Modi should have attended Ferozepur rally and boldly faced empty chairs

 

Modi should have boldly faced empty chairs at Ferozepur rally

Ground Zero

Jagtar Singh

 

There is no reason to distrust the Prime Minister.

There is no reason to distrust the Punjab Chief Minister.

And there is no reason to distrust the farmers who staged the most peaceful and the longest protest in recent history at the gates of Delhi, more than 700 of whom lost their lives during that period.

These are the three dimensions to the latest controversy rooted in Punjab but has erupted at the national level.

At the centre of the controversy is statement by Prime Minister Narendra Modi before boarding his plane at Bathinda back to Delhi without addressing his scheduled rally at Ferozepur thereby he told the officials present as quoted by a news agency, “Thank your CM, tell him that I managed to get back alive to Bathinda airport”. This statement has far-reaching implications and repercussions.

A design started unfolding within minutes of the statement having hit the media.

This statement amounts to maligning Punjab.

It is implied in this statement that people are not safe in this border state. Ferozepur is a major border town and Modi returned just a few Kms from that place. The Delhi media continues to raise the bogey of the international border forgetting that villages are located right upto to Zero line in Punjab where people live without any fear and are known for extending logistic support to the armed forces during wars with Pakistan. At the same time, they desire healthy relations with the neighbour.

Modi returned to Bathinda as the highway had been blocked near Ferozepur by farmers.

The excuse given by the Centre for Modi taking to the 110 km land route was bad weather.

Even ordinary person has weather forecast on mobile phone and it was known to all that the region would witness showers on January 5.

He was to board MI 17 helicopter from Bathinda for Ferozepur.

It was at Bathinda that it was decided to take the land route.

Technical aspects including security lapse is not under discussion here as that field is for the security experts to comment upon.

However, it is pertinent to mention that Chandigarh is the base for the latest helicopters imported from USA and the same could have been requisitioned. But then this is part of technical domain.

The cavalcade of the Prime Minister was stopped by the Punjab police piloting it about a km from the place where traffic had been blocked ostensibly by the farmers.

One fails to understand as to how the farmers, even if staging protest, could have posed security threat to the Prime Minister from that distance?

It came to be known later that the farmers were going to Ferozepur as part of the call to stage protest at the district headquarter and were told by the police to make way for the prime minister. They thought it was a ruse to stop them. They did not make any effort to move forward that led to the blockade.

Modi’s cavalcade returned from that place.

In the latest videos in circulation, one group of people was observed near Modi’s cavalcade as it stopped. However, these were the people wearing Himachali caps carrying BJP flags and shouted Narendra Modi Zindabad slogans.

Within no time of the agency releasing the statement, the BJP and Sangh Parivar handles unleashed hate campaign on the social media, especially Twitter reminding Sikhs of November 1984 when the members of this community were subjected to genocidal attack in Delhi and several other places during which hundreds of them were killed.

The BJP people started havans for the long life of the Prime Minister yesterday.

A design started emerging.

Here was another way to stir BJPs divisive nationalism. UP is going to polls along with Punjab.

Modi should have got down from his car and walked down to the place where farmers were said to have blocked the road.

After all, these were the very people who had staged the most peaceful and the longest protest in recent history at the gates of Delhi? There was no reason to suspect them.

They might have lifted Modi on their shoulders and taken him to Ferozepur. One needs moral courage for that.

The problem was that the pandal at the rally site was empty despite Capt Amarinder Singh being there to receive him. Even his party leaders had failed to mobilise even a few hundred people. Ferozepur has been the base of the BJP earlier.

It is a fact that the farmers had blocked the highways to Ferozepur but that was part of their programme announced earlier.

It should not be overlooked that while they had blocked the highways, the government in Delhi had installed spikes and erected concrete barricades to block them at the border for more than a year and this was unprecedented in the history of independent India. It was too well known to the organisers that the weather would be adverse on that day and despite that they had gone ahead with the rally.

Modi should have gone to Ferozepur to face the empty chair.

But that would have deflated his image of being the most popular leader in recent times. At the same time, it must be kept in mind that Modi factor plays little role in Punjab whose religio-political dynamics is different from all other states.

Going by the fact that the farmers were about a km away and none came near his cavalcade, it is intriguing as to why this narrative of security threat has been constructed and villification campaign triggered against Punjab.

Moreover, BJP has little stakes in Punjab as the party has very narrow base here and has been contesting elections in alliance with the Shiromani Akali Dal since 1997 that broke under pressure from farmers agitation.

But then the Prime Minister has to be trusted.

The main issue is that is empty chairs as Modi did not attract the Punjabis.

Now they are being maligned by the Sangh Parivar.

The Congress played such games in eighties and the cost paid was too heavy.