BJP-AAP row escalates

The Bharatiya Janata Party appears to be absolutely determined to throw its complete weight behind the recently released film, The Kashmir Files, which depicts the pain and suffering of Kashmiri Pandits, who were forced out of their homes in the early 1990s and compelled to live as refugees in their own country.
However, in endorsing this Vivek Agnihotri directed movie, the saffron brigade is not prepared to listen to a counter-point by some of the parties opposed to its understanding of the events. There is no doubt that the Kashmiri Pandits have gone through hell in the last three decades and deserve all the sympathy and empathy of their countrymen. There is no one in India who does not relate to their saga of neglect, trauma and dislocation. During the unfortunate Partition of 1947, millions of people, largely from the provinces of Punjab, Sindh and Bengal, were forced to leave their homes and hearth to secure their life by crossing over the border. Therefore, the families of Partition refugees and displaced persons can understand the plight of these Kashmiri Pandits. There can be no greater tragedy if someone has to witness the rape and mass genocide of their kith and kin and that too in such a gruesome manner. These kind of atrocities on any race, in any part of the world are highly condemnable, and there is no one who can state that the perpetrators, however powerful, should not be brought to book and punished.
In a country like India where the rule of law prevails, the guilty should be prosecuted as per the provisions of the prevalent law, tried and given appropriate sentences by the courts. The scars of the 1984 anti Sikh riots have not healed and also the victims of carnages in various parts of the country, continue to suffer with no justice in sight.
It is often said that justice delayed is justice denied and in this context the law must step in to reinforce the belief of our countrymen in the criminal justice system. Neither the media nor any activism can be substitutes for the courts, which alone have the power to pronounce verdicts.
The Kashmir Files has been acclaimed by a large number of people as an honest attempt by the film-makers to present the sequence of events that led to this monumental tragedy. Simultaneously, there is a section of people, who are of the opinion that the controversial movie does not depict the complete truth since it has not touched upon areas and roles of individuals, that would have helped in granting greater clarity to the matter. This is where the conflict has arisen.
On Wednesday, the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha activists led by Tejasvi Surya, the 31-year-old Lok Sabha Member from Bengaluru South, demonstrated outside the official residence of Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. Their contention was that Kejriwal had insulted the Kashmiri Pandits on the floor of the Delhi Assembly and was in fact mixed up with militants who were the perpetrators of the carnage.
In his defence, Kejriwal’s supporters have maintained that the Delhi Chief Minister empathized with the plight of the Kashmiri Pandits but was of the view that they needed rehabilitation and not a film which was politically inspired to present the events in a certain manner.
While in a democratic set up, the BJP youth wing was within its right to agitate against the Chief Minister, in their over enthusiasm to make their point, they apparently crossed the red line.
The demonstration, in full view of the large contingent of police force, turned violent, and in the process, BJYM workers vandalized Kejriwal’s residence as well as broke boom barriers and closed circuit TV cameras in the vicinity. The AAP was quick to react and Manish Sisodia, the Deputy CM alleged that the demonstration held with the connivance of the police, was in fact, an attempt to assassinate Kejriwal. A very serious charge indeed.
Tejasvi Surya’s inexperience was evident when he meekly tried to defend his position. On a TV channel where he was pitted against Sanjay Singh of the AAP, he found himself at the receiving end as the AAP Rajya Sabha MP, aggressively seemed to completely intimidate him. This kind of confrontation on national television was certainly not helping the cause of the Kashmiri Pandits, for whom successive governments have not done enough.
The political dimension of the BJP-AAP face-off was that other parties which hold an opinion on this issue have for the time being, been pushed out of the debate where BJP is viewed on the side of the Kashmiri Pandits and the AAP has taken up the opposition space which secular outfits would have wanted to occupy.
During the Punjab campaign, the Congress made a weak attempt to paint the AAP as the “B” team of the RSS and if this continues to be the belief of the grand old party, then the Kashmir agenda from their perspective has been hijacked by the “A” and “B” teams of the RSS.
However, this is a flawed doctrine which the Congress holds. It has not been able to wade into this controversy since it shall have to do a lot of explaining on its own role both in 1984 and in the early 1990s. The film has a clear political objective, but this does not prevent any political party from giving its opinion. The Kashmir Files has set the political narrative of the BJP. Between us.