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Insult Vs. Losses

Agitation and enrage are obvious when someone you respect is insulted. However, the insult and the anger should be in some proportion. Yes, it may not be possible to evaluate this proportion in a maddening situation, but it is not impossible either.

I am referring to the desecration of the statue of Meenatai Thackeray (wife of Sena chief, Bal Thackeray) on Sunday and the Shiv Sena’s rampage thereafter. Incidents of violence, bandhs, morchas, stopping trains & local commutation – all were a part of Sena’s protest against the insult to their ‘Mother’ – Meenatai. Anybody would get angry at the insult to his or her mother but the reactions would differ. Sainiks (Shiv Sena members) reacted with what they are best at – creating a chaotic situation all across the city and eventually spreading it in the entire state.

It is indeed saddening that innocent people and public property were victims of this rampage. Some handy few ill people must have carried out the act but the masses had to pay for it. Burning the buses, shutting down of shops and disruption of transportation were all unnecessary and impulsive reactions of the insult to the statue. A wiser thing would have been to take a team of cops and investigate the entire issue. This is being done now but at the cost of heavy losses incurred by the city and its people. Was the chaos and loss incurred really in proportion to the incident that happened?

Moreover, politics has to pour in somehow, so the parties are busy pointing out fingers at each other showing how politically inefficient they are. I wonder how someone can claim that all Hindus have been hurt; surprisingly the leader has self-proclaimed himself as the representative of the entire Hindu society. People get divided exactly at a point when they should be collectively trying to find out the solution and punish the culprits. I feel that even before the CM and the Deputy CM, some Sena leader should have appealed to the public to cool down and control their anger. The issue will now be raised in the Vidhan Sabha.

Sadly when the issued gets resolved (if it ever gets) the incident must have completely been washed off from the memories of Mumbaites, as they have short-term memory for such impulsive incidents. They pack up their worries and agitations at end of the day and get up the next day with a new beginning.

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