As religious polarization grows in the world’s largest democracy, targeting minority institutions is no suprise. Jamia Millia Islamia, the name itself invokes a counter culture image in the mind of people who, are not very familiar with the mores of Indian Muslims.

In our post truth society, It is an already accepted fact that journalism has reached a point of no return. Main stream media has largely become a 

 – an obvious pejorative where paid lapdogs have declared unequivocal allegiances to the ideologically corrupt political parties. They have become the proponents of apathy, alienation, cynicism, brutality and fear racking up issues, not of public interest but of 


In this atmosphere of vigorous mobilization where everything you do, speak or eat becomes a stratagem to attain government objectives more conveniently, the onus is on us to debunk the politics of 

 So, this article is my response to a recent story published on Live Wire ‘

My Family Doesn’t Want Me to Give the Entrance Test for Jamia

’, where the author spoke about her family’s prejudices against 

, largely based on the agenda driven misinformation spread by our very own Media.

 in the mind of people who are not very familiar with the mores of Indian Muslims. The reality is that we don’t live like what they show you in Muslim based TV serials and Bollywood movies, not all Muslim women don veil, are oppressed and uneducated, Similarly not all Muslim men wear skullcaps, shave moustache but keep free flowing beards and perform polygamy. A vast majority of Muslims are an exception to your totalizing perspective but, 

 is not as easy as breaking fake news.
The line of my arguments isn’t running on vilifying any particular ideology, my disagreements are not in anyway dissensions. I am a strong opponent of 

 be it right, centre-right or left but I strongly believe in intellectual diversity and one cannot and should not separate education from politics. Universities across the world see a heightened version of polarised debates and our University is no exception but we are constantly working to reverse this rhetorical training of hurling 

 and discussions, For example, We’ve recently seen the establishment of RSS backed student body in our campus, which shows that our University provides stage to all the ideologies because here we believe that everybody deserves to be heard equally.

In the hope to avert the ongoing propaganda, I interviewed a few students from the University and here’s what they said:


For Ankit Singh, a final year history student and a member of the 

 – the RSS’s student wing, Jamia is the perfect example of communal harmony. “Me and my best friends from the University have conflicting political view points but I’ve never faced any criticism for the same, in fact we had discussions on topics of national importance better than those debates you see on news channels”, he said.


Anugya Jha, a 3rd year Law student believes that Jamia broke the shackles of her modern day education and brought her closer to this country’s enormously 

. “From the best Holi of my life, to dressing an extra bit for Jummah, I have celebrated the resilience at the campus”, she said.
Vrinda Bakshi, a student of Mass Communication shares a similar arc with respect to her notions about the University. She shares her room with two Muslim girls but she never felt like they’re from different religious backgrounds.
“I have faced many frowns from my extended family regarding my admission in Jamia but now I know how shallow their thinking was, I made wonderful friends here and I know the present-day politics will never transcend our education and 


In 1925, When Jamia was going through a serious financial crisis and the University was about to close, 

“Aapko rupaya ki diqqat hai to mein bheekh maang lunga

” and he actually ended up raising funds for the varsity so now you know, 

Sudeep Krishna, a 3rd year law student has represented the University in numerous institutions across the country. A vegetarian, Sudeep spoke of how he enjoyed 

 with his Muslim friends. “The quality of education in the university speaks for itself, and I think it’s enough to counter the rubbish arguments of all those running propaganda against the University”, he added.

Challenging the agenda driven propaganda backed by stereotypes is not like shooting fish in a barrel, but also, it’s not impossible. 

Our University is not perfect and no University is

. We have conservatives but at the same time, we have equal number of progressives. In fact, there are more of those who are constantly trying to reverse the pattern of seeing everything with the same 

, to seeing same thing with different perspectives because, Universities are not just for formal education but to help us grow as an informed individual who knows how to live in an increasingly pluralistic society with 

 for differences and respect for everyone, except for those espousing mass genocide.

Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in this publication are those of the author. They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of The Jamia Review or its members.

STATE, MEDIA AND A MINORITY INSTITUTION

Diving deep into the history of moral outrage, personal gain, institutionalised political and religious propaganda is the prerequisite to float, especially when you’re living in part theocracy, part autocracy and full blown plutocracy. Here’s an account of how wars started for defence of faith had layers of ulterior motives.

I assume you all must be aware about the ‘Holy Wars’, but just in case you happen to be particularly ignorant of the most badass thing ever happened to this world, they were the wars waged for what is supposed or proclaimed to be holy, as the 

. Being a big time sucker for the empires, the wars and obviously, the knights in shining armour, I would love to discuss this doomed venture and the 

 which followed in its wake. Here, Holy Wars strictly mean ‘crusades’ or ‘series of so-called religious wars between Muslims and Christians’ which started in the 11th century.

