Satwant Singh Rissam
The unfortunate incident that happened with a minor girl in Rassana village of Kathua has brought two communities in Jammu region on a very rough road. This new issue all of a sudden took shape of a conflict in Jammu and Kashmir and came into world's attention. Tension in Jammu region started building up slowly in past 3 months when this incident happened at Rassana village. A kind of communal rift has also emerged in these months because some few people from both communities have been instigating this matter slowly but regularly. The sensitivity of the issue was already high but with this added instigation a totally polarized zone emerged within Jammu region.
This matter took negative shape when it was internally & silently backed by people from different political parties. Further the worst things started happening when the leaders of BJP went to address a rally of people in Kathua area lending their support only to one community. This started a trend and leaders across political parties started taking sides of one community or other and helped people to raise their voices over this tense situation. Suddenly the protests done against the accused and those done to shield the accused persons got mixed up and in turn created whole confusion. This was not all, some of the media people and social media platforms showed visuals of people carrying the tricolour and raising jai shri ram slogans as if this all was being done only and only to support and defend the accused persons. The international media too jumped into it and some of them termed all these tricolor carrying people as new face of pro-hindutva supporters. I don't know anything about real intentions of these tricolor carrying people but I believe tricolour if used should only have demanded justice. However, many conclusions were drawn over this act of using tricolour.
On the other hand when this all was going on, the victim family was facing humiliation as they were hurt and stunned to see people going against them after this brutal incident which can happen with anyone's daughter. This all negativity which has grown between both communities was created only by some elements that I think have succeeded in doing a permanent damage to peace in the Jammu region. This ugly situation has some contribution of advocates who tried to stop the police from presenting the charge sheet before the court in this case. It was such a move that gave anti social elements in Kashmir to further exaggerate the situation and in turn also brought countrywide condemnation for the lawyers in Jammu. This whole issue grew up when the J&K High Court Bar Association gave a call for Jammu bandh on April 11 by raising their four demands i.e. removal of Rohingyas settled in Jammu, revocation of the tribal affairs department directive, district status for Nowshera and investigation of the Rassana case by CBI. Basically, protesting over these all issues together made J&K High Court Bar Association members appear as if they were “glorifying rapists”. Jammu region has always represented the secular fabric since militancy erupted in Kashmir but because of this single incident the secular factor of Jammu region has got affected. Now such is the state of suspicion in the Jammu region that the victim's family has demanded that the trial of the case be shifted out of J&K state. The suspicion is also on the working of government and its machinery because a fulltime campaign is being held by various organizations in Jammu who are demanding CBI probe into this incident. The government appears to have failed on this issue as both the communities do not trust each other as well as the government.
When this all happened I was forced to think as to why suddenly such volcanic type anger eruptions were seen in Jammuites. I am sure that somewhere the anger in minds of Jammuites over the issues like; the demographic change in region, illegal settlements and a fear that land is gradually being taken by non-Jammu residents was used to manipulate the whole Rassana incident. Let's not forget that ahead of an election year the flaring up of sentiments is not new in India and I assume that same happened in J&K. In the end, I say it very clearly that the brutal and horrific crime was used by some to score personal points. Initially the sequence of events shown about the crime was different but as time went by many new narratives were added. Now situation is such that you may find many groups of supporters over every narrative both in Jammu and in Kashmir. The trial in this case has begun yet there are many unanswered questions as to why, when, where and how this incident happened. I don't want to comment over any such thing but I only want to say that we need to be rational and should put in no religious sentiments over an incident which has brought shame for entire humanity. People of entire state need to stay united in this divided time or else we live with divided hearts.
