[Reader-list] Seditious articles on Kashmir criticised

[Shuddhabrata Sengupta]

Aditya, Radhikarajen

While I do not endorse anyone telling anyone, be they Aarti or you,  
Aditya, to 'shut up' on the list, (and your 'take it offline' comment  
is only a variation on the 'shut up' theme), I find it indeed  
unfortunate that the list is once again being used to spread a great  
deal of malicious comment and insinuation, based on an assessment of  
the religious identity of the people who live in a neighbourhood.

I found Radhikarajen's comments (which Aarti responded to with her  
'Enough' post) on the inhabitants of Jamia Nagar deeply offensive.

I have studied at Jamia Millia Islamia university, and I have many  
friends who live in Jamia Nagar, and Radhikarajen's broad abusive  
sweep ('car thieves', 'terrorists', 'goons', 'dirty underbelly',  
'brothel keepers') despite his concluding token caveat about some of  
what he calls 'good muslims' is personally insulting to me (though I  
do not live in Jamia Nagar) and to several of my friends who happen  
to live there.

I want to know which neighbourhood in Delhi does not contain anti- 
social elements. Which neighbourhood is free of bigots, wife beaters,  
begetters of petty violence, arms dealers, con men, informers and  
murderers? I grew up during the Anti-Sikh riots of 1984, and I saw  
people in every neighbourhood in Delhi turn on their neighbours,  
killing around 6000 people in less than three days. Not a single area  
in Delhi was unscathed by that terrible violence. And in some ways,  
this city is still coping with what happened during those days. Which  
community, which neighbourhood, does not have in its midst people who  
are prone to a pathological desire to see pain inflicted upon others?  
Would we then be justified in saying that Delhi and its mainly Hindu  
inhabitants, is a city full of blood-thirsty people, mainly arsonists  
and rioters, prone to throwing burning tyres on men just because they  
happen to wear turbans and go unshorn? I don't think so, and I would  
argue against anyone who tried to say as much.

I can see why anyone on the list would be angered and provoked enough  
to say 'enough', when such things are said about particular  
communities and neighbourhoods, though I would not agree with their  
expressing it by telling anyone to 'Shut Up', as Aarti has done.

I do hope you remember that when Shivam VIj made an inappropriate  
posting tagged 'Hindu Terrorists' on this list, not very long ago, he  
was promptly admonished by several people, including me. Now that the  
shoe is on the other foot, I am surprised to see you acting 'holier  
than thou' in this fashion when someone says that they have had  
enough of what is, frankly, unmitigated prejudice.

There is no reason why, just as Shivam Vij thought it fit to render a  
graceful apology, Radhikarajen, and anyone else at all, who marks  
people, no matter of which community, or which neighbourhood, in  
Delhi, or elsewhere, with blanket negative qualifiers, should not do  
the same.That apology is still awaited.

Shuddha