Moving images of George Floyd’s abhorrent, despondent, sick and vile murder by a white police man reach us, and rightfully so, everyone across the spectrum whether a leftist, rightist or simply not aligned to either of these ideologies, poured out outrage, their support and sentiments on various social media platforms.
The murder of George Floyd has resulted in continuous protests from the black community. Martin Luther King Jr. famously said ‘Riot is the language of the unheard’ which may seem so true in the American context. While here we are a country of 1.7 billion people with more than 200 million Muslims, and we do not protest for our dead brothers and sisters, nor do we raise our voice for innocent Muslims who are maimed, injured, killed and incarcerated.
Remember the February 2020, Delhi carnage, remember the youth beaten up and forced to sing the national anthem in their delirious state, and one of them named Faizan, died a few days later.
What did we do? We saw, expressed some dismay, and scrolled up our news feed to see that horrendous tiktok video. And what are we doing now as hundreds and hundreds of thirsty, barefooted, dehydrated, hungry migrants are on foot to reach their homeland?
“In other countries, mobs riot after injustice. In India majoritarian mobs commit an injustice by rioting and killing innocent people without any provocation (on the orders of you-know-who). Riots in India are not the language of the unheard but rather the language of the loud and proud”, reads a FB post.
But the hypocrisy of our people lies in praying and supporting causes of other countries while we ignore the horrible atrocities inflicted to our people right in our backyard.
Do we actually as a nation support the Dalit and Muslim causes, are we as outraged and as angry at the injustice perpetrated to Indians, as we are on George Floyd’s murder. Are we as ready as to call out the police brutality and complicity in the havoc this whole atmosphere has caused.
On one hand we have people disassociating from the downtrodden, the helpless and people of extreme penury, on the other hand we have people who celebrate oppression, mock and deride the oppressed and their sufferings. Don’t believe me?
When the issue of dying migrant workers is brought to a minister in power, a BJP member, this is the heartless, churlish response that we receive from the railways minister, Piyush Goyal who said and is on record “Avoid travelling in Shramik trains, if in distress”. Did the honorable minister and his government provide any other temporary means of rehabilitation for the distressed?
My lecturer once said the events closest to you becomes relative and becomes bigger news rather than news of far away lands that do not effect you. And I believed it to be true, only until now. My mind is boggled because the news of far away lands is blustered and bolstered (I in no way mean what happens far away, is innocuous or should not be condemned in any way) while the news of our own brethren is shrugged off and thrown behind the shoulder, totally ignored. We are unfazed, carrying on with our lives while simultaneously obfuscating and sequestering violence and oppression through our silence.
Societies at large have had historical amnesia, which made them fall into an abyss of degradation. But our Indian selective amnesia is not of history but of the present, what do you think will be its outcome?
