BY DR. JAIPAL SINGH
Opposition's Double Standards
The so called socialist and secular political parties and their leaders in India follow a strange yet predictable pattern in majority cases. If the person involved is from a minority community, particularly belonging to Muslim or Christian communities, they so often raise allegations in Bhartiya Janta Party (BJP) ruled states that the encounter was fake with excessive force applied, due to prevailing bias against the minority community. This is what happened in the case of Asad and his aide Ghulam, the wanted criminals in connection with the murder of Umesh Pal who was a crucial witness too in the murder of his brother Raju Pal, who had ventured to fight election against gangster turned politician Atiq Ahmad's younger brother from an assembly segment in the Prayagraj district of the state of Uttar Pradesh in 2006 and, consequently, killed after winning the election.
Many critics of the present BJP government along with opposition parties have often alleged that many of these police encounters are “fake” demanding a high-level and impartial probe in such cases to reveal the facts. However, while making such allegations they are found selective on most occasions as they do it if the alleged criminal belongs to a particular minority community i.e. Muslim community or a member of the respective political party. The Uttar Pradesh government and senior officials of police painfully refute such allegations while reiterating their resolve and commitment time and again to curb/liquidate all operating mafias and gangsters in the state. Largely on account of such drives against criminals and anti-social elements, and alert and responsive civil and police administration, the law and order situation in the state has considerably improved since 2017 and the state is progressing reasonably well under Yogi government.
When Asad Ahmad and his aide Ghulam was gunned down in Jhansi in a police encounter on 13 April 2023, much hue and cry was raised by the chiefs of two important political opposition parties in the state namely the Samajwadi Party and Bahujan Samaj Party with alleged communal bias demanding a thorough probe into the circumstances leading to the death of alleged criminal duo. Incidentally, both the parties are also competing to capitalize on maximum electorate belonging to the minority community in the state. Both Asad and Ghulam were accused in the Umesh Pal murder case and were on the run since 24 February 2023 following the murder of Umesh Pal with each of them carrying a bounty of Rs five lakh on their heads. According to the police FIR, they wanted to capture these wanted criminals alive and warned them to surrender. However, the two accused criminals preferred to hurl dirty abuses at the police team and opened fire at them. Consequently, the police team too opened fire in retaliation and both the accused were killed.
Atiq Ahmad was put in the Sabarmati jail, Ahmedabad on the directions of the Supreme Court and recently brought to Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh by the state police as he was required to be produced in a local MP-MLA court where the court pronounced judgment sentencing him a life term in the Umesh Pal kidnapping case of 2006 vintage; however, the latter was ultimately killed by the gangster-turned-politician's younger son Asad and his accomplice on 24 February 2023. While Atiq Ahmad and his brother Ashraf was being taken by police on routine medical examination on 15 April night, three shooters impersonating as journalists suddenly opened fire from a close range instantly killing the gangster duo on the spot. This on-camera killing of the jailed gangsters raised a nationwide uproar by the critics of the government and leaders of the opposition parties.
Sharp reactions were received from leaders of the opposition parties such as the Congress, the Samajwadi Party, the Bahujan Samaj Party, the Rashtriya Lok Dal, the Rashtriya Janta dal and the All India Majlis-E-Ittehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM). Taking a dig at Centre, while Congress general secretary Jairam Ramesh sarcastically tweeted that HM did not stand for Home Minister but really for “Headline Manipulator”, the Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav said that attempts were being made to deliberately create an atmosphere of fear in the state. The chief of the Rashtriya Lokdal alled it a ‘jungle raj” and Bahujan Samaj Party leader Danish Ali called it a “cold-blooded murder”. Giving it a communal angle, the AIMIM chief Asaduddin Owaisi alleged that the people celebrating encounter raj were actually responsible for this murder. According to him the killing occurred in police custody and is an outcome of the failure of the law and order of the state.
The double standards of the opposition politicians and critics of the government is clearly visible in their discretionary approach and reaction on case to case basis. While so much hue and cry was raised in Asad encounter and Atiq brothers' accidental killing with more than a hundred cases of murder, kidnapping and extortion pending against them, not a single voice was raised by the same politicians when another gangster Anil Dujana was gunned down recently in an encounter by the Uttar Pradesh Special Task Force (STF) in Meerut on 5 May 2023, who had about 62 cases of murder and extortion registered against him. Similarly, yet another dreaded gangster turned politician Vikas Dubey had over 60 criminal cases including murder of a minister of state in 2001 and more recent killing of a police officer and seven jawans in an ambush on 3 July 2020. Dubey was arrested from Ujjain, Madhya Pradesh on 9 July 2020 and was shot down by the police when the vehicle carrying him met an accident and he tried to run away snatching gun of a policeman.
The same opposition politicians and other critics of the government have no issues with the aforesaid two encounters in which the killed gangsters belonged to the majority community. However, whenever a similar police action against criminals or an encounter involves some accused or convicted criminal(s) from the particular minority community, the same politicians, a section of media and other critics suddenly become apprehensive and charge the government administration and police of deliberate bias against the members of the particular minority community giving it a communal angle.
End Note
It is unlikely that the selfish, corrupt and power-hungry Indian politicians will ever stop playing communal politics in the name of secularism keeping their own interests in mind. The ultimate aim of playing the communal politics over the mafia and gangsters too is to polarize society on the communal and caste lines and garner maximum electorate in favor during elections. Be it Uttar Pradesh crime scene, Mumbai underworld or any other state in the country; ironically, the majority of such criminals, gangsters and terrorists belong to the particular minority community despite their overall percentage of population being just about fifteen percent. Unruffled from irrational communal criticism, the present Uttar Pradesh government and police have gone all out to eradicate or minimize crime in the state. Yet another mafia don turned politician Mukhtar Ansari too had political patronage of another important opposition party in Uttar Pradesh but his crime empire has now virtually collapsed. Yet another powerful politician Azam Khan of the Samajwadi Party with many criminal cases pending against him about land grab, criminal intimidation, fraud etc. too has met his nemesis.
The positive results of zero tolerance policy of the Yogi Government in Uttar Pradesh towards the crimes and criminals are clearly visible. While a large number of mafia and gangsters have already been apprehended or liquidated, with law taking its effective course in the former case, many petty and other criminals have suo moto relinquished their unlawful activities or left the state itself. While nearly all other states in India continue to remain communally sensitive with frequent incidents of caste or communal conflicts and violence reported every off and on, more particularly during the Hindu festivals, the Uttar Pradesh is one province which has remained by and large trouble and violence free without any major incident reported during the last few years. Besides, it's not only the law and order that has considerably improved under the Yogi Government, the state is also progressing well on several socio-economic development parameters too. This truly vindicates the saying that when the leader / ruler is committed, fair and honest, he (or she) is effectively able to contribute towards the overall progress and prosperity of the people in the society. Concluded.
(Courtesy: www.boloji.com)
(The Author is a former
civil servant and currently,
he is engaged as an
Advisor to an illustrious
Central Autonomous Body)
