Attack on Women in Mangalore Pub (Amnesia) by Sri Ram Sena

Was shocked to hear on the news that the latest attack by the moral police (/hindutva brigade) was on women who were minding their own business, relaxing in a pub in Mangalore.

Online searches led to daijiworld, Times of India and IBNLive.

The attack happened on Saturday and daijiworld says that the local authorities did not take the incident seriously until it caught the attention of national media.

The self styled moral police acting this time under the name of Sri Ram Sena entered into a pub and molested/physically abused the women on the premises. The pub owner in an interview on NDTV said that his waiters tried to stop the miscreants, but were unsuccessful.



The abusers have attributed various reasons for this attack:
1. they beat up young girls for "violating traditional Indian norms"
2. they forcibly entered the pub claiming unethical activities were on inside.
3. alleged that the pub owner was allowing the boys and girls to dance in an "obscene manner"
4. Prasad Attavar, State Deputy Convener of the Sri Ram Sena said that it was a spontaneous reaction against women, who flouted traditional Indian norms of decency.
5. got into an altercation with the women customers saying they were dressed indecently.
6. because of the attitude of the young women
7. accused the women of "involving themselves in immoral activities, including consuming alcohol, dressing indecently, and mixing with youths of other faith"

The questions that beg to be asked are:
1. Who the hell is the Sri Ram Sena or any other group of individuals to decide what Indian norms of decency are?
2. What gives them the right to impose their ideals on anyone else?
3. What gives them the right to physically harm anyone else?

Traditional Indian norms also say that women should be treated like Goddesses. But it seems that the moral brigade today has decided that Indian women should behave like Goddesses, if not they will treat them worse than animals/slaves!

Unfortunately these hooligans will be soon let go and we may see them being hailed as the "saviors of Indian culture" and we may even find them contesting elections pretty soon!

Most news sites state The ugly incident has a murky dimension also with leaders of Sri Rama Sene and Bajrang Dal, another pro-Hindu organisation fighting to take CREDIT for the attack in the name of punishing those going against "traditional Indian norms".

Disgusting!

What is our country sinking to? Hooligans and goondas have free rein over our country: Whether it is attacking art halls where they do not approve of a particular artists creative expression, attacking movie theaters when they don't like the subject being tackled in a movie being screened, rampaging bookshops which sell books whose author they do not approve of, burning public buses and trains when mud spatter is found on a statue, the list is endless.

Everytime, they go scot free. It is the honest, law abiding, tax paying citizen of India who is perpetually held to ransom by these miscreants in the name of "protecting Indian culture".

The Hindu reports Ten alleged activists of Sri Ram Sene were arrested and produced before a magistrate in connection with Saturday’s attack on a pub in Hampankatta area here.

The accused have been identified as Subhash Padil, Raghavendra Pai, Subhash, Harish Kumar, Jeevan, Kirtan Raj Shetty, Sharath Padavinangadi, Dinesh, Vinod and Nitesh. The legal adviser of Sri Ram Sena Dinakar Shetty, who is believed to have led the attack, is absconding, according to the Mangalore North police.

When will our politicians wake up from their apathy and take stern actions against these inbred terrorists who have unleashed their own brand of terror against the aam aadmi? (ordinary Indian citizens)

We are tired of empty words, we need to see some action being taken against people whose agenda is to destroy the very fabric of society that holds us together.

Unfortunate Suicide by an Agnesian & Senseless Protests

Just read on daijiworld.com about ABVP organised protests outside St Agnes College following the unfortunate suicide by a student - Ramya.

I am an Ex-Agnesian (97 - science batch). I know Namrata maam was very strict, but she was also extremely encouraging of any student who had talent and creativity. She did go the extra mile for some students whom she liked. Yes, this could be perceived as partiality, but once you are in college you are in preparation for the real world. You are no longer little children who will be cossetted by everyone around you. The sooner you learn this the better.

I grieve deeply for the loss of young Ramya's life and my sympathies are with her parents. But I do not think it is fair to accuse a lecturer with over 15 years of experience that her harassment has led to suicide.


It is also painful to see the young girls on protest, smiling and laughing. There is no grief, no seriousness at all. If I perceive it right, the students have just used the excuse of unfortunate Ramya to get a day off and take out their frustrations against the nuns and college management.

Since when has a communal organisation like ABVP had membership among Agnesians? Looks like the Agnesian girls have allowed themselves to be used as pawns in a bigger political game.



Use your brains girls and think things through for yourself.

Attacks on churches and Christians in Mangalore

Section 144 has just been clamped on Mangalore city.

Police resorted to lathi charge and throwing tear gas grenades at peaceful protesters where a number of nuns and women were injured and had to be taken to hospital.

What the hell is wrong with our country and its people? (I would not normally use such strong language in print, but it doesn't even begin to demonstrate how strongly I feel)

Today morning between 9am and 10am, Bajrang Dal activists attacked and destroyed 4 churches in Mangalore City.

