Parrikar's threat to Aamir Khan exposes a Sangh Parivar blinded by power
The Sangh Parivar has perfected the art of double talk. Depending on its reading of the political situation it blows hot and cold.
It is clever too in appropriating occasions. Like Prime Minister Narendra Modi had June 21 accepted as the International Yoga Day.
At that time, no one realised that this day was the first RSS sarchangchalak Keshav B Hedgewar's death anniversary. Of course other political parties have also celebrated the birth or death anniversaries of their leaders, but this kind of subterfuge is a Sangh speciality.
The Sangh is quick to grab an opportunity to attack or to change tack. For example, it did not like the plain-speaking by Aamir Khan at the Ramnath Goenka Awards in November last year, where he said, "... There is a sense of fear more than there was earlier. I do feel there is a sense of insecurity... Kiran (wife)... for the first time, she said, should we move out of India? That's a disastrous and big statement for Kiran to make to me. She fears for her child".
Defence minister Manohar Parrikar has gone on the offensive on Aamir's feeling of insecurity shared by many, not only, Muslims.
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| Parrikar has displayed his colours as a Muslim-baiter. |
Parrikar, referring to Aamir's speech, in a ceremony in Pune said, "I am only trying to point out... if anyone speaks like this, he has to be taught a lesson of his life".
He then went on to explain one major "lesson" taught to the actor and the e-commerce giant Snapdeal for which Khan was the brand ambassador.
"Some of our people are very smart... They were telling people you order and return it... The company should learn a lesson; they had to pull (out) his advertisement".
Ironically, at this time there is a raging controversy since July 8, after Hizbul Mujahideen commander Burhan Wani was killed in an encounter in Kashmir.
The major weapon used in curbing the mass protests that followed was the pellet gun, which was officially considered a "non-lethal" weapon.
However, many protesters had pellet shots in the face, and a large number of them were partially or wholly blinded. The CRPF DG Durga Prasad frankly pointed out that pellet guns were "lethal" but "least lethal" of the crowd control weapons.
Several experts and retired military personnel have referred to the then prime minister Manmohan Singh's 2011 meeting with DGPs in which he promised to acquire non-lethal weapons and body armour for the security forces.
He did not and nor has Parrikar.
Parrikar has instead resorted to machismo. He stated, "I do not want to train the Army to use the lathi."
So what weapon will it use, since modern non-lethal weapons and protective armour have not been procured even in more than two years that the current government has been in office?
Parrikar has displayed his colours as a Muslim-baiter. He knows very well that in numerous towns and cities, it is very difficult for Muslims and Christians to buy or rent suitable accommodation.
This is part of the difficulties Aamir was alluding to. Parrikar probably doesn't know that the late Ramnath Goenka, the person who launched The Indian Express, was a staunch secularist, and would have supported Aamir. As Lord Acton had warned, "All power corrupts, but absolute power corrupts absolutely."