Why Sonia Faleiro is New York Times’ latest Gunga Din

It is perhaps not well known that Rudyard Kipling, the creator of Jungle Book, was also a vicious racist and a fierce proponent of British imperialism, much more than was common even at that time. After the Jallianwalla Bagh massacre, Kipling lavished praise on General Dyer and referred to him as “The man who saved India”. In fact, Kipling started a special fund to honor General Dyer for the massacre which gave him a reward of 26000 British pounds. Even today, that is over Rs 26 lakh…back in the 1920s…Rs 26 lakh would have been a MASSIVE fortune! One of Kipling’s other creations is a poem named “Gunga Din“, which tells the story of an Indian bhisti (water carrier) and his loyalty to his white British master. Though the water carrier Gunga Din is treated like a dog, often beaten and flogged, Gunga Din gives up his life to save that of his British owner. The New York Times and the self proclaimed New England liberals on the American East Coast who read this infernal “news”paper see themselves as American royalty. And they get really angry when Indians don’t act as obedient Gunga Din. Here comes a brown Prime Minister from a third world country and rubs shoulders with the high and mighty of America : from the President to the biggest CEOs. Instead of begging, he dares to promise them opportunities in his native third world country. Who does this man think he is? As if the natives of India are equal human beings! Be it India or America, Modi always makes the royalty uncomfortable 🙂

No wonder New York Times got one of their water carriers in India to step up! The lucky Gunga Din is one Sonia Faleiro. She has studied in Britain AND at St. Stephen’s College! The perfect CV for a Macaulayputri! So this Gunga Din rushes in with cool water to soothe the ruffled ego of the New York Times, writing an article with the title:

“India’s attack on Free Speech”

(http://www.nytimes.com/2015/10/04/opinion/sunday/sonia-faleiro-india-free-speech-kalburgi-pansare-dabholkar.html?_r=0)

And here is the illustration that went with the article:

A map of India colored blood red with a bullet hole in it? This must be the story of how Hindus across the country are living in fear of being butchered by left wing terrorists! Oh excuse me…or as Arund***ti Roy would have said, not terrorists but “Gandhians with guns”.  Let us read the article:

“In today’s India, secular liberals face a challenge: how to stay alive.”

She is definitely right about that part. With funding to Greenpeace and other NGOs and evangelical mafia cut off, secular liberals could  indeed go to the brink of starvation.

“In August, 77-year-old scholar M. M. Kalburgi, an outspoken critic of Hindu idol worship, was gunned down on his own doorstep. In February, the communist leader Govind Pansare was killed near Mumbai.”

Wait, since when did  “Communist” come to mean a “secular liberal”? Yes, we know…there is a LOT of political violence in India. Why pick and choose a few incidents? Here are some more

1. 28 February 2014 : Six police personnel, including a SHO, killed in “secular liberal terrorist attack” in Chhattisgarh

2. 11 March 2014: 16 People including 11 CRPF Personnel, 4 Policemen and 1 Civilian killed in a deadly ambush in a thickly forested area of Gheeram Ghati in Sukma district of Chhattisgarh.

3. 11 May 2014: 7 police commandos killed in a “secular liberal landmine blast” in the forests of Gadchiroli district of Maharashtra

Why leave out the victims of “secular liberal terrorist” violence? Here is some chilling data:

“In 1997, Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, in a reply to an Assembly question, stated that between 1977 (when they came to power) and 1996, 28,000 political murders were committed.”

(http://www.mainstreamweekly.net/article2234.html)

Why Sonia ji, why? Were the lives of these 28000 victims of secular liberal terrorist violence not as valuable as the lives of M M Kalburgi and Narendra Dabholkar? Why leave them out of the narrative? And please dont try to hide behind the fig leaf of trying to draw a distinction between Communists and “secular liberals”. YOU said it yourself…you yourself counted Communist Govind Pansare as “secular liberal”. There’s no way out now.

