Vidya Bhushan Rawat

Every Life matter..

Yesterday when we were standing up in peace and against hatred at the Connaught Place inner circle with posters and placards like ' Muslim Lives matter', curious onlookers would come and observe the posters. A few onlookers thought to question us so here goes the conversation :

What is this Sir ?

This is a protest against the killing of an innocent Muslim in Rajasthan.

But what happened ?

Don’t you know an immigrant labour was killed brutally there.

He must have done something wrong Sir. Muslims are doing a lot of wrong things.

But who will decide what is wrong and what is right. Who will be the judge. Everyone at the street.

But Sir, Hindus too are being killed and we don’t see such protests.

That is your problem. Yes, we speak for Hindus being killed by the Jihadist in Pakistan and Bangladesh. We protest against all forms of violence against any one, one of my friends said. Tomorrow, if you are violated or anything happen to you or your family or community, rest assure, this community of human rights defenders will speak for you.

Those seeking answer remain clueless or were not convinced. They moved ahead and tried to create problems but later the police intervened. I was just wondering as why people are unable to understand that we are only standing in peace and seeking unprejudiced implementation of rule of law. Why is that people in India are unable to understand that there is no 'final solution' to an issue and we all have to live together and there is no other way except to respect the rule of law and work towards common brotherhood. It is not that we are asking something special.

We need to speak for each other. It is not that mere Muslims lives matters. Each life is important, I said but we must understand the context of this protest. It is happening in the aftermath of one of the most gruesome murders in Rajasthan. If it were a plain murder, then, I would not have stood that much. Have you seen the gory details of this. The videos and that too life. And how the man was crying. How he was brought to a place which make thing worst that you don’t trust anyone. Do we want to come to a stage when people don’t trust each other and when your most trusted friend is betrayed in such a way.


Do you know that the video of this barbaric murder was made by a 14 years old child. Don’t you get worried. I can bet many people don’t have the capacity to see blood. They fear. They faint and it is natural. But today, the way, and these things are being promoted and encouraged deliberately will only make us insensitive towards each other.

When the violence get justified and accepted as norms then the danger is much bigger. People will kill not the so-called enemies but also their own parents and brother sisters for small mistakes or no fault. Violence will become a part of life and only masculine people will use it. There is a much bigger danger for future.

Do we want our children growing in such fear that a sister is unable to speak to her brother or a father is unable to scold his son or a mother unable to stop her son for the fear of this violence.

This is where my fear lies. If we don’t speak against such kind violence and those promoting and encouraging them, I can say firmly that we will end up being part of it and our social, cultural and family environment will become biggest victim of it.

No society grows which live in perpetual violence. Violence converts human being into mad inhuman persons. You can't be human. So for humanity, we will have to speak, we will have to share and feel pain and anguish for those too who are not our coreligionists or family or relatives. We will to speak for all those who are fellow human beings and not merely our co citizens.


Muslims lives matter like any other citizens of India. I would have made the slogan like Muslim lives too matter so that the slogan gives a clear message that we don’t want Muslim lives matter alone which the Sanghis would jump to exploit politically elsewhere.

And speak against violence and injustice. No need to justify or glorify to do the 'purana hisab kitab'. Don’t keep them as we all have our record. No need to fight for Raja maharajas. Fight for human values. No religion is in danger. It is people who are living in danger and suffering. Unfortunately, Gods have not been able to help them. God is purely politics. Politics of fear and politics to make people suffer. So let God remain in your personal chambers but don’t allow God and gods to be dragged to political issues as it will only bring suffering and brutality in the name of Gods.

As a humanist we condemn all kind of violence in the name of God or protecting religion or keeping supremacy of religions or making one religion villain while other super. It is time we create better human being. Rajasthan's youth was blinded in religious hatred in the very similar way as stories of those Jihadist killing non-Muslims in their majoritarian areas. Secular and human rights people are fighting there too and they should fight here too to protect humanity and human values.

And we may be the real 'minority' but yes the survival of the world is attached to this minority who have courage to speak up and take up the cause of all those who are persecuted in the name of their religious, ethnic or caste identities. We need to humanise ourselves and speak up without doing political calculations to protect our constitutional values and defend the idea of a plural, secular, democratic India.

Hastakshep