Use of abusive and divisive speeches in Indian politics

The recent uproar in the parliament over a derogatory speech made by Union Minister Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti has resulted in a lot of debates and discussions. The words she used while campaigning for BJP in Delhi were definitely not acceptable. After such a strong protest and maybe on the advice of senior leaders of her party, Ms. Jyoti apologized "if her comment hurt anyone." I wonder how she expected that after using such derogatory language it won't hurt anyone. The words she chose in her speech are definitely used to insult people who don't subscribe to her faith and political ideology, she not only used abusive language but also made a divisive speech where she questioned people's patriotism if they don't believe in the Hindu god Ram. She rightfully apologized for her abusive language but she and her party defended her divisive comments. Unfortunately, she is not the only one and BJP is not the only party who is trying to defend such divisive comments made by their leader there are quite a few political parties who do the same thing.

Any use of abusive language should be avoided on public platforms, but rarely do politicians in India show this restraint. They address each other with many derogatory names and adjectives but I can understand the theatrics they do to appease their base, so, I always ignore when they abuse each other, especially during election campaign speeches. But one can not ignore it when they start negatively painting communities or when they use derogatory words to insult people who don't support them, this propagates communal hatred and divisive politics. This leads to communal tension, sometimes it even leads to communal riots which are difficult to control once they start and that's why this is more dangerous. Sadhvi Niranjan Jyoti's speech comes exactly under this category of hate speech. She was not insulting any political leader or party, she was talking about all who don't agree with her political ideology and questioning the patriotism of people who don't respect a god from her religion. She literally abused everyone who didn't agree with her views, and this is not some ordinary party worker or some insignificant politician (fringe elements) this is a union minister in Mr. Modi's cabinet. This is the same Modi who declared on Red Fort not to indulge in any communal propaganda at least for 10 years so that the country can focus on important issues like development. But it seems no one from his own party or cabinet heard that part of his speech or they just ignored his request because these leaders think that politics has to be divisive, and without polarizing votes how can they win elections? Not taking any strict action against such people encourages such behavior, it reinforces the idea that as long as you are popular you can get away with anything.

As it happened many times in the past with BJP and many other parties this time also most of Sadhvi's comments were defended by her party. She apologized for using that abusive word (the word means "bastard") but not for the rest of her speech. BJP offered various explanations to defend her, their spokespersons even quoted many other instances where people used some derogatory words for Mr. Modi but they all failed miserably to differentiate between a personal attack and an attack on the entire community or the entire opposition. Nowadays abusive and divisive speeches are used very frequently in politics. Politicians who use them understand their impact very well. They use these types of speeches to their advantage but now it is time for people to understand this dirty game played by politicians and act accordingly.

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

[Copyright: Vinay Thakur. Please contact the author for re-posting or publishing]

Links:
1. Ruckus in Parliament over minister's abusive remark, opposition demands PM's statement
2. Modi's minister uses derogatory language, defends remark