments. Questions that arise are:

1. Is the punishment commensurate with the crime committed (assuimg it was committed)?
   
2. What made the college authorities think that they can arrogate themselves to such positions?

The college's rejoinder with that decision is perhaps potently the most dangerous aspect of the whole episode. They have said that Joseph can be reinstated only if he is pardoned by the leaders of the community whose sentiments have been hurt. Firstly, goons attack someone, then you punish the victim, finally you leave him to the mercy of the so-called leaders of those goons. Justice indeed!

Unfortunately, this incident shows a trend in the country (or may be the world): one of grave intolerance, complete disregard for democratic institutions and mechanisms, and a culture where anything goes if there is gain at the end (votes in our political terms).

Long live Indian mobocracy.