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Did he miss, really? But he has
another shoe
Look who
it was aimed at, and who could be next in line
Kalam Nishan
Singh
The shoe flew,
ever so gently, right in front of
India’s Home
Minister’s nose, landing with a thud to his right.
 By now, you know
most of the details. And most people will recognize Jarnail Singh
from across the road. A simple act of daring, a journalist crossing
the blurred line, if it ever existed, between being a human being
with a heart and a professional doing his job, has caught the Indian
establishment by the scruff of its neck and forced it to stare it in
the face, the gross injustice it has meted out.
The shoe was
hurled at the face of injustice, in utter frustration of a
quarter-century wait for justice.
Jarnail Singh’s
shoe missed
India’s Home
Minister P Chidambaram, but will it hit the target -- the deaf,
dumb, blind brahamanical establishment of India whose conscience has
so hardened that men like Jagdish Tytler and Sajjan Kumar can be Lok
Sabha candidates of a political party seriously planning to rule?
Congress’
tickets to these men was a slap on the face of every man and woman
with a conscience, but the world only noticed the shoe Jarnail Singh
threw.
 What does one
say when a community keeps fighting for justice for twenty-five
years after more than 3,000 members are killed in genocidal
targetted brutal barbaric attacks on the roads of national capital
of India, most being burnt to death using cycle tyres lit aflame?
What does one say when inquiry commissions set up by the government
of India
keep finding the same men guilty over and over again but they keep
dodging justice? And what does one say when the party that sheltered
them all these years makes them once again candidates for the
country’s Parliament?
That these
people are “Jutti De Yaar”?
They deserve
much worse than a shoe.
Well, they got
it then. Jarnail Singh will be forgiven thousands of times over by
every right thinking person who may have a momentary qualm about a
journalist breaching protocol, not using his pen but rather hurling
a shoe to make an extra-ordinary statement about extra-ordinarily
apathetic Indian nation state.
Oh yes, some of
the people find it a very bad thing to do.
To those who
find any ugliness in Jarnail Singh’s action, our submission is
humble: the hordes that Jagdish Tytler and Sajjan Kumar led when
they tracked, chased, beat, maim, kill, burn hundreds of Sikhs alive
in a pace of three days in Delhi were not very disciplined, and did
not come like good guests, asking for a cup of tea in the Sikh
community’s drawing room, and permission to rape the daughters and
kill the young ones. The problem with the Indian nation state, its
media included, is that it finds the acts of Tytler and Jarnail
Singh equally reprehensible.
Perhaps it is
possible for those to do so whose sister or mother has not been
raped, whose son or brother has not been made to run for his dear
life and then burnt alive as the family members watched. Perhaps it
is possible for those to do so who never considered the victims as
their sisters or mothers, their sons or brothers.
It is surprising
to see who all deserve a shoe each, thrown slightly more forcefully
than Jarnail Singh did.
The inhumanity
of the Sajjan Kumars and the Jagdish Tytlers has been matched by
every one of those who could sit back and wallow in India’s growth
rates, thought countries become great by carrying out nuclear tests
or striking nuclear deals and that deep wounds of a community can be
assuaged by making a Sikh Prime Minister apologize to the Sikhs.
 God, how many
shoes we need? Poor Jarnail Singh threw one. He will be at a loss in
which direction to hurl the other. The shoe missed Chidambaram but
it has hit Congress hard, some say it has ended up hitting Tytler
who is now trying to save his nomination once again, and it has hit
the rabidly nationalist Indian media that forgets about the genocide
of the Sikhs till it is that time of the year again when Sikhs ran
on Delhi’s roads, sans turbans, some desperately borrowing scissors
from neighbours to cut their hair.
This shoe was
meant for many many more than just P Chidambaram who got it within
hours after expressing happiness that the CBI has exonerated “my
colleagues”.
