The hate that inspired Gandhi’s assassin is rising again – By Rana Ayyub
On Thursday, as India paid homage to Mahatma Gandhi on the anniversary of his assassination by a Hindu nationalist, a young man opened fire at a peaceful rally at Jamia Millia Islamia University in New Delhi. The students were protesting the discriminatory Citizenship Amendment Act while commemorating Gandhi’s contributing to the freedom struggle.
Like the mass shooter in New Zealand last year, the shooter streamed the lead-up to his attack live on Facebook, under a cover photo that showed him brandishing a sword. He shouted slogans and fired a shot while Delhi police officers – who work under the orders of Home Minister Amit Shah – stood by as mute spectators until the attacker injured one person.
It’s clear the shooter had been poisoned with hate – the same type of hate that drove a radical to shoot the man who led India to its independence. Seventy-two years ago, when the Hindu nationalist Nathuram Godse, a follower of the right-wing Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, the ideological fountainhead of today’s ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), pulled the trigger, he blamed it on Gandhi’s alleged emasculation of Hindus and generosity toward Muslims. Today, the same rhetoric is in action.…
SEE ALSO:
- Police Zindabad – Editorial (Jan 31, 2020, Indian Express)
https://indianexpress.com/article/opinion/editorials/jamia-millia-protest-shooting-delhi-police-6243255/ - Jamia, Hindutva Radicalisation and the Currency of Bigotry – Editorial (Jan 31, 2020, The Wire)
https://thewire.in/communalism/jamia-shooting-bjp-hindutva-bigotry - Jamia and Shaheen Bagh shootings: It’s deeply worrying that the word ‘terrorist’ is absent from popular discourse – By Praveen Swami (Feb 2, 2020, First Post)
https://www.firstpost.com/india/jamia-and-shaheen-bagh-shootings-its-deeply-worrying-that-the-word-terrorist-is-absent-from-popular-discourse-7983651.html - The Fanaticism India Lives In Now Is A Reminder Of Our Failure As A Nation – By Anandi Sen (Jan 31, 2020, Youth ki Awaaz)
https://www.youthkiawaaz.com/2020/01/is-this-still-the-land-of-gandhi-and-ambedkar/
