Understandably, on Friday, Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front Chief and the alleged killer of scores of Indians, all Hindus, Yasin Malik, fond of calling himself ‘Gandhi’, began a hunger strike in the Tihar Jail, New Delhi, alleging that he was not given a fair trial. The allegation is yet another brazen lie by hardcore separatist, who is serving life term for cases including funding terrorism. He must be having his own philosophy behind spreading lies on their auspicious day of Friday. Is the hunger strike permissible in Islam? According to Perlis Mufti Datuk Dr Juanda Jaya, in the article Orang Islam dilarang sertai mogok lapar, appearing in Malaysian Bar; Badan Peagan Malaysia on May 25, 2009, stressed that Muslims were forbidden to go on hunger strikes, as this resembled Buddhist and Hindu practices. Yasin Malik’s move has evoked no reaction from Kashmiri separatists or mainstreamists.
The hunger strike drama, therefore, should be seen as a tacit ploy to make ground for his ‘respectable return back to public life’ in the event of any non-BJP government coming to power in Delhi in the near future.
Yasin Malik and his sympathizers, however, preferred to keep secret certain facts related to his case in a Delhi NIA Court. Like, he had pleaded guilty; was represented by R. M Tufail, who met some accident and represented himself in the court before being provided amicus curiae Akhand Pratap. This makes difference between the modern version of Gandhi and Mahatma Gandhi, who always spoke truth, however bitter it would have been. In the first instance, mere comparison between a terrorist and the world’s tallest Messiaha of non-violence is ridiculous. In fact, serious comparisons were made by pseudo secularists and self styled activists. Sunanda Vashisht, an eminent Explorer, Political Commentator and Chronicler, in her tweet wrote “Fact check-Yasin Malik called himself Gandhian and declared he was like Gandhi. The Indian press was quick to make comparisons. They said just like Gandhi lived amongst Dalits, Yasin lived in Maisuma in a poor locality. All this is well documented. A simple Google search will help.”
The euphoric and ‘motivated’ media is blaring up the event of the hunger strike as a major event in Indian politics. This is nothing new. A section of the Indian intelligentsia, media and activists worked overtime in projecting Yasin Malik as the modern Gandhi or strongest proponent of Gandhian philosophy. The backchannel ‘projection campaign’ succeeded as the projectionists got a red carpet rolled for Yasin Malik before he shook hands with smiling Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in the national capital in 2006. Eight years after this shocking meeting, Yasin Malik told the media on August 23, 2014 that Dr Manmohan Singh wanted him to contact militants in Pakistan for initiating peace talks. He said the Prime Minister made the ‘request’ two years after becoming the political executive of the largest democracy of the world. So, the dreaded terrorist from Kashmir was inching towards becoming the ‘Gandhi’ and the ‘peace pigeon’. On April 27, 2019, senior Congress leader P.C Chacko tweeted in defense of Malik with a caveat that ‘they do not support his ideology’, saying “…the courage he has shown is something which should be appreciated because New Delhi cannot threaten anybody, India is a democracy”.
Yasin Malik is being eulogized by all and sundry in the opposition-from former Chief Ministers of Jammu and Kashmir to senior pseudo secular leaders across the country without going into the background of the ultra’s involvement in Rubaiya Sayeed’s abduction, assassination of IAF officers in early 1990, targeting the members of the miniscule minority community, forcing them to abandon their homes and hearths in the Valley, money laundering and terror funding besides launching a campaign known as ‘Safar-i-Azadi’ in May 2007, a year after rubbing shoulders with the Indian Prime Minister in the full media gaze. He made mockery of himself by snatching the army boats during 2014 Srinagar floods when the forces were rescuing the marooned people and providing succor to them, just to hog media attention.
Instead of ‘wasting’ its energies, the myopic Indian media ought to have highlighted the crimes of their ‘modern Gandhi’ and his scant regard for the Constitution of India. True, every prisoner has certain fundamental rights and Yasin Malik cannot be deprived of such a dispensation. But making it a political drama speaks of the hidden agenda.
The hunger strike of the ‘modern Gandhi’ should have been on some finer issue like Mahatma Gandhi did while undertaking 18 fasts during India’s freedom movement. On January 13, 1948, the Mahatama undertook 6-day hunger strike, inter alia, in support of the hundred odd mosques in Delhi converted into refugees camps be restored, Muslims be allowed to move freely around Old Delhi, non-Muslims should not object to Delhi Muslims returning to their homes from Pakistan, accommodation of Hindu refugees in Muslim areas should be done with the consent of those Muslims already in these localities.
Did Yasin Malik and his ilk in the separatist amalgam or the so-called Kashmir mainstream leaders ever sat on even a token dharna against the forceful occupation of the dwelling units of the minority community in 1990, distress sale of their properties, encroachments in Hindu shrines and worship places and selective killing of Hindus, which is continuing unabated even now.
But for the BJP, India would not have seen the day when the ‘modern Gandhi’ is spending his life in a Delhi jail. Much more is yet to come for him and his likes.
