“We are committed to turning out the non-Hindu sinners from Delhi.”
– A VHP leader addressing a gathering in Delhi.
“..Consume less food, purchase a cheaper mobile phone, anything, only promise to have five tridents in a home”.
– Another VHP leader addressing a meeting in Delhi.
Provocative speeches and distribution of what is being peddled as ‘legally permissible weapons’ , very much in the heart of the national capital ; detailed plans to hold similar events all over the city, on the eve of elections – all this has not stirred the deep slumber in which the law and order machinery found itself in.
Thanks to the inaction, now the campaign to arm a section of radical Hindus has reportedly spread to the womenfolk as well. Plans are afoot to distribute 20,000 daggers to women from the majority community under what is being billed as ‘Shastra Deeksha Samaroh’. In fact, media was agog with footage of daggers being distributed to Hindu women in the second week of January itself.
No doubt, it would be height of innocence to presume that the silence of the officers/ personnel entrusted with maintaining law and order in the city – which is directly under the purview of the Ministry of Home – is inadvertent.
These events are rather difficult to believe in a city still recovering from the ‘riots’ five year ago which saw deaths of innocents from both the communities and damage to their properties, with role of a section of the police itself coming under the scanner.
It is not difficult to imagine the serious impact such radical mobilisation of the majority community can have – with at least 50,000 Hindu men, the actual numbers could be far more, holding fresh tridents/trishuls and 20,000 women possessing daggers – on the social fabric of the city. With Republic Day celebrations approaching followed by elections to the Assembly, with three major players in the wings, it is anybody’s guess that mischievous elements can engage in their dirty tricks, or even a single event/ non-event can bring the peace and harmony in the national capital under cloud.
What needs to borne in mind is that distribution of what are being portrayed as ‘legally permissible weapons’ (the term itself is an oxymoron) – focusing on the majority community – under religious garb have tremendous political overtones and such programmes held in the national capital are no exception.
It remains to be seen how such ‘weapons distribution’ does not come under censure of the Arms Act, 1959. Section 2(1) (c) of the Act defines “arms” as:
Articles of any description designed or adapted as weapons for offences, or defence, and includes firearms, sharp edged and other deadly weapons, and parts of and machinery for manufacturing arms, but does not include articles designed solely for domestic or agricultural uses such as a lathi, or an ordinary walking stick and weapons incapable of being used otherwise than as toys or of being converted into serviceable weapons.
This story was originally published in newsclick.in. Read the full story here.
