SP Sharma
The common people are suffering as routine governance has virtually been put at the backburner in all the four Northern states, J&K, Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh, which are currently in the grip of unprecedented situation triggered by beef controversy and political turmoil.
The beef controversy has badly hit J&K, Himachal Pradesh and Haryana, whereas sacrilege of the holy Guru Granth Sahib at seven places in a planned conspiracy in Punjab has set off violent protests resulting in death of two persons in Faridkot due to police firing.
Himachal Pradesh that has generally been known as an oasis of peace in the North recently was in news for lynching to death of a man from Saharanpur who was among a group that was allegedly trying to smuggle cows from the Sirmour district adjoining Uttrakhand.
Incidents related to beef controversy in J&K have resulted in blackening of face of (engineer) Rashid in the Press Club of India at Delhi where he had gone to address media persons. Rashid is being considered as the villain of the current turmoil as the beef party hosted by him in Srinagar generated a wave of anger in the country. This has led to killing of a Kashmiri trucker in a petrol bomb attack in Udhampur.
It is worth mentioning that in the TV debates on the beef controversy and its fallout, various religious leaders of the Muslims and intellectuals belonging to the community grilled Rashid and accused him of having become a source of ridicule for the entire community by hosting the beef party that was more of an attempt to tease a particular community.
Not only the beef controversy but also the growing differences between the ruling alliance of PDP and BJP are resulting in misgovernance in J&K. Chief Minister Mufti Sayeed is perhaps going through the worst period of his political career as he is facing problems not only with the BJP but stalwarts in his own PDP have become defiant and have started speaking publicly against his decision to rule the state with support of the BJP. Two MPs of PDP, Muzaffar Hussain Baig and Tariq Hameed Karra, skipped the meeting that was convened by the Mufti and his daughter Mehbooba to discuss functioning of the coalition government.
The situation in Punjab is on boil for the past few days on the issue of sacrilege of the holy Guru Granth Sahib and the tension has refused to de-escalate regardless of the fact that the police has arrested two granthis and a woman in connection with four incidents of the crime and was on trail of three other cases.
Initial reports indicate that the tension was being fomented from Pakistan where the 5 top Sikh terrorist leaders have taken refuge under the patronage of ISI. The police reportedly have evidence of the ISI conspiring trouble with active support of these terrorists. A number of telephone calls of those arrested on the charges of sacrilege have indicated foreign hand in the current violence. India has repeatedly been asking Pakistan to deport these terrorists against whom heinous cases of mass murder and kidnapping were registered.
Chief Minister Parkash Singh Badal and his son and Deputy CM Sukhbir Singh Badal are working round the clock to bring the situation under control and restore peace in Punjab.
Not only this incident, but the octogenarian Badal is also being often pin-pricked by leaders of the BJP that is ruling Punjab alongwith the Shiromani Akali Dal (SAD). Some middle-rung BJP leaders of Punjab have been demanding that the party should snap ties with the Badals and contest the next Assembly elections on its own without any poll-understanding with the SAD.
The recent burning of two children of a Scheduled Caste family and the controversial statement on beef consumption of Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar has also brought Haryana into focus.
Communal frenzy has generally been unknown in the hill state of Himachal Pradesh where a person amid the beef controversy was lynched to death at Sarahan in the Sirmour district where some people from Saharanpur were trying to allegedly smuggle cows in a truck.
The state had seen one such incident earlier in mid-1990s when a Pakistani terrorist shifted to the Central Jail at Nahan from Srinagar was lynched when a group raised anti-India and pro-Pakistan slogans. Other terrorists were immediately evacuated from the jail and flown back to Kashmir.
The state is also reeling under political instability caused due to initiation of CBI case against the Chief Minister Virbhadra Singh and his family members by the Modi government at the centre. This has evoked controversy with the Congress accusing the Modi government of targeting non-BJP CMs and not taking any action against their own leaders against whom documentary proof of alleged misuse of authority was available.
This is not for the first time that the CBI has been let lose at Virbhadra Singh. The CBI was assigned the task to examine a BJP and Sukh Ram prepared chargesheet against him and register a case when LK Advani was home minister during the NDA regime in 1998. However, the CBI gave clean-chit to Virbhadra Singh after about a yearlong investigation.
However, this time Virbhadra Singh is also facing onslaught from within the Congress with many of his juniors eyeing the Chief Ministerial slot.
(The writer is a senior journalist who has worked in J&K, Punjab, Haryana and HP)
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