The Face of 2019

It’s the season of naming the person of the year, leader of the year, bigot of the year, etc. Upon ringing in that new year, I wanted to get something off my chest. It’s not my usual cynical crap. 

Jollu Rajappa. This is a name I saw for the first time about three weeks ago after the gangrape and murder in Hyderabad. The incident is now buried under the CAA ruckus, which has brought the country that much closer to becoming the spitting image of its neighbor, meddling generals and all.

The four accused in that rape/murder were killed in a shoot-out, which most reasonable people would agree was a staged encounter killing. They were not from the privileged class and their pictures and videos were there for one and all to see in the print and visual media. Even their dead bodies. Immediately after the extra-judicial killing there was an avalanche of celebrations all around, with people from all backgrounds, cutting across the political spectrum, across religions, and across professions praising the lord for serving justice, and saluting the police and their guns.

Four scrawny vermin from the gutters got what they deserved as per a vast majority of my friends. They were cocksure about that. There was no doubt in their mind that all four were equally culpable. Well, the police and media said so. There was not even a one in a million chance that one of those guys perhaps had been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Some even wanted to cut off the balls and burn the bastards. Some were worried that pesky human rights activists would turn up and screw up justice. These are my friends. Normal people, charitable people, people who show genuine concern for others. And, that was the case across the country. An yahoo poll had more than 80% approving the police action.

Yahoo poll on police action

At around the same time, there was a similar incident in another part of the country where a woman was burnt to death in broad daylight by a group of men. You’ll be hard-pressed to find the pictures of those guys, and there were no calls for their summary execution, because they were not from the vermin class. You don’t see the police taking any bishop, guru, or politician accused of a similar crime to the crime scene in the guise of collecting evidence and shooting them dead. We all know that it won’t happen. So, we rejoice when four men, who are not that well-dressed or well-off, from the underbelly of the society are executed.

Amidst all this laddu-distributing, fire-cracker-bursting din, there were two soundbites that my well-dressed, well-fed, well-off, some even well-read, friends would love not to hear, even as they join the chorus for the police playing the roles of judge, jury and executioner.

The first one is from the earlier mentioned Jollu Rajappa. He is the father of one of the accused in the Hyderabad case. When asked if he thinks the killing of his son by the police was right, he said, “So far, why hasn’t such action been taken against those accused of multiple rape cases. I agree that what they did here was right..” Mind you, he has just been delivered the news of his son's death by the person asking that question. He doesn’t say it was wrong. He probably doesn’t know that he can say it was wrong, but he does ask that important question as to why such action is not taken against others.

Jollu Rajappa's reaction at 1:23

The second one is by the father of the Unnao rape victim. He is also asking the same thing. Why such action is not taken against the guys who raped his daughter? "I do not want money or any other kind of help. I want to see that the accused are chased and shot dead like the Hyderabad encounter or hanged to death," he said.

Unnao victim's father's reaction

I don’t know how to end this piece and I don’t know how this societal fault lines will play out in the end, but Jollu Rajappa’s stoic face will remain etched in my mind. The face of 2019 for me.