I always thought of Karl Marx as an early globaliser. Workers of the world unite, and all that jazz. So it has not failed to puzzle me hearing Indian Communists rant against globalisation. Not corruption or exploitation, mind you, just pure and simple globalisation. Only now am I beginning to appreciate that actually they support globalisation. For them globalisation always takes pride of place.
That is why they passionately supported Iran’s right to make the nuclear bomb. Their pacifist ideals, of course, impelled them to oppose India’s nuclear bomb. With a global perspective, they knew Iran had to defend itself against America. With a national perspective, they knew India need never fear China again after China had forcibly seized all the territory it required from India.
Because Indian Communists are global, they now worry about Saddam’s death sentence. Their ally Iran doesn’t. The Iranians danced on the streets when Saddam received the death sentence. Obviously, Iranians are not sufficiently global. Indian Communists worried over the failure of Iraq’s justice system after the death sentence. Going by what their spokesmen say, they must have studied Saddam’s case very closely. They worried about the US influence over Iraqi judges. They worried about wrong court procedures followed by Iraqi judges. They worried about the treatment given to Saddam’s defence witnesses.
With so much to worry about globally, they forgot altogether to worry about India’s justice system. Despite commissions of inquiry collecting ample evidence, not one politician has been indicted for the 1984 Sikh genocide. Despite ministers being named by intelligence agencies for aiding the pogrom against Muslims in Gujarat, not one has been indicted. Indeed, some named offenders continue to occupy office. Despite the Supreme Court as well as India’s Human Rights Commission confirming that over 2,000 Sikhs, 1,700 of them identified non-terrorist, from one district alone were killed in custody by Punjab police, not one politician has been indicted. For all this, one did not hear a single tweet from our comrades. Human rights are equal for all. But clearly, for some they are more equal.
(Puri can be reached at rajinderpuri2000@yahoo.com)
