THE BLASPHEMY LAW: A POLITICALLY MOTIVATED
AGENDA
It is safe to say that the political climate of our country for the past decade has
been nothing short of mass hysteria; be it scams, passing of ungodly bills,
demolitions, acts of cowardice from the politicians, demonetization, article 370
or the Love Jihad law at the turn of the decade, we have seen it all; the country
has been in shambles. But a new year brings new challenges and now we are
faced with the newest and a rather grave challenge which questions the very idea
of our foundation; of our democracy and its paramountcy. The Indian version of
the blasphemy law; section 295A is based on an archaic law put in place by the
British, which is not relevant anymore but continues to be a part of the
Constitution merely because the people in power get to exploit and tamper with
it in line with their own convenience. Privileging religious orthodoxy’s is not
going to lead us to fruitful outcomes of any sort because it would mean
privileging patriarchal, hidebound people at the apex of these institutions and also
people at the top of the political religious orthodoxy. There’s a culture of
reverence and apotheosis of these religious entities and with them, the political
entities that extrapolate petty issues into much larger arguments of dissent than
they really are. It is also important to mention here, the role and conduct of the
police which has been truly abominable and appalling as can be seen in the case
of the comedian who was recently arrested for allegedly “insulting” Hindu deities
in his stand-up comedy set; Is our faith really so frail that it’ll get broken and
debilitated by a couple of jokes and hurt our feelings and sensibilities and
sentiments to an extent that we will incarcerate people for making jokes.
Another important aspect of mass furore is also vigilante justice, which has
reached its peak in the years that followed 2014 simply because of the narrative
that has been built around religious sanctity and the fact that it is and should
remain sanctimonious and anything or anyone that goes against it or questions its
genesis or even attempts to question it will be considered sacrilegious and will be
met with the same fate: untenable mass furore; taking the form of mob lynching.
In this time of difficulty and despair we have to understand that the capacity
of a human being to love is akin to godliness; and taking offence to petty matters
should not take precedence in our lives over compassion for our fellow mankind.
In closing, I would say that laws like this question the jurisprudence of our
country and therefore it is imperative for this law be revoked, for we cannot be
truly independent and democratic until and unless we see this law lifted, for good.
On a parting note, I’m reminded of Pandit Nehru’s quote from Tryst with
Destiny: “At the stroke of the midnight hour, when the world sleeps, India will
awake to light and freedom. A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history
when we step out from the old to the new when an age ends, and when the soul
of a nation, long suppressed, finds utterance”.
This is our time to seek out that utterance from within ourselves and fight
against unjust practices and remember John F. Kennedy’s words; “Those who
make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable.”