In India, politics is above law and politicians (and their supporters) can resorts to various types of lawlessness including burning vehicles, damaging railway and government properties and such other acts in the name of mass movement with the law machinery remaining numb.
Spearheading the political lawlessness is West Bengal, where every now and then an incident is dubbed as political issue and the result is vandalizing the national property even if it is Assembly house as happened sometimes ago when in the presence of Mamata Banerjee, her party leaders broke assembly furniture mercilessly in broad daylight with scant respect for democracy. And she and her boys got scot-free!
Mamata has a penchant for breaking law and is becoming an icon of political lawlessness in Bengal as is also clear from her latest sojourn by the side of Durgapur expressway to siege Tata Nano factory hijacking Bengal’s industrialization for Ransom. Her blockage of Durgapur expressway marks the beginning of a new era in contempt for law.
There is a high court order to clear the expressway. But it has fallen to deaf ear to her. Even the governor has appealed to clear the expressway, which is one of the important lifelines of Calcutta and Bengal. But this appeal met with partial success as only after nine days of complete blockade, when only one flank was cleared.
Thus there is a bizarre situation where the governor is chairing a meeting in which major players on one side represents a political outfit that disregards the high court order with complete nonchalance. The people who should be put behind the bar for inciting people to break the law or take it in their own hands are now the guest of the Honorable Governor Mr. Gopal Krishna Gandhi, who himself is the grandson of Mahatma Gandhi.
An argument has been put forward that the blockade has been made by uncontrollable supporters of Mamata and other splinter groups that support her cause, does not hold water and is actually a poor alibi. She has launched a mass movement and she must own responsibility to control the crowd she is rallying day in and day out. Even if she failed for the first couple of days, she could have controlled them afterwards if she desired. But it was clearly her overt encouragement that the crowd continued blocking the Highway in utter disregard for Law.
Mamata has another penchant for describing her (violent) mass movements as ‘Satyagraha’ a term used by the Great Mahatma Gandhi for his mass movements. It will be worthwhile to remember that Mahatma Gandhi withdrew his mass movement after a violent mob burnt alive some policemen in Chouri Choura in Bihar.