By
Shameem Faizee
After
having failed in setting agenda of choice by raising various emotional and
sectarian issues, this week the Narendra Modi government is back on using old
cases and filing new cases on the charges of sedition against those who had
dared to speak against the government. In Assam a Left intellectual has been
charge-sheeted for sedition as he has opposed the government on the issue of
citizen’s bill.
During
the last four years various BJP controlled state governments have leveled
sedition charges against the critics of not only prime minister but even the
BJP chief ministers. Number of cases has been filed on the basis of what has
been written on the Face book, WhatsApp or other social media tools against
Narendra Modi or any BJP chief minister. In Manipur, even after a journalist
was granted bail by court, the BJP government invoked NSA to send the victim to
jail for a year. All these misuse of charges of British era law on sedition has
been condemned by all those who have some regard for democratic right of
dissent. Obviously the BJP and its government do not come in this category.
Most
brazen use of this law that has made the Modi government a laughable stock is
the revival of a case of sedition against the student leaders of JNU after
three years. There was some gathering of students in February, 2016 in JNU
campus. The ABVPRSS was facing very rough weather among the student community
on the suicide committed by Rohit Vemula, a Dalit student leader of Hyderabad.
JNUSU president and other student leaders had started mobilising students on
the issue of Rohit’s suicide against RSS-ABVP.
To
divert people’s attention from this, the ABVP activists planted certain people
in the gathering of students who raised antinational slogans. From beginning,
it was obvious that the Kashmiris who raised anti- India slogans were planted
by ABVP. But police under the direct control of Union Home Ministry, in place
of arresting these miscreants, filed cases against Left leaning students that
included JNUSU president Kanahiya Kumar who was kept in custody for two weeks.
Later the courts released most of them. As no charge sheet was filed during the
past three years, everybody thought the government has ultimately decided to
forget this “sinful venture” of Delhi police. But it is not so.
The
Delhi police have been instructed to file a 12,000 word charge sheet against
the JNU student leaders and activists. Of course, according to police, the main
culprit is Kanahiya Kumar who has already completed his research work and
submitted his doctoral thesis in JNU. He is now active in political field as he
has been elected a member of the CPI National Council. Interestingly the most
concrete evidence against AISF leader is by five ABVP cadres. Even they have
not charged him with raising seditious slogans. Similar filthy and unfounded
charges have been referred against other student leaders of JNU.
In
the charge sheet, 36 more students have been named but no specific charge has
been mentioned against them. These students include Aparajitha Raja, another
known AISF activists who had contested the JNUSU presidential election in 2017.
Nobody has claimed that she raised an anti-national slogan but her name is
being publicised as one of those who have been charge-sheeted for seditious
activities.
Obviously,
the government, under distress due to growing anger of the masses, want to use
some issues to divert people’s attention from the socio-economic issues that
have perturbed the people in the recent months and forced them to take to
streets. In past few weeks, we witnessed upsurge among farmers and farm
labourers, students outburst against the anti-people education policies,
growing unemployment as well as economic measures heaping burden on common
people. About 20 crore workers observed two days strike, defence workers are
going on to strike and different categories of unorganised workers too are on
agitation path. The Modi team and its political patrons have realised the fate
this government is going to face in the coming four months.
We
have repeatedly reminded that the only weapon for this most hated regime is
invoking political sentimentalism and use sentimental slogans to hasten
communal and caste polarisation and divide the society on sectarian issues to
the extent possible.
Not
only the secular democratic political forces have to get alerted against this
growing threat, they have also to awaken the younger generation, particularly
the student community against this growing threat of division. (IPA Service)
The post Sedition Charge Meant To Divert Focus From Real Issues appeared first on Newspack by India Press Agency.