Of course we know where the shoe REALLY pinches, isn’t it?

“The number of people killed by Maoist violence has come down from 1005 in 2010 to 167 this year….Figures up to September 15, 2015, ET has accessed shows attacks on security forces are down by almost 25% this year. Maoists have held only 28 ‘people’s court’ this year, compared to 58 in 2014. Arms training camps are down to 11 from 34.”

(http://economictimes.indiatimes.com/news/politics-and-nation/all-quiet-in-naxal-belt-government-may-have-finally-reined-in-maoists/articleshow/49189381.cms)

Don’t cry Sonia ji… secular liberals have still managed 167 kills this year. That’s a pretty good score and they have 3 more months to make up the deficit from 2014.

And Sonia ji continues:

“While there have always been episodic attacks on free speech in India, this time feels different. The harassment is front-page news, but the government refuses to acknowledge it. ”

Of course it feels different to you. Because it is front page news! That is what’s different 🙂 167 people were murdered already this year by secular liberals and hardly anyone heard about it. But the death of ONE Communist became frontpage news. THAT is what is different. In India, when free speech is suppressed, usually people never get to hear about it. In India the “thought criminals” are usually hounded by your favorite communities and beloved secular liberal parties until they say something like this:

“I, Shirin Dalvi, begin with an apology for having printed the title cover of Charlie Hebdo. It was a mistake and I had no intention to hurt the feelings of my community. Like any other Muslim, I deeply respect Prophet Mohammed – sallallahu alahi wa sallam – Peace be upon Him.”

(http://www.ndtv.com/opinion/i-shirin-dalvi-an-underground-citizen-of-india-736916)

Sonia ji, have secular liberals pardoned Shirin Dalvi yet? I don’t know…because the secular liberal press lost track of her…

Sonia ji continues:

” Indeed, Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s silence is being interpreted by many people as tacit approval, given that the attacks have gained momentum since he took office in 2014 and are linked to Hindutva groups whose far-right ideology he shares.”

Interpreted as tacit approval? By who? Do you mean yourself 🙂 ? For sake of argument, let me accept for a second that the attacks have indeed gained momentum since 2014.  The REAL reason behind her anger is that she feels that right wingers are gathering steam whereas stats show that secular liberal violence is down by 25%. She is not worried about free speech, she is only angry because she thinks that thugs of secular liberal ideology might be losing the violence race to thugs of a different ideology.

Oh…and if Prime Minister Modi’s SILENCE can be interpreted as “tacit approval”, what do you call it when Dr. Singh EXPLICITLY says that Muslims have the first right to India’s resources? Also note that Dr. Singh was legendary for rarely speaking up. So what do you call it when Manmohan Singh makes it a point to speak up and lay it out explicitly that Muslims have the FIRST RIGHT to India’s resources? Should it not be interpreted as a direct clarion call for Islamic supremacy in India, reducing the rest of us to second class citizens?

What is your interpretation when Queen Sonia sees the dead bodies of the two terrorists killed in the Batla House encounter and starts crying? She does not cry for Inspector Mohan Chand Sharma who is martyred in the encounter with these terrorists, but starts weeping for the terrorists? Here is Cabinet Minister Salman Khurshid explaining the reaction of Queen Sonia when she saw the dead terrorists:

Sonia ji, you are interpreting PM Modi’s silence. What is your interpretation of Queen Sonia’s tears on seeing dead terrorists?

Sonia ji continues:

“Earlier this month, a leader of the Sri Ram Sene, a Hindu extremist group with a history of violence including raiding pubs and beating women they find inside, ratcheted up the tensions. He warned that writers who insulted Hindu gods were in danger of having their tongues sliced off. For those who don’t support the ultimate goal of these extremists — a Hindu nation — Mr. Modi’s silence is ominous.”

