by Soter D'souza
The unprecedented rise in lynchings in some States has evoked widespread
reactions from a cross-section of Indian society. The Supreme Court has
come down heavily on the government by pointing out that “Mobocracy can’t
be allowed in a democracy” and even issued directions for enacting an
anti-lynching law. But predictably the debate on these lynchings will be
stuck in the usual denial, blame and farcical opinions from politicians and
intellectuals who beat around the bush. The saffron brigade is desperate to
play down the issue by claiming that lynchings are like any other law and
order problem. For the last seventy years since independence it has been
the default stance of the hate ‘parivar’ to rubbish any communal motive
attributed to various riots.
The Union Home Minister too has joined in rationalising the insignificance
of the present lynchings by positioning the 1984 anti-Sikh riots as the
biggest lynching episode in the history of independent India. Another Union
Minister claims these lynchings to be a sign of the Prime Minister’s
growing popularity, while another MP argues that the lynchings are a result
of the growth in Muslim population. The very compulsion of the right wing
forces to deny, justify and rationalise these lynchings coupled with their
reluctance to outrightly condemn lynchings is enough reason to believe that
these crimes are far from being the outcome of spontaneous mob reactions
triggered by social media. These lynchings appear to be planned and
executed by those who have marketed this hatred for minorities over several
decades. If not, then how is it that the Hindu traders who top in beef
export from India and those Hindus who eat beef continue to face no threat
of lynching?
Circulation of rumours and provocation by hurting religious sentiments
leading to communal clashes and killings is nothing new in independent
India. The only difference is that ‘Digital India’ has added sophistication
and lethality in the operations of the ‘Rumour Spreading Society’, as these
fanatic groups are popularly known. There is now a speed and efficiency in
their craft of rumour mongering which is no more by mere word of mouth but
laced with provocative fake visuals intended to plant misinformation and
biases and sow distrust, anger and fear against certain communities all by
the press of a key. Blaming digital technology for the lynchings is just to
distract public attention from the real game. The rumour of yesterday is
the ‘Fake News’ of today to lend a degree of deception quite similar to the
play with terms like ‘Hindu’ and ‘Hindutva’. With partition blamed on the
Muslims, a false perception created that communal riots are the legacy of
British and Congress rule and a myth that no communal riots occur when the
BJP is in government, it becomes necessary that the communal riots of the
past get refashioned as ‘lynching’ and ‘gau raksha’ to deceive and confuse
society and statistics.
The lynchings need to be understood in the context of the psychopathology
of hate which cannot be tackled by TV debates which pitch liberals versus
the religiously orthodox and bigots and by enacting new laws. It requires
the intervention by psychologists and psychiatrists to detoxify those who
are mentally intoxicated with hate. Laws by themselves can do little to
prevent crimes without the simultaneous interventions from mental health
experts. We see how the stringent anti-rape law has failed to deter
rapists. Since lynching is about human behaviour, just that one-off fake
news in the social media cannot always trigger such spontaneous mob
violence. The background as to why people think and manage their feelings
in the way they do is of utmost importance to comprehend such lunacy.
These barbaric episodes need to be understood in the context of a history
and pattern if effective responses are to emerge. The culture of mobs
delivering justice and death on the streets cannot be viewed independently
from a mob in black robes almost lynching a JNU student activist or an
accused rapist within the court precincts, or even the attack on Swami
Agnivesh on the street. So, propaganda over a significant time period about
religious or cultural superiority when coupled with prejudices and
stereotyping of certain communities as being a threat to the cow, nation
and the Hindu culture contributes to creating an explosive cognitive
cocktail generating negative feelings in members of a community. It is in
such a mentally corrupted and emotionally bankrupt ecosystem that one fake
message or provocation is enough to arouse barbaric behaviours. Lynchings
are only the end result of the fanatical brainwash.
It would be unfair to limit the blame for lynchings entirely on social
media and the public. The ideological preferences and communal prejudices
prevalent within the ranks of the police force and politicians have as much
a role to play. This is exactly why those convicted of lynching get
garlanded by MPs and MLAs
