By Justice Markandey Katju–
(Justice Markandey Katju is a former Judge, Supreme Court of India, and former Chairman of Press Council of India. The views expressed are his own)
In 2015, a Muslim man named Mohammed Akhlaq was lynched in Bisahda village near Dadri, Gautam Buddhanagar district in Uttar Pradesh. Why? Because a mob suspected him of eating beef and beat him to death. I was invited to a panel discussion by TV journalist Barkha Dutt (then with NDTV), along with four politicians — Sanjeev Balyan and Sudhanshu Mittal of the BJP, Naved Siddiqui of the Samajwadi Party, and Ajoy Kumar from the Congress. There was also writer Tavleen Singh, a supporter of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and Santosh Desai, a marketing expert and newspaper columnist.
The politicians were asked to speak first, and they started shouting and quarrelling with each other angrily. Later, when I was asked to speak, I said, “Barkha, this country is passing through very bad times. All our politicians of all parties are a set of rogues and rascals, who should have been hanged a long time back.”
The moment I said this, the politicians, who were till now at loggerheads, united against me and started opposing me rather than discuss the issue. Barkha said I was “doing loose talk”, and added how could I say that “politicians should be hanged when the Supreme Court had said that death penalty should only be given in ‘rarest of rare’ cases?
I replied that these politicians polarize society and incite caste and religious hatred for securing their vote banks, even if the country goes to hell. They have no genuine love for the country. So don’t they deserve to be hanged? Balyan interrupted me when I was speaking (though I had never interrupted him), and called me an idiot. Siddique said I was giving a ‘Talibani haq’, and asked me how could I say what I said?
I replied that I said it because it was because you politicians incite hatred and make people fight with each other on the basis of caste and religion. You only care for your vote banks, even if the country goes to ‘jahannum’ (hell), and I repeated that you politicians have no real love for the people.
Later, Naved Siddique said that I have called politicians idiots. I replied that you are not idiots, you are cunning people, the reverse of idiots. For your vote banks you can take the country to hell. At the end Sudhanshu Mittal called me a criminal because I ate beef, and waved some paper.
I would have liked to tell him that I eat beef only where legally permitted, e.g. in Kerala, Goa, the north east or in US, but I thought it better to remain silent in the heated atmosphere.
The interesting and somewhat amusing thing in this episode was that these crooks (our politicians), who are otherwise often quarrelling with each other, quickly unite when faced with a frontal attack on their whole gang.
