Hard-hitting crisis

Assaults on public servants are becoming mainstream

It is a potent sign of the rapidly deteriorating standards of public behaviour when the prime minister has to take time out of his party’s first parliamentary meet to condemn an assault with a cricket bat by a Bharatiya Janata Party MLA on a municipal official earlier this week. Caught on camera, the MLA, who is also the son of a senior party functionary, was arrested but remained arrogantly unrepentant. Worse, he was welcomed with sweets and garlands at the local party office after being released on bail. Stung by the popular outrage, Mr Modi said such behaviour would not be tolerated, irrespective of the person’s status. The prime minister’s admonition is welcome but such violent displays of power against public officials is a party-agnostic trend.

 

In another recent incident, a woman forest officer and her colleagues were beaten with sticks by a group of men led by the brother of a Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) MLA. Last year, two Aam Aadmi Party MLAs assaulted the Delhi chief secretary in the presence of Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal. And then, of course, was the infamous case of the Shiva Sena MP who beat an Air India staffer with his shoe, which caused the domestic airline industry to introduce the concept of a no-fly list.

 

Incidents such as these highlight the wilful institutional weakening of the country’s law and order apparatus by the political class. It is worth noting that the police hesitated to act in several of these incidents, principally because the political connections of the perpetrators of violence raise the possibility of punishment for the law enforcers. The law did take its course in some of the incidents listed above because they were circulated on social media and attracted a public outcry. But there is no guarantee that politicians will side with the law. Mr Modi and the head of the TRS Working Committee publicly condemned the assaults by their party workers, who were duly booked. But others did not think it necessary to apologise for their associates’ behaviour.

 

Equally, few saffron politicians have condemned unequivocally the cases of communal and casteist lynching that have occurred with distressing frequency over the past few years. This variable response, dictated most often by the exigencies of electoral politics, is not an overnight trend, either. It represents a steady erosion of societal values, has created a vicious circle of lawlessness, and contributed to the rise of the strongman (or woman) culture. Over the years, so many police personnel have been physically threatened and transferred to the boondocks, or have seen their career progression blocked for enforcing the law of the land. Their successors mostly opt to follow the line of least resistance to the powerful and well-connected.

 

The upshot of this has been a steady diminution of the authority of the state’s law enforcement machinery, which enables those with clout to exploit the system by garnering followers based on protection rackets. Mr Modi’s very public admonition may have a salutary effect of reining in his party members, but whether India’s power elite chooses to exercise such restraint is extremely doubtful.