Fighting the Menace of Left/Liberal Fascists

I have always argued that the so called Left-Liberals in India are the Fascists of the highest order and the worst communally minded persons. The latest example is the publisher Bloomsbury India coming under their pressure and withdrawing from publishing a book titled Delhi Riots 2020: The Untold Story by authors Monica Arora, Sonali Chitalkar and Prerna Malhotra. The book was already printed and supposed to hit the markets in September. But the publisher succumbed to the pressure of these fascist Left-liberals just because the authors, in what was a publicity function of the book, had invited BJP leader Kapil Mishra as a guest. Mishra is a citizen of the country. He has not been convicted of any crime. He has got the same rights as these fascists to express his views. So why should the book be withdrawn?

I believe Mishra’s presence on the function was a pretext; the real agenda of these Left-Liberal fascists was to stop the publication of the book which did not share their narratives that the riots were the handiwork of the BJP and its “Sangh Parivar”.

Banning of the books under the pressure of the communal fascists in India is not exactly a new thing, however. On earlier occasions, they pressurised the government of the day to ban books or films that they did not like. And the government of the day invariably shared their thoughts that the Hindus are behind every riots, that Muslims and other minorities are always right and nothing must be done or be approved that hurts their sentiments, and that any talk of nationalism or national unity and integrity is poison as that amounts to injustice to not only minorities but also dalits and backwards castes.

This was the way (through the government of the day) books of the Bangladeshi novelist Taslima Nasreen, British-Indian author Salman Rushdie ( Satanic Verses) and author-journalist Arun Shourie ( Worshipping False Gods) were banned. The government decided even to stop BBC from filming Rushdie’s epic, Midnight's Children, because somebody in power feared that the sentiments of some community might be hurt. Similarly, worried over the backlash of the Christians, who are extremely important in the politics of Kerala and North-eastern States, the government banned the screening of the religious thriller “The Da Vinci Code”, a highly successful film otherwise in the United States and Europe.

One also remembers the mob-violence in Maharashtra few years ago against the prominent regional newspaper Lokmat. Spearheaded by the then Congress legislator Shaikh Rashid, Muslim protestors attacked multiple offices of the paper, just because the paper had carried a cartoon showing various currency symbols pouring into a piggy bank whose snout carried an image from a jihadist group's flag- a white seal with black Arabic lettering that read "Muhammad is the messenger of God". Though the paper had apologised for the "offence", Rashid was not satisfied.

Ironically, these left, liberal and secular fascists have been at the forefront since 2014 against the Modi government for its various acts of commission and omission on the issue of what they say "intolerance". But how "tolerant" are these people themselves of things they do not want to see and hear? And how "consistent" are they on the very trends they proclaim to be dangerous or suicidal to a pluralistic and democratic India? One may remember here that not long ago, six opposition parties, including the Congress, had moved a notice alleging breach of privilege and contempt of Rajya Sabha against the then Lok Sabha Member Baijayant Jay Panda for his write up in the Times of India edit page. Panda had argued that there must be a rethink, as it is happening in Britain and Italy, on the virtual veto power of the Rajya Sabha to block a popular mandate as reflected in the Lok Sabha. He had written that the Rajya Sabha was only playing the role of "checking", not "balancing". He had also argued how the Rajya Sabha, supposed to represent the interests of states as a whole, had been reduced to be a place of "party nominees", because of its indirect elections.

Similarly, one remembers how five years ago members of this fascist gang in our media and academia had withdrawn themselves from the Bangalore Literary Festival, objecting to the actions of its principal organiser, historian and writer Vikram Sampath. For them, Sampath had committed two sins. One, he had written an article saying why he would not return his own Sahitya Akademi award (this was perceived to be against the award-wapsi brigade). Two, he had signed an online petition with a group of historians and archaeologists, urging the government to consider alternative historical narratives. This resulted in Sampath to withdraw himself as the organiser to save the festival. Likewise, Salman Rushdie was not allowed to speak in a literary festival in Jaipur by these secularist-Islamist goons.

It seems that their success in literary festivals in Bengaluru and Jaipur in suppressing the alternate viewpoints have now emboldened these fascists to carry on their agenda without the government-support. In my considered view, this is the essential difference between banning thoughts in the past ( through the government) and now ( without the involvement of the government). Now they attack all those directly who support alternate viewpoints to theirs. They now go directly to the organisers of the festivals or functions, publishers, editors and heads of the educational/social institutes to deny those who do not share their worldview platforms and jobs.

And invariably, they succeed because , and I have argued this always, India's perception-makers are overwhelmingly dominated by academicians, artists, journalists and contributors who are moulded in what is said to be the Nehruvian framework or establishment or ecosystem – "Left/Liberal/Secular". This ecosystem literally hates anybody who has an alternate worldview. As a friend of mine adds, they become fiercely violent of late if you challenge their narratives. They are of firm belief that their and only their idea is the "idea of India".

I will also like to quote another friend of mine in the Facebook here: “The Left Liberals are the biggest double -speak hypocrites in India. They talk of ‘Bhagwa Aatankwad’ (which is difficult to locate) but remain tongue-tied to Islamic terror which is seen all over the country or even globally day in and day out. Islamist fanatics’ killings are law and order problem but Hindus retaliating or countering that is Communal....we saw this in recent Delhi riots. Bangalore incidents where a religious community engaged in organised violence in open, were a minor issue for them. None spoke on that.....none spoke when a Professor's both hands were chopped off in day light....all lips were closed. They pick only those cases where a Muslim or a Dalit is a victim. They will be found mocking Indian Armed Forces, supporting Kashmiri radicals and their separatist movement. They are found taking caste issues where caste feelings can be instigated so that the nation gets divided more and more and feeling of nationalism gets weakened. A divided and weak India suits their political agenda.”

Thanks to the advent of the social media, these fascists have become more powerful, even though they are not getting the same level of the governmental support as in the past. Contrary to whatever they may say, they are now totally dominating the social media such as Facebook, WhatsApp and Twitter because the senior managers or administrators of these platforms happen to be from the same ecosystem as theirs. For instance, in India, of the four top officials of the Facebook, three happen to be those who had worked either under the UPA government or for the Congress party (one of them had contested elections on a Congress ticket) and one is related to Trinamul Congress, the ruling party in West Bengal. No wonder why the Left-Liberal fascists are now openly demanding that these very officials must control and regulate openly as well as legally the contents that they differ with. In other words, a time will come when voices like mine and yours will not be allowed such social media platforms.

What then is the solution? There is no alternative to systematically fighting against these forces by weakening their monopoly in the country's intellectual space through creation of alternate outlets and exposure of their real character. We should have more and more platforms of our own to show their true character and thoughts. More and more people should beware of them and of what they say and do. They must be made irrelevant if India is to match towards prosperity and remain truly democratic and secular. It will be a prolonged battle, though.