Drop a fur it comes down, drop an apple it falls and then there’s an air plane crashing. It all comes down. The brutal most truth is you can defy gravity by pushing against it just if you maintain fuel and respect aerodynamics. There is no way to escape gravity as long as you are in its atmosphere.
As disconnected as the above narration may seem from the title of the write-piece, you will know it is perfectly in sync with it, as you read on. Gravity is the law, the eternal, primordial and ever-lasting timeless truth. Inequality in the social/societal sphere is the same as gravity for earth. The world is an example of inequality and story of its unequal populace, strewn across the timeline of history. Like gravity never goes out of work, inequality never disappears. In different societies, it manifests in different faces and names.
A group of intellectuals sipping coffee in a graceful manner are not the same as a bunch of wage labourers drinking tea while making a drinking noise. The intellectual class here could be highly educated, well bred, fatly paid. The wage labourer could be the opposite. And in all probabilities, the coffee sipping bunch will interact with the tea drinking tribe just to the necessary extent. They could even share a joke or smile at each other. But, beneath all this eye wash of good behaviour and humane exchanges lie the enormous elephant in the room – the difference between them and us. No matter what, the thought of it looms and lingers in both the minds.
We are talking about the most obvious, the most generic, the fundamental nature of the human thought-behaviour-action pattern. The basic human tendency to mingle, interact, befriend or socialize with people they strike a chord with. The small homogeneous group of liking or interacting with each other could be a result of religion, cult, same schooling, sharing same music taste, being born to the same tribe, travelling by the same class of travel or any damn thing which creates connections between few. But instantly the same reason could disconnect the others. This reinstates the fact that the communist-socialist-leftist- myth of absolute equality is indeed a myth. Then where is the debate? If the world is a pot of inequality – from race, class, intellectual level, educational qualification, size of car or even colour of skin, what is all this debate and tension about? Well, it’s about profitability of the debate for a select few.
Welcome to the business of caste in Indian Polity.
Tonnes have been written about caste and how it came up and what it did to the society. We really need not go into the basics of it anymore. There is a whole JNU dedicated to it, already. So, whose profitability are we talking about by caste – politics? Politics revolves around narratives, narratives that are sensitive, which can spread fear, which can enrage and infuriate. And people who can manufacture such narratives can take the lead.
But manufacturing a narrative is only the beginning, what’s most important is to steer and control the narrative as per need. Because, narratives can be hijacked and serve your rivals’ purpose.
Now we are inching close to the real debate.
The Supreme court of India ruled that, the SC/ST Act (prevention of atrocities Act, 1989) can no more be used as a tool of legal terror. As widespread misuse of the law has been reported over two decades. According to this law a public servant can be booked without investigation on the complaint of a person from the SC/ST category. The law was meant to protect the backward people from any atrocity but never was the intent of the law to harass the people. As the fundamental books of justice and jurisprudence advocate, may ten guilty go unpunished but never let one innocent be penalised. But, as is evident this act stands right opposite to the most fundamental spirit of delivering justice.
Thus, the supreme court comprising a bench of Justice A.K. Goel and Justice U.U. Lalit ruled, “interpretation of the Atrocities Act should promote constitutional values of fraternity and integration of society. This may require a check on the false implication of innocent citizens on caste lines.” Thus, providing a relief to thousands of Public servants who were just a false complaint away from being hand cuffed.
Here comes the twist, if the apex court is endeavouring to uphold the sanity of the institution and the validity of the constitution, who has a problem and why? Right in the beginning, it was mentioned the brutal nature of reality, that of the unequal nature of universe is hard to understand and digest by pseudo-intellectuals. They constantly make efforts to break away from this, making every possible vandalism, whether fanning the fire through Bhim Army or trying an impeachment of the Chief Justice of The Supreme Court of India.
This is about sentiment exploitation of the masses who don’t even understand the whole story of where is the politics leading in this whole game of caste? Whether, the court retracts from its ruling or the government tries its legislative option, in the meanwhile to put up a show of Pro – Dalit lament is a non-negotiable act in the penultimate year of Elections. This is how you control the narrative in your favour posing as emancipators of Dalits. The whole drama of Dalit upliftment sloganeering, pro – Dalit articles etc. are just an extended arm of the larger narrative of clinging on to the vote bank which is as large as 30-35 crores. Now that’s a number! So many European countries put together! After all, who would let go such an opportunity of leveraging a lucrative chance of shedding some Dalit- tears.
A nation is created at the cost of thousands of lives, a nation is protected by the blood of martyrs and the same nation is held hostage by divisive agencies masquerading as leaders of change. Welcome to the caste theatre! The making and the breaking of a nation.