The sole purpose behind taking you all straight to 11th century is not because I can not survive 2020 anymore, but it is just to test the validity of the much exploited saying ‘history repeats itself’ and obviously because the fact that they started out for Jerusalem and ended up at 

 is enough to give any history nerd multiple orgasms.

Getting back to the Crusades, I would not mention the dates here because broadly speaking, I am terrible at them, also I don’t want to make it mundane, however for your baseline understanding, just know that it started in late 11th century ‘seemingly’ on the commandments of 

 from the Holy Roman Empire against the Muslim world, ‘seemingly’ to recapture the kingdom of heaven, Jerusalem (I believe, you all know about Masjid-ul-Aqsa, Church of Holy Sepulchre and the Western wall, the only wall left at the site of Prophet David’s temple) which was conquered by Umar Bin Al Khattab in mid 7th century making it the first successful attempt at 

As per popular imagination, it was a religious war initiated by the Christian powers to take the holy land back from Muslim control. I wonder what made these Christian powers to launch a sudden campaign against the Muslim world when they themselves were toiling in the chains of feudalism and that too after 400 years of siege of Jerusalem? The answer lies here, when you have nothing to offer to your subjects, “START A WAR”.

When Pope Urban was playing the threat of Islam to Christian territories and busy mobilizing the people of the Holy Roman Empire on religious lines, 

 Muslims to the extent of mass bloodshed, Muslims were struggling with their own sectarian feuds (between 

, obviously) completely ignorant of the brewing crusade and that’s how it proves that the demonization was downright fake and the real motive was just to fuel participation of people to kill and to be killed. Over the course of time, through skillful propaganda, Pope Urban transformed the whole idea from ‘attacking them because they captured Jerusalem’ to ‘attacking them because they were Muslims’. (Any resemblance to ‘anything’ is purely coincidental.)

An estimated 90,000 men, women, and children of all classes participated in the first crusade, they considered this war, ‘a pilgrimage’ to expiate for their sins as they were told that their souls would reap untold rewards in the next life. Here is something interesting to note, Pope Urban initiated these crusades on the beseech of 

 because he feared the advance of the Seljuk Turks towards his capital city of Constantinople, indeed religion is the most effective tool for political manoeuvring since aeon’s age.

Despite all odds, the first crusade had successfully secured its goal, the crusaders managed to defeat the Seljuk army and created a kingdom for themselves which included the states of 

. But this was not the happy ending, as the Muslim world would not remain so catastrophically divided for long. Saladin Ayyubi managed to bring both Fatimids and Seljuks under the 

 banner and waged a war, popularly known as 

 against the crusaders, successfully wrecking their vengeance and turning the crusaders to ashes. It triggered the third crusade popularly known as 

 in which Richard, the King of England agreed to give up the city of Jerusalem and signed a peace treaty with Saladin Ayyubi ending the battle in truce.

Well, there were also rumours of brewing friendship between Richard and Saladin, in fact there’s a hollywood movie named ‘Kingdom of Heaven’ where they presented the whole picture of crusades so well and ended up eulogizing Saladin Ayyubi.

Now you must be thinking that finally it is over but the major twist is yet to come, Pope Innocent from Holy Roman Empire called for a fourth crusade, not to topple the Muslim forces but against the Byzantine Empire itself. It was never for religion but for territory. Religion was used as a pretext to mobilize participation. When the Christian-Muslim religious clashes did not work out, the languishing Holy Roman Empire came up with the idea of sectarian split and waged a war against Orthodox Byzantine Empire for 

, followed by the sack of Constantinople.

The chapter of crusades is a classic example of moral outrage, personal gain, institutionalised political and religious propaganda, peer pressure, societal expectations, but mostly a thirst for adventure which fills the blackest and bloodiest pages of human history.

The world is full of fools and hypocrites. Fools are quarrelling, fighting, burning and torturing one another for blurred speculations which are beyond the comprehension of the human mind. Hypocrites are using the fools as the means to their end, or to be precise for their political gains. The simplest way to escape this manipulation is to use your brain because historically speaking, religion and politics screw us enough on their own, and together, they’re our deathbed. Let us save ourselves, let us not die before our deaths.

HOW HOLY WERE THE HOLY WARS?

