Our country is the biggest democracy but it is not the greatest democracy in the world. The most important reason for not achieving that status is that the people of this country are separated from each other by the walls of religion and caste. Unfortunately, these factors of religion and caste play a major role in the voting pattern and give advantage to candidates belonging to a particular religion or caste as per the corresponding percentage of voters existing in that constituency.
The politicians of this country have taken undue advantage of this situation and in their efforts to win the election by hook or by crook, they have even gone to the extent of giving speeches full of hatred towards other religious communities. The end result is the vertical divide among the people and total polarization of the voters. In fact such a divide brightens the winning prospects of communal-minded candidates and darkens the prospects of a communally harmonious future of this country.
Take for example the on-going elections in Bihar. Communal minded leaders in the country have not hesitated to spread hatred against other community. There are complains and counter complains against leaders of political parties. Election Commission is supposed to act but, as it is seen in the past, nothing much comes out of this exercise and same will happen in Bihar too.
It was believed that the focus of elections in Bihar would be ‘development’. But it has not happened because all the contesting political parties, in their attempt to win the elections, have lost the sight of development and started focusing, directly or indirectly, on religion, caste, etc. It is for these reasons that hate speeches are being heard in the political discourse of Bihar elections. A sad commentary indeed!
What is a Hate speech? One of the elaborate definitions of Hate speech that I have come across goes as follows; “ Hate speech is a term for speech intended to degrade a person or group of people based on their race, gender, age, ethnicity, nationality, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity, disability, language ability, ideology, social class, occupation, appearance (height, weight, hair color, etc.), mental capacity, and any other distinction that might be considered by some as a liability. The term covers written as well as oral communication and some forms of behaviors in a public setting.” Such speeches incite discrimination and hatred, resulting in violence against a person or a group of persons on account of place of origin, ethnicity or lack thereof, nationality, race, or specific religion. Unfortunately, our country today is a victim of hate speeches and this trend will do a grave damage to the unity and brotherhood of Indian people.
Elections come and go. In a democracy elections should have been just like any other sports game. It should have been played with sporting spirit. Accepting defeat gracefully is the greatest strength of this game. But this does not happen in our democracy. Every candidate fights the election only to win. Thus money power and muscle power takes the centre stage of the electoral process. Besides money and muscle power the next best option for politicians to garner more votes is by putting one religious community against other or one particular caste against the other caste.
During the electioneering in 2009 Lok Sobha elections the first hate speech was made by the then young emerging leader Mr. Varun Gandhi, the son of late Sanjay Gandhi and Maneka Gandhi. In his venomous speech against the Muslim community he said, “ If any Muslim raises his hand against any Hindu, Varun Gandhi will cut that hand.” Everyone that matters was surprised at Varun’s hatred and violence-filled speech more so because he is the great grandson of India’s first prime minister, Jawaharlal Nehru – the country’s symbol of secularism and the grandson of late Indira Gandhi who laid her life for the unity and integrity of this country.
In present times too, many BJP ministers and MPs indulge in hate speeches and unfortunately no body has acted against them. Can the BJP, which is ruling the country, be so insensitive to the unity and communal harmony of this country?
It’s truly unfortunate for India and its people because there had been numerous political leaders in the country who indulged in hate speeches in order to win political battles. In the 1970s, Bal Thackeray’s Shiv Sena attacked South Indians for taking away jobs from Maharashtrians. He later targeted Gujaratis, and then Muslims. He wrote, “Islamic terrorism is growing and Hindu terrorism is the only way to counter it. We need suicide bomb squads to protect India and Hindus.” In the recent past Raj Thackeray led his own hate campaign against North Indians working in Maharashtra. “From today, Maharashtra will only celebrate Maharashtra Diwas. Other states’ celebrations will simply not be allowed,” thundered Raj in 2008. Mr. Asaduddhin Owaisy, a Muslim leader and Pravin Togadia, a Hindu leader, both have many times disturbed communal harmony through their hate speeches.
This only proves that there are leaders in all religions and castes who have attempted to win over a particular community by making use of hate speeches. There are also political parties in this country which clandestinely support such leaders because it helps them to win elections.
All such leaders and political parties which directly or indirectly support these divisive attempts must be dealt with an iron hand in order to save the Indian democracy from disintegration.
(Tomazinho Cardozo is a former Speaker of Goa Legislative Assembly)