Jarnail Singh is
a senior journalist, not known for any aggressive streak, a father
of two, the happily married man who touched his mother’s feet every
day before going to office. He was not even rabidly anti-Congress,
and was quick to underline that his method may have been wrong but
the issue was not.
The issue,
Jarnail Singh, was most certainly not only “not wrong” but rather
completely, absolutely the most crying one to be taken up. Jarnail
Singh was swiftly taken away from the press conference on Tuesday,
he could only quickly say a few words but even then he was able to
make his position crystal clear. Here was a man who was saying much
more to jostling reporters than people say in expert treatises on
justice.
TV channels do
not give much time to shoe throwers. So sometimes they cannot
explain their position in much detail. So, please be very clear
about what it was that Jarnail Singh threw a shoe at.
The problem with
injustice is that it does not exist in a vacuum. Injustice happens
in a society, not in isolation. Its aftermath is a real measure of a
society. Does it pull together its act to mitigate injustice, or
does it increase its capacity to see, absorb and be at peace with
even more of it?
Jarnail Singh’s
shoe was aimed at every one of those who went on Indian TV channels
within minutes of the incident to say that “Sikh community mein
barra ros hai, bahut anghish hai”. “It is an eye opener for
Congress about how frustrated the Sikh community is at lack of
justice,” the BJP spokesperson was saying. The best and the
brilliant of
India’s journos
and TV anchors took due note of “Sikhs’ anger.”
Thank you very
much. Just make a note. That shoe was meant for you too. Each one of
you.
Why is this
anguish limited to the Sikh community? Is it only the responsibility
of a bunch of poor widows eking out a living at the edge of survival
subsistence to sit down cross legged on the roads and beat their
chests to ensure that justice is served in
India?
“Punjabi bhaichara bahut gusse mein hai,” Balbir Punj was saying
on NDTV. Thank you, Balbir. You just threw a shoe at Madrasi
bhaichara, Gujarati bhaichara, Telugu bhaichara, Oriyya bhaichara....
Throw one at yourself also. Pity you never had a teacher who taught
you how to crack a tight slap on your face.
That shoe was
meant for every Narendra Modi, every Maya Kodnani, every Babu
Bajrangi. That shoe was meant for those who forget what the BJP-RSS
Hindutva juggernaut is doing to hundreds of thousands of Muslims.
That shoe is meant for those who make five year olds sing songs
about demolishing mosques in thousands of RSS shakhas every morning.
That shoe was meant for those who put poison in school text books.
That shoe was
meant for those who brought tanks into the
Golden Temple.
Just as it was meant for those who led hordes of hate inspired mobs
to demolish the Babri mosque. That shoe was meant for those strike
fraternal alliances with agents of hate.
That shoe was
hurled at the face of injustice.
That shoe was
hurled at those whose conscience needs a 26/11 to be awakened
because their slumber cannot be disturbed by suicides of farmers
running into six figures. That shoe was hurled at those who can
spare page after page of glossy news print to talk about malls and
starlets when it can be used to talk about what happened to those
who burnt Sikhs to death or speared Muslims in the streets of Naroda
Pataya.
That shoe was
meant for those who only see Operation Bluestar and the genocide of
the Sikhs but forget genocide of the Muslims or the atrocities on
Christians or the unacceptable condition of Dalits.
Jarnail Singh
had just one pair of shoes. He threw one, he is holding on to the
other. Close your eyes and visualize Jarnail Singh, white turbaned,
olive green shirt, flowing beard, not great with aiming shoes,
having practised only once, and with another shoe in hand, and so
many who deserve to be hit hard. Look within yourself. Are you also
the one who he may aim at? Be careful. He has had some practice, and
he may hit harder this time.
After 9/11, we
were all Americans. After this, we are all Jarnail Singhs. Watch
that shoe coming in your direction. Keep ducking,
India. That
bunch of widows is still out there. And they wear much less
respectable chappals these days!
8 April 2009
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