Firstly, my congratulations to Prashant Bhushan for his pyrrhic victory, not forgetting that he was found guilty and ₹1 is still an amount against his crime. However, the major questions that arise from this case are: Why the Honourable Supreme Court put up the contempt case in the first place? What would have been the consequences had it been somebody else other than Prashant Bhushan? And for how long does the most powerful public institution deliver nothing but breadcrumbs disguised as moral victories?

Gone are the days when describing thief as a thief and rogue as a rogue was not considered as undermining the most powerful public institution of this country, when common people could repose their fullest confidence in the sagacity of this institution which now seems to wield the thunderbolt of authority against dissent, and when the country was not swept by the dictatorial rhetoric overriding the fundamental rights of its citizens every now and then.

, a well known public interest lawyer who has a record of standing up and showing mirror to the people in power. His crime was to tweet a picture of Chief Justice of India, where he was riding an expensive bike owned by the son of a BJP Politician, 

 and that too, without wearing any mask, while physical hearings in courts are on halt all over the country. In another tweet, he pointed out the contribution of the last four CJIs in assisting the government for assaulting democracy and as expected, the most powerful public institution saw it as an attempt to undermine its credibility in the eyes of people, unaware that people’s credence in the public institution is already on the downward spiral since January 2018, when the four judges of Supreme court held a press conference alerting the people that judiciary is at stake as the government is trying to hijack it and as per basic common sense, the institution is now required to act more cautiously and little less like an instrumentality of the government to rectify it’s image.


Coming back to Prashant Bhushan’s contempt case, the three judge bench led by 

 the same judge who parted with Amit Shah in Justice Loya’s mysterious murder case and our honourable Prime Minister in Sahara Birla Case, deemed Prashant Bhushan’s two tweets as false, malicious and scandalous in a 108 pages long judgement. The quantum of punishment came out to be a fine of 1 rupees, which if he failed to pay so, he would have faced an imprisonment of 3 months and would have been disbarred from practicing with the Court for 3 years.

Bhushan’s prior refusal to apologize suggested that he would not pay the fine – as per the Right Wing Intellectuals, it wasn’t about 1 rupees, but his admission of guilt. However, the Left Wing Intellectuals believed that the Court was scared to give him any severe punishment because of the public outrage, hence they accepted their defeat and asked for only 1 rupees as fine. Disagreeing with both the statements, I find myself in a moral quandary. Neither do I want the poster boy of free speech nor the most powerful public institution to cave in; I want the tyrants, the authoritarians, the emperors to cave in and that too, before the common people of the nation.

The question here is not only on the order convicting Bhushan for his tweets, but also on the constitutionality of Section 2(c)(i) of the Contempt of Court Act, 1971 which deals with the offence of criminal contempt on the ground of scandalizing the court or lowering the dignity of the court and as suggested by the 21st Law Commission, it should have been scrapped long time back owing to the fact that it produces deblitating effect on the fundamental rights of people. Prashant Bhushan also pointed out that as per article 145(3) of the Constitution of India, there shall be a quorum of minimum five Judges for deciding any case involving substantial questions of law. Following that, this case should not have been heard by the three judge bench which is why he and other members of legal fraternity called it a mistrial.

Many well known activists, as well as eminent lawyers criticized the apex court on hasty suo moto action against Bhushan, while myriad of petitions raising issues vital to our constitutional democracy and its institutions, like the electoral bonds case, the challenge to demonetisation, the abolition of Article 370, conversion of the state of J&K into a union territory, ‘lockdown’ on the liberties and freedom of the people in J&K, illegal encounters in Uttar Pradesh, etc., are languishing in the court.

I am not learned enough to comment on the judgement of supreme court, but as an active viewer of the court’s proceedings, I can say that the judgement is 

 authoritarian and is potent enough to produce a chilling effect on the fundamental right of freedom of speech and expression. I believe that people holding public offices taking umbrage at genuine statements is not only making a mockery out of constitution, but it is also a breach of faith with the fundamental rights of the citizens.

At the same time, I believe that the ‘third pillar of democracy’ is the only bedrock left for the efficient functioning of our democracy, and as an ardent believer in liberal democracy, I think that the mantle of protecting the institution from the populist government is on our shoulders and we can do so only by reposing our complete faith in the institution. Undoubtedly, the attainment of justice is the conscious end of the Supreme Court and questioning the administration of such institution can have profound destabilizing effect on a liberal democracy, especially when the populist government is continuously trying to disparage it so it’s our duty to refrain from saying or writing anything against the institution without rock solid evidence to back our statement.

‘power corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely’,

 the Chief Justice is and will always be liable to answer questions concerning his position in a democratic society. People holding power in any institution, be it government or judiciary are not allowed to play truant with the fundamental rights of the citizens, reducing them to an idol dream.

