Where rulers fail ...
Humra Quraishi
Sakshi Maharaj and Yogi Adityanath
There can be a hundred
television debates on rape
and rapists but the crux
lies in the fact that a large
percentage of today's
political rulers are not just
corrupt but have criminal cases
against them. Quite obviously
affected is the entire policing system
and the administrative machinery
and, of course, us!
A hundred new laws or reforms
can be introduced but the mess is
bound to persist because today you
have Sakshi Maharaja ( who happens
to be Member Parliament from
Unnao where the 16 year was raped
by BJP's sitting MLA) inaugurating a
night club in Lucknow and roaming
about scot free! This when he has
several criminal charges slapped on
him…
Taking you still further, there were
criminal charges against Uttar
Pradesh chief minister, Yogi
Adityanath, till he sat on the chief
ministerial throne and had those
charges removed! Not just that, he is
in the process of 'removing' or
'dropping' charges against several of
his tainted BJP ministers and political
workers.
In December 2017, he announced
that his government is bringing a law
to withdraw "politically-motivated"
cases, registered against ministers,
legislators and others in the state.
The proposed law seeks to scrap
about 20,000 such cases registered
in various parts of the state!
These announcements by a chief
minister leaves one aghast, in the
backdrop of the fact that criminals
are ruling us, in various garbs and
hues. Last summer (August 2017) a study conducted by the Association
for Democratic Reforms (ADR), a
non-government organisation
working for electoral reforms,
brought forth hitting facts on the
country's lawmakers : As many as 51
MPs and MLAs have declared cases
of crime against women, including of
alleged rape and abduction. Of the
51, 48 are Members of Legislative
Assembly (MLAs) and three are
Members of Parliament
(MPs)…Giving party-wise details, the
study stated that among various
recognised parties, the BJP has the
highest number of MPs and MLAs
(14), followed by the Shiv Sena (7)
and the All India Trinamool Congress
(6) who have declared cases related
to crime against women.
ADR and National Election Watch
have analysed 4,852 out of 4,896
election affidavits of current MPs and
MLAs. This includes 774 out of 776
affidavits of MPs and 4,078 out of
4,120 MLAs from all the states of
India. Out of the analysed 1,581
(33%) MPs and MLAs with declared criminal cases, 51 have declared
cases related to crimes against
women...334 candidates analysed
who had declared cases related to
crime against women were given
tickets by recognised political
parties.
Among these candidates, 40 were
given tickets by parties for Lok Sabha
or Rajya Sabha elections. Various
recognised parties have given tickets
to 294 candidates with cases related
to crime against women for state
assembly elections...
The study also brought into focus
the fact that in the last five years, 19
independent candidates with
declared cases related to crime
against women contested in the LS
and RS elections. And 103
independent candidates with
declared cases related to crime
against women contested in the state
assembly polls…Another fact came
to the fore: over the last five years,
48 candidates with declared cases
related to crime against women were
given tickets by the BJP. The second highest number of candidates (36)
who had declared cases related to
crime against women were given
tickets by the BSP, followed by 27
candidates from the INC which had
contested for LS/RS and state
assemblies elections. Another fact: Among the states, Maharashtra has
the highest number of MPs and MLAs
(12) who have declared cases of
crime against women, followed by
West Bengal (11) and Odisha
(6)….Also, among the states,
Maharashtra has the highest number of candidates (65) in the last five
years, followed by Bihar (62) and
West Bengal (52) (including
independents) who were given
tickets by political parties even
though they declared cases related
to crime against women in their
Poison
spreading out
Tell me, in such a scenario where
do we go? What should we do?
Shouldn't we yell and scream: the
tainted politicians have to get out!
Out of the system. Out of the public
domain Out of our lives. Out from
any of the posts grabbed by them!
Sheer poison is spreading out.
Look at the havoc taking place in the
Jammu region Probably worse than
the Partition times, which had seen
communal frenzy spread out to such
an extent that entire clans had no
option but to run for their
lives…hundreds had been killed if not
uprooted from the Jammu region.
And today Jammu remains as
communally charged as it was in the
1940s. Communal politics unleashed
over the rape and murder of a 8 year
old child, who was even denied burial
in her village. Her family had to carry
her battered and bruised and broken
body for eight kilometres, to another
village, where she lies buried.
It gets painful to describe the
emotions one is going through.
Unbelievable, yet true that we are
destined to live in such harsh times ,
where little children are raped and
murdered to settle disputes. To top it
all, you have political men publicly
defending the rapists!
The deteriorating political
pollution seems to be affecting
hundreds. There's that fury and
ferociousness. Everyone's on some
wild chase…wilder it gets as the
atmosphere gets surcharged.
Polluted atmosphere, polluted
minds, polluted system. And in this
mahaul its not very amiss to hear poison - dripping polluted speeches
of the communally charged. Nothing
short of raping the very psyche!
At least the kings of yesteryears
killed at one go .Not like today's
politicians hell bent on killing our
souls, raping our psyche, day after
day with those poison dripping
speeches, and yet they remain intact
and untouched. The nexus leaves
them untouched.
We have gone beyond
decay…much too far into
degeneration. With tyranny
spreading out, one is not too sure
who all will be raped and killed by
the political rulers and their men,
roaming around scot free to terrorize
the hapless and then come on
television debates to scream and
shout and defend their tyranny!
Leaving you with these lines of
Sahir Ludhianvi
'Tyranny is but tyranny; when it
grows, it is vanquished/
Blood however is blood; if it spills,
it will congeal/
It will congeal on the desert sands,
on the murderer's hands/
On the brow of justice, and on
chained feet/
On the unjust sword, on the
sacrificial body/
Blood is blood, if it spills, it takes
root/
Let them hide all they want, skulk
in their lairs/
The tracks of spilled blood will
point out the executioners' abode/
Let conspiracies shroud the truth
with darkness/
Each drop of blood will march out,
holding aloft a lamp/…
That blood which you wished to
bury in the killing fields/
Has risen today in the streets and
courts/
Somewhere as a flame,
somewhere as a slogan, somewhere
else as a flung stone/
When blood flows, banoyets
cannot contai8n it /
When it raises its defiant head,
laws will not restrain it /
Tyranny has no caste, no
community, no status nor dignity/
Tyranny is simply tyranny; from
its beginning to its end/
Blood however is blood; it
becomes a hundred things:
Shapes that cannot be obliterated/
Flames that can never be
extinguished/
Chants that will not be
suppressed.'
