[Reader-list] Fwd: The ' Left' that takes Pride in Bullying

[Venugopalan K M]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: <kmvenuannur at gmail.com>
Date: Mon, Jan 11, 2010 at 9:25 AM
Subject: The &#039;Left&#039; that takes Pride in Bullying
To: kmvenuannur at gmail.com


*Payyanur:* A small town in the northern Kannur district of Kerala is in
focus again, for its  characteristic  ways  of  bullying in the name of
defending 'Left'. On 10-01-2010 evening ,a literary seminar and book release
were organized by Decemder Books .The event had  participation of many
important literary figures of Kerala and was attended by an enlightened
audience together with activists of the Purogamana Kala Sahitya
Sangham(Forum for  Progessive Art and Lierature). Pu.Ka .Sa is  an  all
Kerala Organization considered to be under the control of the state unit of
the CPI(M).

Sacaria, the well known  social critic and writer, while releasing a book by
Madhu Nair referred to certain  deplorable features of the society; where  a
man and a woman  when found in circumstances of having extra marital sex or
even suspected of such thing, would be hounded by the moral brigade, for
example. Obviously , Sacaria was alluding to an 'anaasasyam'  case recently
clamped on  Rajmohan Unnithan at Manjeri, Malalappuram district in which a
local mob led by  DYFI and PDP activists surrounded a house and got the
police to arrest Rajmohan (a Congress leader) under sections related to a
criminal legislation which is actually meant to prevent trafficking on
women. In that incident, Rajmohan Unnithan was found in the company of a
woman who was not his wife but who had been known as Seva Dal leader and a
friend of Unnithan.

According to today's news paper  reports, as Sacaria spoke about the
culture of bullying and growing intolerance , a small gang from the audience
heckled Sacaria  and threw filthy abuses at him. Later, while he was about
to leave the town, this  group of DYFI men accosted him and keys of the car
were forcibly snatched from the driver. According to the reports,the gang of
about half a dozen men  included  son of a former Member of Parliament from
Kasargode constituency of which Payyanur assembly constituency ia a partt.
The gang shouted at Sacaria that he would not be allowed to get away in good
shape, with this kind of speeches made(against the movement and party!) at
Payyanur. They threatened to smash his head and teeth.

Sacaria reportedly replied  that he would then be happy to have a taste of
the  DYFI culture of Payyanur. Irritated by this, the gang pushed him by the
neck and manhandled him. They persisted on shouting, giving threats  and
continued to pour abuses on Sacaria. The organizers of the event were CPM
sympathizers too and they finally succeeded in dissuading the small mob.
Sensible intervention by literatuers like C V Balakrishnan also helped to
diffuse the tension.

Along with this incident, someone within or outside Payyanur may wish to
recall many an expression of misguided, authoritarian 'Leftism' in the past.
Beneath the thin, superficial layer of 'Left', one might  see the unabashed
face of casteism and misogyny as displayed in the case of burning an
autorikshaw owned and driven by a dalit woman in Dec 2005.

In another incident, a benign SMS message which had been already  in
circulation and thus been sportively  forwarded by a young teacher in a
parallel college to his female student some time in 2006, led to his
expulsion from job allegedly at the behest of SFI /DYFI enthusiasts,  and
finally to his committing suicide.

Sending this kind of 'controversial' SMS to a girl student by a male teacher
was judged as giving disrepute to both  the educational institution and the
girl (who will marry her then?).Jagadeesh, the teacher had been badly
roughed up in public and in broad day light by the die-hard 'Leftists'. But
again, the poor teacher also had a back history of 'antagonizing' the Party
just by keeping aloof from it, in spite of his residing in a Parrish largely
under the diktat of the Party. Speakers in a meeting organized by the
colleagues of Jagadeesh and a few human rights activists in the small town
of Payyanur also had been threatened by a gang of 'Lleftists' in ways
similar as in the Sacaria episode.

Lot of reported and unreported incidents like this do occur, but the party
leadership unfailingly find reason to justify such acts of vandalism. When
even bigwigs of the literary world, like Sacaria are not spared of such
attacks, comparatively much less luminous human rights fighters of Payyanur
can definitely be proud of bearing the brunt of such  attacks on many
occasions in the past.

But pitiable indeed, is the plight of those organizing progressive events
under the auspices of organizations like Pu.Ka. Sa (Forum for Progressive
Art and Literature), who have to be content being people with subordinate
status,  as meek witnesses of  these acts of vandalism and who are yet
unable to speak out, just for fear of ostracizing and harassment by the big
people who really  manage their shows.

Payyanur and its people are always taken for granted by the CPI(M). Each
election is a cake walk for the 'Left'. The opposition parties, on the other
hand, are neither too ambitious to challenge the 'Leftists' on the electoral
arena nor do they feel any such need . This must be because they are content
with many things they already share with the 'Left' or rather the ‘Left’
recently shares with them. For example, all those  development activities,
the feudal moral and cultural fabric woven with a unique mix of caste and
gender, and so on.

End result : Everybody feels more or less  happy here in Payyanur, with the
'Left' taking care of the cultural /moral concerns of all, though a
few(outcastes?) will continue to make noises here and there. Again, thank
them for not showing any sympathy to the RSS unlike few in other parts of
Kannur district, who have indeed crossed the floor thanks to their
disillusion with the Left !


www.mynews.in



-- 



You cannot build anything on the foundations of caste. You cannot build up a
nation, you cannot build up a morality. Anything that you will build on the
foundations of caste will crack and will never be a whole.
-AMBEDKAR



http://venukm.blogspot.com

http://www.shelfari.com/kmvenuannur

http://kmvenuannur.livejournal.com



-- 



You cannot build anything on the foundations of caste. You cannot build up a
nation, you cannot build up a morality. Anything that you will build on the
foundations of caste will crack and will never be a whole.
-AMBEDKAR



http://venukm.blogspot.com

http://www.shelfari.com/kmvenuannur

http://kmvenuannur.livejournal.com