The headline in the national newspapers on Tuesday say - Hindu saints stage protest, torch effigy of Udhayanidhi, in New Delhi, the capital of the country. The words here are clearly misleading. Are these people saints? Just wearing saffron robes and growing long beards and smearing your foreheads with sandalwood paste and sporting red oversize bindis make you a saint? Do saints apart from the time of conducting yagnas burn or torch effigies that too of political individuals? Is this an example that they are or should be setting their followers and society in general. Saints generally eschew all forms violence including arson and the like. If they are really saints can they not devise more enlightened forms of protest rather than stoop to actions that are associated with common miscreants like burning effigies? These are the mistakes that we in common society make of calling such people saints by virtue of their appearance. This has also happened because the RSS & BJP the flag bearers of the Saffron Brigade encourage these kind of activities and laud those who indulge in them.