 The actions of all the power holders in a democracy should be in conformity with the standards set by the constitution because democracy is 

government of the people, for the people and by the people,

 and it works best only when it is protected from the people in 

SOFT AUTHORITARIANISM CLOAKED IN JUDICIAL MAGNANIMITY: MORAL VICTORY OR MORAL REPUGNANCE?

We are all standing on the shoulders of giants when it comes to set off a revolution or social change, but little do we know that love and revolution are intertwined and inseparable, a true revolutionary is always guided by the feeling of love, without which, revolution is nothing but violence.

 said and I quote, “medicine, law, business, engineering, all these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for”, so let us take a moment from our busy lives and normalize talking about love and conundrums that coincide with it.

This is a piece born from my serious concerns for all the over-emotional, woolly, cold and chaotic people who are constantly struggling in their romantic relationships. I request you to introspect and question your self doubts which you have not mastered yet. Have you ever noticed why you’re allowing yourself to be treated like a doormat but flaking on people who actually care for you? Why do you fixate on people who seems to be less interested, but in the presence of a potentially available candidate, you become so demanding and unreasonable in your requests that no sane soul would remain in contention? Why do you always want love to hurt you atrociously and go nowhere? And most importantly, why do you get bored of people the moment they start reciprocating your love? If you can answer these questions, congratulations, but if not, you are yet to know yourself.

In a study of more than 1,000 men and women, 

, a well known psychologist and proponent of 

 was able to identify three distinct types of romantic styles: anxious type, secure type, avoidant type.

In the “anxious” type, people’s experiences in infancy and early childhood have made them fearful of being abandoned by people they love. As adults, such people are emotionally demanding of their romantic partners. In contrast, the “secure” type has had more positive experiences with being loved in childhood, and so has more realistic expectations of mature relationships in adulthood. And the third and most common category is “avoidant” type, whose childhood was lacking of secure, loving relationships, hence they tend to shy away from romantic link-ups. Similar to the character played by 

 because of the fear of another let down, they prefer crashing the plane than to see how it might land.

What I mean by ‘secure and loving relationships’ here is, being loved by people in the very start of your journey as a protection against the subsequent neglect of the world, because that’s how you acquire the art of looking sympathetically on your cracked and troublesome being. As an infant, it is simply not in your remit to believe in yourself on your own, you need someone to boost you up on every minor step in life because without that, even the eternal admiration of millions won’t ever be able to convince you of your goodness, unless and until you get above yourself and trust me, it’s not easy but also, not impossible.

As an avoidant type, you don’t consider yourself worthy of someone’s love or to be with someone who can soothe you or stroke your hair and tell you that it will all be okay, instead you’re happy with people who are not all-in because that’s what you think you deserve. Because of low self-esteem, you engage in bread-crumbing. Whenever you feel low or empty, you slide into the DMs of 4-5 potential partners, not because you actually want to have a conversation with them, but just to keep them interested because you breed on attention and their unbroken attention is the constant source of validation for you.

You are always told that happiness lies in achieving self-enhancing goals such as career, success, wealth, fame, or power. The need to love and care for others is rarely emphasized, except perhaps in the arts but it’s time to decontrol yourself. Prioritizing your career doesn’t mean sacrificing the things which are personally meaningful to you. Loving people or getting loved back and achieving things in your professional life are not mutually exclusive. By contrast, knowing that someone has your back, no matter what happens is a key for pushing the boundaries of possibility in your professional life. Also, from the scientific standpoint, 

 released as a result of physical intimacy puts you in a peak state for creativity. Physical touch, in the form of hugs and holding hands, has been shown to reduce 

, lowering stress and strengthening your immune system.

Now that you know the importance of being loved, know that expressing love or compassion for others is equally important. Love is potent, only when you’re not just a beggar, recipient of affection but also the person who delivers. When you are generous, the story you tell yourself is that you have everything you need and more, which is why you can afford to be generous.

Small acts of kindness generate just as much happiness as do lofty acts. In an interesting set of studies by 

, the participants were either given $5 or $20 as part of an experiment. Participants in both groups were then asked to either spend the money on themselves or on others. Those who spent the money on others, it turned out, grew happier than those who spent it on themselves. More interestingly, the amount of money spent on others didn’t make a difference on happiness levels: those who spent $5 derived just as much happiness as those who spent $20.

