Saturday, December 29, 2012

The nation mourns

When a national political leader dies, the government declares a period of national mourning. This is a formality. Only on very rare occasions citizens really feel the loss. But today (29th December) was different. Entire nation spontaneously and silently mourned the passing away of the paramedic girl from U.P. who had been brutally assaulted in Delhi. A pall of gloom has enveloped the whole nation.

Response of the political class to this unfortunate series of incidents has been shockingly disappointing. The son of our President made his barbaric mindset transparent by his ludicrous comment. The government used its brutal police force to silence the protestors. Metro railway stations in the capital were shut down in a disgraceful manner. Even on 29th December at a time when the citizenry is keen to express its total solidarity with the cause of women, the shameless government has thought it fit to close the metro stations. It is a signal admission of government's incapacity to feel the public pulse and its ever-present readiness to abdicate its responsibilty.

It is pathetic that government's failures have been many. That a brutal assault on a woman can occur in a bus in Delhi was irrefutable testimony to administration's recklessness and dereliction of duty. Shifting of the girl to Singapore proved the sinistrality of the government beyond doubt. Her condition, according to many doctors, was such that even the slightest stress arising from the journey to Singapore would prove fatal. Why did the government take this inexplicable risk? Was the guilty government pathetically trying to prove its solidarity with the girl by making a show of caring for her? Has this misstep resulted in her death? No one can be sure.

29th December should every year be observed as the 'Day for protection of women's dignity'.

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