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| Edited By: DNA |Source: DNA |Updated: Jul 25, 2019, 07:05 AM IST
The Left may be finished as a political force to reckon with in India, but its followers in the ranks of creative arts and the intellectual fraternity are legion.
Every year, since the Modi government first came to power in 2014, there have been periodic protests by theatre groups, academicians, artists and journalist associations, all with a pronounced pro-Left tilt. In 2015, a section of writers had returned their Sahitya Akademi awards as a sign of protest against mob lynchings and intolerance against cattle traders.
Between 2015 and 2017, thirty-nine litterateurs returned their Sahitya Akademi awards over “growing intolerance” in the country. The same year, actor Aamir Khan waxed eloquent on the theme, sparking outrage. Well, the usual suspects may be down but not out.
Eminent film directors and actors such as Adoor Gopalkrishnan, Mani Ratnam, Anurag Kashyap, Aparna Sen, Konkona Sen Sharma and Soumita Chatterjee have written a letter to Prime Minister Narendra Modi expressing concerns over the growing cases of lynching.
A total of 49 celebrities have signed the letter expressing regret that “Jai Shri Ram” has become a war cry. The celebrities have protested against what they called the lynching of Muslims, Dalits and other minorities. Quoting the NCRB, they said there have been no less than 840 instances of atrocities against Dalits in 2016, and a definite decline in the percentage of convictions.
The most notable aspect of the letter, dated this week, is the wide gamut of charges – from lynching to low conviction rate to pontificating on the state of democracy, politics and economy. To be sure, this is a continuing trend, a chain reaction in what is essentially a clash of ideas on what constitutes India.
The Left liberal brigade, used to decades of state patronage, is now finding the heat difficult to handle. The only way they can hit back is to release signed letters against the government.