When you are an avoidant type, it’s hard to settle with the people around, without getting dissuaded from their mediocrity, selfishness and idiocy, but keeping yourself sane and consistent when it comes to generosity and love is what life is, it’s not some chick flick, but another name for struggle. Learn to separate out the verdict of today from the emotional verdict you are carrying around with you. Learn to appreciate yourself as well as others even for their smallest of the small efforts. Learn that your past traumas are not your present reality.

You need to control your anxiety instead of running away from it, because that’s cowardice. It will leave you forever incapable of rising above it. Your anxiety should not be keeping you from improving, it should be directed to motivate you. Be strong enough to tolerate ambiguity, practice minimalism so that tomorrow when you encounter something you weren’t ready for, you can still be your confident self.

Lastly, consider your childhood traumas as a nudge from the universe to become more courageous and resilient, and once you overcome all your anxieties, you’re all set to see if someone you like might want to go out tonight!

AN ODE TO ALL THE ‘HARD TO LOVE’ PEOPLE

When your government with a track record of systematically attacking universities, scrapping institutional autonomy and stifling freedom of speech and expression among students and teachers alike introduces an educational policy with bucket full of utopian promises peppered with words like Privatization, Commercialization and Digitalization – question that.

As you all are busy soaking in the potent utility of Modi-government-approved new 

, it’s my self-avowed duty to put forward my ‘seemingly’ pillorying insights. Though to be clear, like you all, I am also suffering from Stockholm syndrome and trust me, it is just an unintentional product of my serious concerns for class-war, economy and education, which is unfortunately our only defence.

Before presenting the much needed critique of this holier-than-thou new National Educational Policy, let me clear the fact that previously I had no intention to decry another governmental document of fancy promises, not because of it’s veracity, obviously; but because I do not think it is going to be implemented any time soon.

National Educational Policy dates back to 1964, when 

 criticized the then government for lacking a vision and philosophy for education. The same year, a 17-member Education Commission, headed by then 

, was constituted to draft a national and coordinated policy on education. Based on the suggestions of this Commission, Parliament passed the 

. The new NEP usually comes along in every few decade. 

 has had three NEP till date. The first came in 1968 and the second in 1986, under 

 respectively; the NEP of 1986 was revised in 1992 when 

 was Prime Minister and the third NEP released on 29th July, 2020 under the current 

The new NEP presented by the Modi cabinet is the first in 21st century and also the first to not be presented in the Parliament and I do not wonder why. Before another round of unnecessary commotion, let me tell you, that it is only a policy, not a law and implementation of this proposal depends on further regulations by both states and the centre only if the 

National Higher Education Regulatory Council (NHERC)

 is not one of those faceless organizations, 

 wrote about in 1984. And also, by the mercy of BJP government, education is still a concurrent subject, touchwood.

Before moving forward, let me make it very clear that I’ll only criticize few points here which I find worth mentioning. For in depth study of NEP, I would suggest you to read the official document released by the 

As we all know, NEP proposes to change the school curricular structure from the current 10+2 with a 5+3+3+4 structure, bringing children from age 3 to 5 years within the formal education system. But how many of you noticed that examinations are proposed to be conducted only in Classes 3rd, 5th and 8th standard. Well, I am not really a nerd, but I personally believe that examinations are not just for checking the student’s potential, but a touchstone, a check and a preparation for future educational life. This elimination of annual examinations for junior classes is not something worth cheering about. Not to offend anyone but why to prepare the students for communism when we live in the cut throat capitalistic world?

The mention of classes reminded me of the gravest implications of NEP, that is on the majority of those covered under 

SEDGs (Socially and Economically Disadvantaged Groups)

. In NEP 2020, there’s no mention of the term “caste”, apart from a fleeting reference to Scheduled Castes. Adding to that, there was no mention of reservation in academic institutions, whether for students, teachers, or other employees. It’s nothing new that caste-based reservation is not something 

 government is against, reasons varies from appeasing upper caste 

 to formation of meritocratic hubris. Despite firm opposition to affirmative action in the civic life of this country, I believe that it’s elimination is corrosive not only of the sense of commonality but also of common. It renders the people of lower caste not only unemployed but also unemployable, which in turn hollows the whole idea of democracy. This is a frightening dystopia at least for the people with little alive conscience.

