Even more than 24 hours on, Asaram Bapu’s enlighteningobservation, when criticised, slammed and mocked by the media and slammed,slammed and slammed some more on social media, that elephants do not pay heedto barking dogs has a grain of truth in it.
While a case was filed against the self-styled religiousleader at a local court in Delhi on Wednesday for insulting women in generaland causing hurt to public sentiment with his remarks on the gangrape, made insequences on Sunday and Monday, his comment against his critics ” the “barkingdogs” in his words ” throws up a curious poser. Did we act like elephants,attaching too much significance to Asaram Bapu’s remarks on the south Delhirape and its aftermath?
But, then, an accident like this was waiting to happen ifthe driver is something called a godman, a tribe not known to hold their viewsto themselves.
The word godman comes with a red underline in MicrosoftWord, immediately switching on the mental red light, while the hyphenatedgod-man throws up no results in the software’s inbuilt thesaurus. Good oldOxford dictionary calls it an Indian word, often used in the derogatory sense,for “a holy man; a guru”.
Like MS Word, Asaram Bapu has also switched on the internalred light with his comments on last month’s gangrape and the victim’ssubsequent death in Singapore, even as the dictionary’s definition for the wordgod-man seems to fit his remarks like the proverbial T ” derogatory. Anaddendum: derogatory to the extreme.
While people have heard pretty regressive views in the lastfew weeks from politicians ” from Andhra Pradesh Congress chief BotsaSatyanarayana’s ‘women shouldn’t venture out after dark’ to President PranabMukherjee’s parliamentarian son Abhijit’s ‘dented and painted women led theanti-rape protests in New Delhi’ ” this was a new low. It was worse, as it camefrom a religious leader, as against political leaders, who anyway are believedto be afflicted with the foot-in-mouth syndrome.
In academic parlance, that is called putting the cart beforethe horse ” part-laughable, part-infuriating belief that rapists are primarilygod-fearing creatures who would curb their animal instincts at the sound of amantra. In layman’s lingo, though, it is called horse manure ” the kind thatdeserves to be put aside with a shovel.
More laughably, his supporters and spokespersons, likeNeelam Dube who came on primetime national television holding a baby and evenmanaging to outshout Arnab Goswami on The Newshour, a programme where usuallythe host holds forth, defended their guru saying he had meant it as an “advice”and that the remarks should be read in the “full context”. Now, what that“context” is, is anyone’s guess.
But the storm notwithstanding, Asaram Bapu held fort withaplomb. Delivering a sermon in Faridabad the following day, he said thegangrape case had triggered a campaign against men. He also cautioned againstmaking the anti-rape law more stringent, as it could be open to misuse in thatcase.
Perhaps, like political leaders, religious leaders tooshould apply their mind before opening their mouth to eject a comment on everyother issue floating around to be commented upon.
