Kanhaiya a hero: a father's anguish at how to explain that to his son

I am a peace-loving citizen, and I value simple things in life, like the security and safety of me and my family, and of the people around me.

I still remember that cold December day in 2001 when the Indian Parliament was attacked. I vividly remember the sense of disbelief in the newsroom around me in Delhi as the news broke, the nail-biting live coverage on television, the tales of heroism, and stories of families robbed of their loved ones. Of politicians who escaped, of people whose quick thinking saved the lives of many politicians who were caught inside, and of a terrorist who died laughing. And of the panicked phone calls from my family back in Kerala.

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Perhaps it is because of those memories that I find it weird when politicians, intellectuals and media make a hero of Kanhaiya Kumar who held an event to commemorate someone convicted for that terror strike. I can't understand why a person who raised anti-national slogans, or held an event to commemorate a convicted terrorist's death, should be considered a hero. I have not watched the JNU student's so-called electrifying speech after he was released from jail, and don't want to either.

I have read the arguments of leftist-liberal intellectuals and media persons who, when shown the video clips of the JNU event, have gone to extent of saying that a “few anti-national slogans” from a student are par for the course (Correct me if I am wrong, but I don't think we could ever do that in school or college). I have also pondered hard to understand why these intellectuals took on a Malayalam actor who invited the nation's attention to the difficulties our brave jawans endure to keep our freedoms secure.

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Have I given priority to the wrong things in life? Am I wrong in desiring safety and freedom for my children and my family, for my people? To my simple mind, a soldier who goes through the often inhuman and extremely dangerous conditions at our borders, ever worrying about his family back home, is doing much more for India than a 30-year-old student who lives in the safety of his campus and wants the dismemberment of his own country. And he has at least once behaved rudely with a girl and got a complaint lodged against him for that.

I can't understand his ideology, I can't understand him, and I can't understand his supporters' minds.

My question is simple: how will I tell my son 8-year-old son that this guy is a hero and a role model, as the eggheads and media want me to believe?

One leftist intellectual and media person proclaimed on social media that it is the Constitution that protects us, not our soldiers. Darn, I feel like kicking myself for not recognizing that great truth earlier. Should we not call back our troops from our borders then?

But something in me says I should trust those troops on our borders to guard our freedoms, more than this JNU student who thinks India's salvation lies in his leftist ideology with a gory history, and his supporters. The same voice tells me that I should tell my son that our jawans are our true heroes.

In the simple, peaceful world that I yearn to be in, any person who wants to dismember his own country, and his supporters, should be jailed. No questions asked. Not because I want to be in a police state, or one where the government wants to restrict freedom of speech. But because people like me want to live peacefully and want the same safety, peace and freedoms that we enjoy for our children and their children. That is why people like me elect our governments. And we expect that government to do its job. Okay, at least that is what I think is how things should work in our country. And that is what people like me think.

Folks like me wish the JNU administration had booted Kanhaiya and his supporters long back. That the government had acted swiftly and firmly against these hooligans (forgive the word; I am trying really hard to visualize them as great guardians of all freedoms, shining brightly on a free and fair firmament) and their liberalist supporters.

When news reports say that JNU students are set to march on Parliament to demand the release of Kanhaiya's associates who are still in jail, it strikes me as supremely ironic. Will they call the brave people who defended the Parliament that day as anti-national?

We were taught that freedoms come with accountability. But here we are, making media stars out of people who want to destroy the country itself. I wonder how that JNU professor who justified the "pro-azadi" slogans by the students still has her job. A soldier on the border who said anything remotely similar would have been behind bars now. And this “liberal intellectual” is still sitting in the safety of her home and is being paid by the government – with taxpayer money!

Perhaps it is that I am a demented man living among some very high-IQ individuals, and I should just stop asking questions about things I don't understand. How can all those worthies be wrong?

Perhaps we simple folks should stop thinking. Or worrying about the future of our families. We should just let the Kanhaiyas run amok, watch as he and his friends dismember the country and do a blood-splattered war dance. And clap when the eggheads and liberal media praise his heroic deeds.

After all, who can be smarter than these people who have earned a name and a living vilifying the country they live in, and the people who protect their safety.

(The views expressed in the article are highly personal.)

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