Coming to vocational education, which has been proposed from 6th standard in the NEP. I am also a huge fan of 

’s hands-on approach, but keeping in mind the child behavior and parental attitude towards education in our country, I don’t think it’s a viable option. Thinking of the debilitating effect it’ll have on student’s work-ability, say for example, if a student is so fond of animals and not so good in studies, there are 80% chances that she in between standard 6th-10th, without thinking about the meta consequences of her choices will decide to go for a career option in animal care and management instead of pushing her limits when it comes to studies, because that’s how our psyches are designed to work. We tend to go for easier options, especially when we don’t care about money, but will anyone bother telling this 14 year child about the income and lifestyle differences of a banker and a pet adoption counselor along with the importance of money?

 will become holistic and easier, only to reduce the so-called unhealthy competition and pressure on students. Who calls the competition ‘unhealthy’? Not toppers for sure. Though I am not a topper, neither do I believe in academic vying but this whole idea of running away from competition will make students all the more weak. Teach your kids that winning is not important but the desire to win is, tell them the difference between earning and deserving. Ask them not to gloat after winning and most importantly, tell them not to be downhearted even after losing as defeats are the means to victory and if you’re strong enough to bear the pain of loss, you’re ready to conquer anything.

It’s interesting to note that in the endless list of subjects such as philosophy, music, language and literature, subjects such as women’s studies or gender studies, cultural studies, media studies, Dalit studies, studies of discrimination and exclusion, environmental studies and development studies, all of which are developed over the last three or four decades are missing and we as a responsible citizenry should question about it.

Digital education in NEP 2020 most likely requires additional government funding, but I wonder how the government will deliver on it’s fictitious promise of spending 6% of the GDP on education when it has already fallen from 

 right now? This digitalization will ultimately lead to fee hike and further the gap between the poor and the rich, promoting privatization of public education. Sounds like some pre-planned brainchild of the capitalist government.

My last but the most important argument, I don’t think I need to state the secondary reasons like ‘problems of parents with transferable jobs’, ‘translation of primary books in vernacular languages’ or ‘cipher importance of 

 language in the academic field’ when it comes to allowing teaching in vernacular languages till 5th standard, owing to the growing importance of 

 language and how the lack of command on English is already impeding the progress of the nation.

If till Class 5th, students would be communicating in their mother tongue, will we start with the basics of English in Class 6th? In order to form strong base, language development incorporates listening, speaking, reading and writing, in short, surrounding yourself with the language completely, so as far as I believe, this is the worst our government could do to us. Without good command on English, we cannot even think of jobs in white collar professions and legalities but who has the audacity of asking the government to stop making mockery out of our lives? It will also deepen the class differences as no Doon school will give up on English knowing the global importance of the language and at the same time, students of modest means will continue studying in Hindi or other vernacular languages which will further separate their lives from the affluent class.

As I am well aware of the fact that none of my legitimate grievances will tap the wellspring of your anxiety so here is my argument from a patriotic standpoint. 

 is spending a lot of funds, resources and labour on learning English language and we’re far ahead of them when it comes to English, so why to sacrifice the only advantage we have against them?

Apologies, because I had no intention to stop you from gushing over the new National Educational Policy, but as a woke student, it is my duty to request you to revisit NEP once again before it actually gets implemented, only if it’s implementation is possible.

Revisiting: National Educational Policy, 2020

We are at a juncture where we can easily get away with cruelest of the cruel crimes if we are capable enough of justifying it as propriety is subjective, it changes with a gust of wind, nothing shook the collective conscience of the society anymore. We are the followers of the deranged cult of misplaced consciousness who can dive any deep just to line their very pockets.

There’s a constant conversion of our offbeat thoughts into corrupt realities, of our dark fancies into absurd actuality of the world, one such product of these conversions are 

 where it was alleged that freemasonry is plotting to rule the world on behalf of all 

 because they believe themselves to be the chosen people of the God.

One of the most scintillating amongst them is still the theory on 

 during the reign of terror, they are also considered to be the mastermind behind the rise of bipolar world after the second world war and now presumed to wage a war against 

Conspiracy theories offered causal explanations to the unusual and shocking world events such as 

. We’re more vulnerable to them when we feel powerless, when we feel threatened and we need to get a sense of control and that’s where, conspiracy theories starts offering meaning and much needed satiation to our sprinting brains. In 

, many right-wing think tanks came up with insane hate-mongering conspiracy theory gluing 

 with a global disease, demonizing them to genocide, this time, the pretext being the negligence of few religious fanatics.

