Compliment or sedation

Hardline nationalists in India appear to have completely lost their minds after their national cricket team’s 10-wicket drubbing at the hands of Pakistan, arresting and seeking sedition cases against people who dared to celebrate or even acknowledge Pakistan’s outstanding performance. Apart from the obvious lunacy of equating supporting a rival sports team with an act of treason, some people were only praising the opposing team’s performance, which is what any true sports fan would do, even when on the losing side.

Although reports of such actions emerged from several states, the worst cases appear to be taking place in Occupied Kashmir and Uttar Pradesh. UP, India’s most populous state, is run by Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, a Modi loyalist who is widely seen as his potential successor at the helm of the BJP. Adityanath is even more right-wing than Modi, and appears to have even more extraordinary delusions of grandeur, referring to himself as ‘maharaj’, while tweeting about his order to arrest Pakistan ‘supporters’ for sedition. At least three students have already been arrested in Agra, the state’s fourth-most populous city. Social media posts suggest the number of people detained is significantly higher, although details on whether or not charges have been filed are still sketchy.

Meanwhile, six people have been arrested in Jammu, while raids were conducted at colleges and universities in IOK. In addition, a teacher in Rajasthan was arrested and fired from her job after she used a colourful photo of victorious Pakistani players, even though she deleted the picture shortly after realising her ‘mistake’. Among the charges against her is “provocation with intent to cause a riot”. All this in a country where terrorists and instigators of deadly riots are elected to the highest offices. Modi oversaw deadly anti-Muslim riots as Gujarat CM. Meanwhile, Adityanath’s term in office has seen the total number of riots reported annually in UP double before declining due to Covid-19.

Published in The Express Tribune, October 30^th, 2021.

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