Seriously, what is the reason for Modi to speak here? Well, earlier this week, secular Imams in Kolhapur issued a fatwa to Muslim women not to contest polls:

(http://www.catchnews.com/india-news/fatwa-directs-muslim-women-not-to-contest-kolhapur-civic-polls-1443847219.html)

These secular Imams have a history of imposing Burqa, triple talaq etc on women and even fighting SC judgement on Shah Bano. You are silent on these Imams. Is your silence “ominous”? Should I interpret it as “tacit approval”?

Now, we will come to Sonia ji’s second “pain point”, i.e., the second main reason she is so upset. You will see what I mean…let her continue:

“This is a turning point for India, a country that has taken pride in being a liberal democracy and that often adopts a high-minded tone when neighbors fall short of the same standards. When the liberal Pakistani politician Salman Taseer was assassinated in 2011, the Indian journalist M. J. Akbar, now the national spokesman for the Bharatiya Janata Party, or B.J.P., chided, “If Salman Taseer had been an Indian Muslim, he would still have been alive.” ….We should be worrying instead about what’s happening in India, and recognize that it could go the way of the very neighbors it criticizes.”

He he…this is the SECOND place where the shoe pinches…In 1947, India was divided up and a “land of the Pure” was created. Several decades later, the secular peaceful religion has reduced the land of the pure to a smoking ruin. No wonder Indians find it easy to take potshots at our “pure” neighbors 🙂 And each time someone mocks the land of the pure, the secular liberals in India wince with pain 🙂

“In addition to erasing the contributions of long-dead liberals, B.J.P. leaders are busy promoting violent Hindu nationalists. Sakshi Maharaj, a B.J.P. member of Parliament, described Nathuram Godse, the man who assassinated Mahatma Gandhi, as a “patriot.” Although Mr. Maharaj later retracted his statement, his opinion is shared by many of his party colleagues. Gandhi’s assassin was a former member of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh, an armed Hindu group, with which Mr. Modi has been associated since he was 8 years old.”

This had to come up. Well, then what do you call the Congress party’s 14 year old alliance with MIM, which called for the police in India to suspend its work for 15 minutes in which 25 crore seculars would supposedly kill all the 100 crore Hindus in India? And please note that the MIM is founded by the Razakars, an armed secular militant group that massacred Hindus and fought the Indian Army when it entered Hyderabad.

Sonia ji is getting even more angry:

“The realization has made for decisions that were once unthinkable.Last December, the acclaimed author Perumal Murugan informed the police that he’d received threats from Hindu groups angered by a novel he wrote in 2010. Extremists staged burnings of his book and demanded a public apology from him. The police suggested he go into exile. Realizing he was on his own, in January Mr. Murugan announced the withdrawal of his entire literary canon. On Facebook, he swore to give up writing, in essence apologizing for his life’s work out of fear for his family’s safety.”

Yes, Shirin Dalvi’s apology is not “unthinkable”. But Perumal Murugan’s apology is. Here is a picture of the comedy group “All India Bakchod” apologizing to the Archbishop of Mumbai for making jokes on Christians:

(https://www.facebook.com/ArchdioceseBombay/posts/1030762713603826)

This apology is thinkable. Shirin Dalvi’s apology is thinkable. Perumal Murugan’s is of course, “unthinkable”!

Finally Sonia ji spills the beans:

“It’s hard to accept what is happening in India.”

Exactly…Chaiwallahs in power and Shehzadas in exile. Hard to accept. And finally, Sonia ji lets it slip:

“It is easier to ignore or dismiss the attacks and the threats as a liberal persecution complex or a phase that will last only as long as the B.J.P. is in power.”

🙂 🙂 Indeed it is easier to see it as a liberal persecution complex. Sonia ji, let me introduce you to a very powerful logical tool known as “Occam’s razor” …a philosophical method  used to cut through a pile of bullshit quickly and expose the real truth. Occam’s razor says that the “simplest explanation is usually the correct one“. You gave  it away yourself 🙂