It’s been quite a few days since complete lockdown of this country, some of you are busy doing productive things and some can’t even think of anything apart from 

. Well, this happens. Thought process differs from people to people. The optimistic ones are becoming productive and thinking of their bright future after the wrap up of this pandemic but what about the ones suffering from analysis paralysis or I better use a term, ‘

’? . What about their mental health? What they are feeling is complete despair, they are hollow, they are dying a slow death, seeing day by day increasing 

 cases, this is a test of survival not only for them but also for their mental health and very much alive conscience. Well, I don’t know how I am writing this but it’s urgent to pen down my thoughts as they are constantly ripping my life apart since last 26 days. First, I thought this continuous uneasiness in all probability is because of the outspread of the pandemic but no wait, what’s more distressing is being a spectator in a puppet show where 

 would only scramble the old graves and disturb the people already died of hunger, poverty and social trauma. Social trauma? Yes, social trauma. I’ve never been a supporter of any kind of extremism, I’ve never believed in the sanctity of religion based division, I’ve never supported any political party and deplore 

 only for mobilising politics on communal lines, I deprecated the 

 and demanded stringent punishment for their outlawed behaviour and above all, I am habitual of finding faults in the people of my own community but it’s high time to admit that I’ve never seen my countrymen getting this blinded by hatred, intolerance and fanaticism. I am scared, we, the people of ‘particular community’ are scared, this hatred is no pushover, it’s not temporary unlike the demons in power, it is entrenched in the minds of 

 which is self evidentiary from the recent events where 

 families being driven out of their villages in 

, they being denied the access to water in 

There’s an equivocating distinction between savagery and civilization, Police is no longer the protector for them, they see every government institution as a perpetrator, witch-hunting them to death, their constant vilification by the embedded media is no less a deathbed for them and only with this media, fascist state manufactured consent, stifled dissent and further normalized the discrimination against the particular community under the garb of toxic nationalism. Hey folks, welcome to 1930s 

Call it my stigmatized rationalism but the day is not so far when there will be a petition in the 

Should the Indian Muslims be burnt alive or castrated in a public square before getting propelled out of this nation?

’ there will be a trade off between justice and disgust and the jury will decide unanimously in favour of religious fanaticism as people always choose convenience over convictions.

It’s seems nearly impossible to get out of this nightmare but I believe in my countrymen, they’ll be reverted back from the herd of pigs to the sane average people again, sun of the much exploited ‘unity in diversity’ will shine upon us again, all you need to do is to be patient, chuck on your enmity and stop eulogizing your equally evil 

Coming back to conspiracy theories again, we see people who are unable to make ends meet starving to death while waiting to be killed by 

 and the central government still bargaining with state governments for providing them two meals a day? And you say, this government love ‘its’ people. Where’s the money from PM Relief Fund going? Is that only for buying MLAs? The trajectory here is that you cannot hold your half God accountable anymore, because you are either blinded in his worship or you are a sinner whose only sin is tolerance towards the people of ‘particular’ community. What I believe is we are rushing into a new world order where 

 will be no longer a fiction, moral matrix will be a thing of past and people claiming to be richer than God will be the only survivors.

ARE WE RUSHING INTO A NEW WORLD ORDER?

Anything can be politically manipulated if it is significant enough to be manipulated and this manipulation plays a major role in framing our day to day understanding of history, law, justice, power, mercy and humanity.

For those who believe that they are acting and making decisions out of their free will, their instincts are unaffected and they are at liberty to revamp it whenever they want to, the time has come to differentiate the world you’re living in and the world you will never know, the time has come to awaken the dissenter in you who is audacious enough to assert that everything is manipulated, the opinions you have, the things you say, the rights you exercise, the society in which you live in and even the air you breathe. Since the time immemorial, you’re being governed by the amateurs who neither have the right nor the virtue to govern you. Ironically, they are not the megalomaniac dictators but the democratically elected demagogues. Your democracies catalysed false consciousness which propitiously stimulated populism over rationalism and replaced reason with emotions and cheers, here you’re living in technicolour post truth world!

To substantiate this, let’s name the one who must be named over and over again, the Machiavelli of Indian politics ‘Chanakya’. As per his most celebrated work ‘Arthashastra’, a ruler need not to bring his promises to fruition and when subjects begin questioning things, a ruler is recommended to respond by attacking a neighbouring country and in the twinkling of an eye, everything will fall into line as it is an undeniable fact that petrifying one’s own citizenry by synthetically created fear of foreign enemy is a tired old horse which the politicians have ridden to power for centuries.

Politicians of the largest democracies or may I say, kakistocracies have used this subterfuge time and again to deceive their own people and we being babe in the woods invariably welcome this manoeuvre with open arms which many a time, resulted in mass devastation of various countries, scores were killed, thousands were displaced and ultimately thrown a unipolar world at us with one dominant state asking other countries for veneration, not spiritual but material and I don’t think that this state is need to be named. It’s history of waging and sponsoring endless wars, vanishing civilizations, disfiguring thriving states and much loved wholesale murdering from Latin American countries to West Asian countries is internationally very well renowned.

