Author: C. Sitharam
Publication: Samyukta Karnataka
Date: June 12, 2002
Now that the 'Ahmedabad carnage'
has come to an end, people in the country can, at least temporarily, take
a sigh of relief. Recently, there were some communal disturbances
in the Tilak Nagar area of the Bangalore City. It should be noted
that they remained limited to a very small area. Whatever one may
say, people, whether they belong to the majority community or the minorities,
generally wish to co-exist peacefully. This is evident by the fact
that Gujarat incidents did not trigger incidents in other parts of the
country or the event in Tilak Nagar did not spill over to other parts of
Karnataka. It can reasonably be expected that India will pick itself
up and unhamperedly execute its own welfare plans.
It is a great tragedy in this country
that the words like Secularism, Sanatana Dharma, Social justice, uplift
of Dalits and so on, which are to the considered greatest goals and ideals
in any civil society, have become bereft of their essential meanings of
"Shrirastu, Shantirastu, Tushtirastu". (Let good happen, let peace come,
let satisfaction accrue). Instead, they have become the playthings
in the hands of petty politicians and anti-nationals who want to divide
people to achieve self-gains even by throwing the society into unrest and
warm themselves by lighting the pyres. The irony is that those mostly
responsible to this state of affairs are the armchair intellectuals, who
are now enjoying all the fruits of independence that their country is making
them available.
Because of the irrational behaviour
of these intellectuals, it has now come to pass that any one who wants
to be recognised as secular, should be professing leftist, has to rend
the society on Minority-Majority basis or on Brahmin-Non Brahmin basis
or Forward-Dalit basis. He, therefore, has to interpret, without using
his critical faculties, any incident that occurs in the country so as to
demonstrate that he is a leftist, an anti-Brahmin and a pro-Dalit.
If not, he is at risk of being segregated and kept out of the coveted community
of 'Progressive intellectuals'. Now-a-days, to be considered as a
member of the progressive intellectual community, it is not necessary as
of yester years to be a scholar in Tarka, Vedanta or Mimamsa, or even geography,
history or science, may not necessarily adorn even the pendant of a PhD.
It would suffice if he were committed to the above-mentioned policy, or,
at least he should loudly be condemning things like astrology or Karma
Siddhanta, without knowing even their basic premises.
From times earlier to Shri Adi Shankara,
we find an established tradition in Indian intellectual circles, namely,
'poorva paksha'. This means that a scholarly person who had to enter a
debate to demolish a particular theory or view, had to first propound it
as the followers of that theory would have explained it, and thereafter
start refuting it by offering his own logical findings. It meant that the
scholar had to exhibit his versatility in proving and disproving points.
This was a normal expectation because otherwise would it not be ludicrous
to allow demolishing a theory by one who had not made an in-depth study
of it?
But, for the neo-intellectuals of
modern India, this does not appear as of any significance. Say for example
they have to oppose astrology, they would be quoting some Noble laureates,
although their statements were made at different times and in different
contexts. The expertise of these laureates would be in physics, or literature
or medical science, or they would have got their Nobel Prize for their
peace efforts.
Our modern day intellectuals are
never troubled by a simple doubt, whether the profundity of these Noble
laureates in their subjects in any way helps than to gain an experience
and expertise in Astrology. With this irrational stand, it appears they
are not bothered that they are actually going against the scientific temper,
which is their own professed value!
What these alienated species unfortunately
haven't yet understood is that their heady writings and statements, though
intended to conceal the truths, are, instead, spreading into the society
a secret poison. They should know that Bhishma and Drona, the two exemplar
characters in Mahabharata, are illustrative of what happens when worthy
people do not condemn an obvious injustice, but try to take a stand by
using brilliant logics in support of it. Both of them were elderly, scholarly
and highly intellectual. But, when Dushasana was attempting to disrobe
Draupadi in the open royal court, instead to preventing that offensive
injustice, they started talking about Dharma sukshma (Knottyness of justice
and duty). Result? They were among the first two fallen, as commanders
of the army, on the battle ground of Kurukshetra. Our intellectuals
have yet to realise the lesson of this incident. They are yet to
know that their distorted views or logics, destroying the social peace
and harmony, will ultimately lead us all to a new Kurukshetra battle, where
they can't get themselves saved by their intellectual brilliance.
