Tavleen Singh writes: Hate speech cannot go unpunished

Terrorism on our sub-continent is nearly always inspired by religious fanaticism, and this is as bad as hate speech. Hate speech is always bad... When it is political leaders who are responsible, it is irresponsible and unforgivable.

When it comes to hate speech and religious fanaticism, I put the whole hateful bunch of haters and fanatics in the same basket. Whatever their genre, whatever their rationale, in my eyes they are all despicable. This is why it disappointed me profoundly that the Supreme Court last week let two BJP leaders off the hate speech hook. If the court had found reason to rule against them, it may have contributed vitally to calming the hate filled mood that has spread across India since the age of belligerent Hindutva and jihadist Islam began.

Whenever I have said this, and I have said it often, I have been reviled by Hindutva’s social media warriors for not recognising that belligerent Hindutva is not as bad as radical Islam. I am fully aware of this. Hindutva has not produced the kind of horrible violence we saw in London last week against the Jewish community. It has not created suicide bombers who believe that Allah approves of killing innocent people simply because they are infidels and idol-worshippers. The kind of fanatics who came to that sunny meadow in Pahalgam just over a year ago and shot Hindu men in front of their families simply because they could not recite the ‘kalima’ have so far not been bred by any of the Indic religions. But fanaticism of a nasty kind has.

This is a recent development. In that older India in which I grew up, I cannot remember ever running into a Hindu or Muslim fanatic. There were casteist Hindus around who did not allow those of lower caste to come near them or enter their kitchens and pooja rooms. And mercifully, there are fewer of those around these days. At least in the cities. They have been replaced by haters who do not hesitate to direct their hatred at Muslims. It is the speeches of BJP leaders like the two who were absolved last week that inspire them.

The speeches made by Anurag Thakur and Parvesh Verma came in response to Muslim opposition to the Citizens Amendment Act. Muslim fears were valid because for the first time in our proudly secular land, we were told that migrants to India of all faiths, other the Islamic faith, would be put on a fast track to citizenship. This was justified on the grounds that our neighbours are nearly all Islamic and it is Hindus and Sikhs who face sickening brutality in these countries. Not true. Shias do not have such a good time in Pakistan nor do those of the Ahmadiya sect. It was a discriminatory amendment, and a deliberate attempt at showing Indian Muslims that they were lesser citizens.

Proof came in the speeches made by the two BJP leaders who the Supreme Court absolved last week. Anurag Thakur was a minister at the time which made it so much more unacceptable that he addressed public rallies at which with a smarmy grin on his face he yelled ‘Desh ke gaddaron ko…’ and smiled when the crowd responded with ‘goli maaro saalon ko’. For those with limited Hindi, this translates as ‘traitors to this country must be shot’. The ‘traitors’ meant Muslim protesters. It was Muslim women protesters in Shaheen Bagh that were targeted by Verma.

These were dangerous hate speeches. Hate speeches always are because the message they send every time to the semi-literate thugs who make up the violent hate mobs they inspire is that they must go forth and attack the community that is being targeted. We have seen too many incidents of this kind of violence happen in recent years and it must be said that because of them, ethnic hatred of one kind or another has become the norm.

There were communal tensions in those gentler, secular decades as well, but they never became the norm. The first time I heard people spitting venom against Muslims in the drawing rooms of Delhi was when L K Advani set off on that first ‘rath yatra’ to Ayodhya. One of his companions on that chariot was Narendra Modi and it was he who fulfilled the promise of building a magnificent temple on the ruins of the Babri Masjid.

Mission accomplished. Now it is time to stop talking about traitors and infiltrators just as it is time for our security forces and intelligence agencies to be better trained against jihadi terrorism. When those responsible for an incident like the one that happened in Pahalgam are killed in anonymity only after the event, many continue to disbelieve that the real culprits of some truly horrific hatred crime have been justly punished. One reason why the Prime Minister needed to send political delegations to the capital cities of the world was because Operation Sindoor did not get the support we expected to get from the international community. After the 26/11 attack in Mumbai, the world was on our side because there was proof in black and white and on reams of videos from CCTV footage that showed clearly who was responsible.

Terrorism on our sub-continent is nearly always inspired by religious fanaticism, and this is as bad as hate speech. From many months of covering Jarnail Singh Bhindranwale’s crusade from the Golden Temple, I can report that I witnessed some of the hate speeches before some horrible crime was committed. Hate speech is always bad. When it is political leaders who are responsible, it is irresponsible and unforgivable.