Why? Because New Life members distributed pamphlets which said "Do not Worship Hindu Gods"
While I admit that this could be an incendiary statement, does this justify attacking people and churches who do not even agree with the methods used by the New Life preachers?
Does this justify attacking members of a church, who have not had anything to do with conversions or preaching and just listen?

Lets look at the issues here:
1. The Bajrang Dal resorts to violence because of something that is printed that they do not agree with.
2. When the Bajrang Dal says that conversions are illegal, (and all the other things they do with tis as their cause) aren't they infact enforcing that "you cannot worship any God other than a Hindu God"
3. The New Life Church is a relative newcomer, known to be more hardline than most other churches which distance themselves from them. Shouldn't the Bajrang Dal have at least distinguished that?
4. Even if they did not agree with what was printed by the New Life church in India, couldn't they try having a dialog with them first, before resorting to violence.
Looks like the hooligans behind these attacks are only interested in breaking bones and getting their adrenaline pumping rather than really trying to sort out any kinds of problems or misunderstandings.

The ruffians broke all the religious statues in the Sisters of Poor Clare's Adoration Monastery. They threw the Holy Eucharist on the ground and desecrated it.

Is this OK, just because it is being done against Catholics/Christians in India who have historically been as non-violent as the Jains and buddhists (other minorities) in India?

Concerned members of the churches gathered in the church grounds during and after evening mass in a peaceful way to seek assurance and guidance from the priests and other religious. Wasn't this a peaceful gahtering compared to mobs rampaging and torching buses because of some mud smeared on Meenatai's statue? or The countrywide riots following a desecration of an Ambedkar statue in Kanpur? The second incident was also of smeared mud. Both the desecrations happened on public roads. This does not make it right, but compare this to religious statues being broken on private property, the Holy Eucharist (which Christians believe is the body of Christ once it is blessed) thrown on the ground. Do not Christians have a right to congregate to discuss their fears following such incidents.

Remember the Christians were gathering in peace outside their place of worship (since the insides of the church were full) not going out and torching buses or hurting other innocent people.

To add fuel to the fire, the police arrived. No issues with their arriving where crowds had gathered, but they started lathi charging the gathered people and seriously injured nuns and women among the crowd and threw tear bombs inside the church where Sunday evening mass was being held. A religious ceremony, a peaceful ceremony, held everyday inside these churches.

Was this responsible on the part of the police to use force and violence against unarmed, peaceful members of the public?

People present at the scene said that the police themselves were pelting stones at the crowd and caning them, hurting both people and damaging property in the vicinity.

The news channels started to broadcast about this and then completely hushed up. I turned on my India feed of NDTV which promised for 15 minutes to show an update and news about Mangalore city and suddenly it stopped showing those banners without showing any news about what had happened. Looks like someone high in the political chain, got to them and yanked the news off the air.

Now take 2-3 other incidents into perspective.
On 29th August over 40,000 Christian Educational Institutions across India stayed closed to register a peaceful protest against the continuing violence against Christians in Orissa which has now spread to 13 out of 30 districts.

On the same day, the government of Karnataka announced its decision to take action against Christian schools in the state for closing without prior permission.

This same government has yet to take action against the Akhila Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishat and RSS workers, who had launched violent protests when the JD (S) failed to hand over the state reins to the BJP last year.

Is it any surprise that both Karnataka and Orissa currently have the BJP in power?

The VHP held violent protests in Madhya Pradesh and other places asking why the Christians had killed Saraswati? (by shutting educational institutions for a day) What about all the occasions when the BJP/VHP/Bajrang Dal/Shiv Sena and other Hindu organisations force schools, colleges and business to shut shutter for their own bundhs which destroy all normalcy in the cities?

Why are these double standards in play? Why are Christians being given the short end of the stick? Religious Christian institutions have a large role to play in education, medicine, caring for the orphans, abandoned, old and dying in India. Christians have been one of the most tolerant minorities in India (imagine what would have happened by now if by chance the Bajrang Dal hooligans had desecrated a mosque this morning) who have contributed immensely to the growth of the country. Why this treatment? Do they deserve it?

Do they deserve a government that is apathetic to their religious sensibilities being trampled upon?

Christians have always believed in being peace loving, patient and tolerant. Will the Christian youth of today continue to be as tolerant when they see the atrocities being committed against their brethren in Orissa and the North East?

Why are these atrocities against Christians being downplayed in the media? (Try googling for the attack against Christians in India and see how many Indian media links pop up) Why aren't they being given coverage? Is it because the powers-that-be know that they aren't doing a thing to control, controllable situations and the miscreants in their party? Is it because the powers-that-be know that the Christians haven't ever retaliated with violence? How long will the Christians community be able to react with tolerance and peace? (2 values that a lot of Indians in the news seem to have completely forgotten about)

Final note of irony: Union minister of labour and employment Oscar Fernandes (a Christian) was in Mangalore today to inaugurate the opening of a (Hindu) temple.

And so we debate endlessly in the media about terrorism coming in from across the border while we burn our own own citizens in their homes and places of worship.

Also Published on desicritics.org