The most recent of all is the assassination of Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, second most powerful leader of Iran after religious leader Ayatollah Khamenei. Uncle Sam tried to legitimize this act of terror by fabricating various allegations against Soleimani, one of them being his involvement in various terrorist activities from London to New Delhi which is nothing more than an outright lie instead he was the major actor in terminating the Islamic State of Syria and Levant (ISIL). Most of us simply believe that Trump did so just to get away with Impeachment hearings just like all the other previous US presidents did for the fantasy lust for power. Not advocating for Iran but I would love to mention some facts here which can prove most of us right: United States first meddled in Iran’s internal affairs when Iranian government nationalized it’s oil as it was too much to bear for USA’s economic interests in the region that it launched a coup d’etat against democratically elected Mossadeq’s socialist government in 1953 and replace it with the USA’s loyalist Pahlavi dynasty. Mohammad Reza Pahlavi’s rule in Iran was quite similar to that of Kemal Ataturk’s in turkey. Although he was the stooge of USA, I admire him eminently for his persistent attempts to make Iran a modern secular state with ‘White Revolution’ consisting various political, economic and social reforms. These reforms eventually redistributed land to some 2.5 million families, established literacy and health corps to benefit Iran’s rural areas, furthered enfranchisement of women and ended the rule of Shariah. In subsequent decades, per capita income of Iranians skyrocketed and oil revenue fuelled an enormous increase in state funding for industrial development projects. Not rhapsodizing but being a law student, I cannot flunk the principle of ‘audi alteram partem’ and demonize the Shah just because he was conditionally westernized and not a parochial neo traditionalist like the majority of Iran.


As I say, ‘not only the religion but also the culture is opiate of masses’. Imposition of western values led to the countrywide resentment as people saw Shah as a threat to their culture which in turn resulted in the Iranian revolution of 1979 where a Shia leader, Ruhollah Khomenei successfully mobilized people on religious lines and usurped the throne. This act of Khomenei can be considered as a classic example political manipulation of religion.
The key intent behind putting the example of US and Iran here is not only to explain the political manipulation by reshaping the hearts, minds, hopes and dreams of the citizenry but also to put that all of us are same be it Americans, Iranians or Indians etc irrespective of the sanctity of our borders. We all are designed to serve, inundated with the constant barrage of propaganda, our minds are moulded, our tastes are influenced, our words are exploited and our actions are coerced to accept the plattered lies, to be satisfied with the shows of flags and bucket full of nukes, to believe that war is peace, red is blue and girls are boys and slavery is freedom.


By reversing the case here, it can be avowed that the assassination of Soleimani worked in Iran’s favour. Coincidentally, at the time of Soleimani’s assassination, people in Iran were protesting against the corrupt government, unemployment, human rights abuses, hike in fuel prices and demanding the overthrow of the religious leader, Khamenei but in the fraction of second, everything has changed. Now, people are not protesting against Khamenei but rallying to show their love for Soleimani, right hand of Khamenei which ultimately suppressed the popular dissent against the government. Now, you all are free to use your minds cum catacombs and relate this post truth idea with all the communal riots happened in India just before the elections.


Anyway, this uncontrollable phenomenon of psychological manipulation for political gains is inevitable and will stop only by overcoming the shortage of outlaws in your society, by outgrowing the knee-jerk reflection of what people wants you to think and most importantly, by decontrolling your own selves.

Articles by Sadaf Parvez

STATE, MEDIA AND A MINORITY INSTITUTION

HOW HOLY WERE THE HOLY WARS?

SOFT AUTHORITARIANISM CLOAKED IN JUDICIAL MAGNANIMITY: MORAL VICTORY OR MORAL REPUGNANCE?

AN ODE TO ALL THE ‘HARD TO LOVE’ PEOPLE

Revisiting: National Educational Policy, 2020

ARE WE RUSHING INTO A NEW WORLD ORDER?

How politics assaults our psyche: In the light of the tussle between United States of America and Iran

STATE, MEDIA AND A MINORITY INSTITUTION

HOW HOLY WERE THE HOLY WARS?

SOFT AUTHORITARIANISM CLOAKED IN JUDICIAL MAGNANIMITY: MORAL VICTORY OR MORAL REPUGNANCE?

AN ODE TO ALL THE ‘HARD TO LOVE’ PEOPLE

Revisiting: National Educational Policy, 2020

ARE WE RUSHING INTO A NEW WORLD ORDER?

How politics assaults our psyche: In the light of the tussle between United States of America and Iran