Democracy slaughtered in God’s Own Country

Report by : Rajiv Ranjan Adaptation by : Abhishek A city where people are slaughtered everyday, with more than 300 made headless, more than 400 limbs chopped off, 500 being amputated, beaten and brutalized…is this the only way of democracy….looks like in one corner of this country, India. These gory details can be true about your city someday.....From being the eternally ‘developing’ nation to a nation whose time has come, India has managed a phenomenal transformation. This new India is reflected in its fast developing cities, rapidly modernising infrastructure, and its newly rich middle class. But somewhere along the line perhaps politics has been left in the feudal age. Always divisive, often violent, it gives the lie to the rule of law. Has this trend really become irreversible? Is it endemic? Zee News pieced together recent political events in different parts of the country to find an answer to this pressing question. The attack on CPI (M)’s office by RSS-BJP workers in March may still be fresh in your memory. But the root cause of that attack was in Kannur, Kerala. The state with the highest literacy rate has a long history of violence among parties and has seen a lot of bloodshed over the decades. Kannur has been a CPI(M)’s constituency since 1930. Back then handloom Industry and bidi business used to provide employment to a majority of the population. Congress, RSS, BJP and other parties were looking for a foothold in the area. Later, when the bidi factories had to be closed down and left many people with no job and no money, it gave chance to other parties to gain strength.RSS provided employment to many people which brought them in the reckoning in Kannur. With political equations changing and vote bank tilting in the favour of other parties, tensions started to rise among political parties. The first victim of rising tension was a CPI (M) worker who was attacked by RSS workers in the year 1969. This sparked never ending clashes among various parties. It did not take much time before the villages under the Kannur district were divided on the basis of the parties they supported. Even members of a family have enmity on the basis of their party preferences. Now supporting a party has become a compulsion in Kannur. With time the clashes among parties have only become bloodier and fiercer. Vote bank is the main reason behind all this violence. People are first forced to join one party or the other and people are amputated or mutilated just because of a person being from the other party. It did not take long for people to take up arms to take revenge from other parties. People use swords and axes to attack opposition party workers. From party workers to those contesting in the elections, people at every level have borne the brunt of this hatred. Whichever party loses, its cadre performs last rituals of the deceased supporters to show its strength- with counts of people attending last rites. A funeral procession of a party worker of the ruling Left recently saw scores of people attending the procession with the police guarding it. Parties take oath at the funeral of their dead to take revenge of his/her death. And monthly wages are paid to the family of their workers. If the party’s worker survives in the attack losing his limbs, then all his medical expenses and cost of artificial limbs are borne by the party. On the other hand the party which had ordered the attack on the deceased bears the litigation cost on the behalf of their party worker. Whom do you vote for, sell your property to, have acquaintances with and even get married to is decided by the party preference. Those who lose their lives in this violence are glorified by their respective parties. This violence seems to have no end, as the division has been longstanding and its roots too deep. One wonders whether coming to power in any which way is the only mandate agreed upon by the politicians of this country. And the mindless violence the only consensus that the politicians of India have arrived upon?