State of mayhem

It’s shocking. The partisan police response to rioting incidents in recent days, particularly against peaceful Anti-CAA supporters, is unacceptable. If the rioters are guilty so are the guardians of the law who are turning a blind eye to the mayhem (“Delhi violence refuses to end, claims more lives,” Feb.26, Gulf Today).

Reports in Indian dailies are castigating the police for being negligent but are also implying that the police are not able to function in an impartial manner because of political interference. Even if it is true, can such behaviour be condoned? What is the recourse if the police force is being manipulated by the politicians?

The people of India cannot be bulldozed into silence by a force that is violating its own code. The mindless violence which erupted in multiple parts of northeast Delhi is burning not only the capital but the democratic structure of secular India.

The queer workings of the Delhi police force is well documented.  At Jamia Millia Islamia the men in uniform are believed to have entered the campus last month and roughed up the students. A few days later the same force intervened in a clash at the JNU campus.  But this time it was not as speedily.  The police reached the site only after the violent group of outsiders had bolted.

The footage of the ongoing rioting in Delhi show rioters on a rampage, destroying public and private property, but the police are taking their own sweet time to rein in the guilty. Will communal harmony and peace ever return to Delhi?

S Moidu
By email