Where Do We Go From Here!

By Shah Alam Khan

18 February, 2016
Countercurrents.org

A Muslim man is bludgeoned to death in his home by a mob for allegedly possessing beef meat. Where do we go from here?

A dalit student is forced to commit suicide. The lawmakers of the nation question his caste; his intent and wish lost in the din! Where do we go from here?

A student leader is arrested on charges of sedition without a formal enquiry. His speech sounds as patriotic as the war song of a moving army! Where do we go from here?

A murderous mob of lawyers (and a lawmaker!) pins down an innocent, à la medieval justice! The rabid lawmaker desires to have been in possession of a gun for venting out his love for the motherland! Where do we go from here?

A Police Chief sounds so in tune with the party in power! It is spine chilling what this nexus can achieve! Where do we go from here?

A news anchor, the so-called harbinger of facts, thumps his chest so loud that the sound of truth gets drowned in the insanity of his primetime! He stands naked in inciting violence. Where do we go from here?

Not long ago we made a tryst with destiny; today the shards of that broken dream wound the soul of our nation. Where can we run away from our dreams, how so ever broken they may be?

May be tomorrow we learn that the shame of the so called anti-nationalist rant made Kanhaiya Kumar commit suicide within the iron confines of the Tihar jail. Would we then ask, where we go from there? May be not. We would have arrived, exactly were we are meant to be- in a dark hollow abyss of obscurantism and fascism.

Shah Alam Khan, AIIMS, New Delhi