Violence is not an option

One police constable (47-year-old Subhash Chand) who was said to be injured during the protests against the Delhi gang rape case died because of injuries he sustained during police action against these protests. This is very sad news, as sad as the rape case itself. One police officer who was performing his duty died at the hands of a mob that was trying to protest against the inability of their government to protect their citizens. Now whose fault it is? There are already photos on social media, and on the internet that show protesters, especially women protesters getting brutally attacked by police. Now, people might think posting these photos is an attempt to justify the attack of protesters on police but I don't think the matter is so straightforward here. The blame game in this case has already started. Police arrested a few youths in this case and Arvind Kejriwal came out to defend these youths saying that there is no proof against them. I hope that both these tragic events don't get politicized, and no one should use these events for political gain because the issue of the safety of the citizens of any city or country should be above any politics or political party. The constable is dead and something must have caused his death. They should find the real reason for his death, then find the criminals who committed this act and punish them. 

During many protests in India, the crowd tends to get violent because they can not control their anger, or get too emotional about the issue. This is a very common case in India. It's very easy to organize protests but very difficult to control the crowd. The most infamous incident like this happened in 1922 (pre-independent India) during the non-cooperation movement that Mahatma Gandhi started. The angry mob burned a police station in Chauri Chaura (a town in UP) after police firing. Records say that 48 people died (26 in police firing and 22 because of the burning of the police station, police firing happened first). Gandhi wanted this movement to be strictly non-violent so because of this incident he called this movement off. He received a lot of criticism for taking this step as many leaders felt that the non-cooperation movement was working very well and the violence was not started by protesters. Such incidents happen regularly, not always resulting in deaths but many times resulting in public property damages, disturbance in public life, and inconvenience to the general public. It's very strange that this all happens in a country like India achieved her freedom via a non-violent freedom struggle movement. 

So the question we need to ask here is, do these violent protests work? Do they produce the desired result? What good do they do for our country? Do they help in creating awareness about the issue or just help in spreading hatred and anger? The answer to all these questions is a big 'NO.' Violence only results in more violence nothing else, it spreads hatred and anger, and it spreads fear not peace. Our own freedom struggle movement has demonstrated the power of non-violent protests to us, so why we don't use the same method? How come we are losing faith in the same method that we used successfully to win our freedom from foreign regimes? People definitely have the right to express their anger against their government, and they have full right to protest and register their demands, but they absolutely don't have any right to disrupt public life which creates unnecessary inconvenience to many people, damage public property, or attack police for no reason. Violence is not an option in any democratic country. I hope that our government, the people who are protesting as well as the police department all understand this and act accordingly. 

Thanks for reading and please share your views about this topic.

(Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing)

References:
1. http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/constable-injured-in-india-gate-protest-dies-in-hospital/article4237638.ece
2.  http://www.thehindu.com/news/national/policeman-death-no-evidence-against-arrested-youth-says-kejriwal/article4238310.ece
3. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chauri_Chaura