Sir,
So far, 36 Sahitya Akademi awardees have returned their awards which were from time to time conferred on them in connection with their literary pursuits. An unfortunate act of violence claimed the life of a person in Dadri , UP which everyone has and must sincerely condemn. Unfortunately, the incident was blown out of proportion and some politicians tried to grind their own opportunistic axe and some shedding crocodile tears,
Strangely, all of a sudden, some literary figures and “more secular than thou” chose to come in a day’s limelight by announcing to return the awards conferred on them , under what they call ,”protest”. That the so called protest seemed well orchestrated and motivated hardly needs any clarification. It appears that these literary “giants” have just connected the dots on the dictated maquette as the present dispensation at the centre with massive democratic mandate is a bête noire to these intellectuals who have , with the act of returning , violated academism. Where were they when the huge humanity of an ethnic minority , the Kashmiri Pandits were hounded out from their hearths and homes? Where these “secularists” were when they were selectively killed, women raped and their religious places vandalized and razed? Where was their conscience when hundreds of Sikhs were killed in 1984? Where were they when a noted writer, intellectual and a reformist thinker Tasleema Nasreen was physically assaulted, her books proscribed in India, asked to leave Kolkata, not allowed to stay put in New Delhi and her literary work stopped from being aired on Radio and telecast from TV Channels? Where were these awardees when around the same time of Dadri incident, a police inspector N.K.Tyagi in Fatehpur , Saharanpur on duty was crushed under the wheels of the truck which reportedly was carrying bovine animals and which he tried to stop for verification. Where was their “protest” when a Professor’s hand was chopped as he had set a question in the question paper not liked by fundamentalists? Why their conscience was asleep when in UP , Bihar, Gujarat and elsewhere in the country under Congress rule , communal riots in hundreds took place? Instances are numerous. Freedom of choice of protest cannot be selective in time, place, region or religion in the choice of these returnees. Their protest cannot be left to their whims and selection as writers and intellectuals are above the littleness of political affiliations and group allegiances.
Those who pawn their pen and thinking are no ones to claim connect with literature. India is a garden of different trees and flowers which is its strength, two brothers fight court cases against each other, they often fight but still they are brothers , their mother is the same. No one needs to nurse any apprehensions about our democracy, secularism, co-existence, powerful media, our superb judicial system and above all our solid constitution. Yes, it is another thing to hunt ways and alibi to trouble and defame a leader like Narendra Modi which is all despicable.
Yours etc….
Shiban Khaibri
Senior journalist
Paloura, Jammu
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