Gurmehar is our daughter, protect her rights

Even if I completely disagree with what Gulmehar says, I must, as a father, as an Indian, protect her rights and her dignity. Otherwise I am not entitled to be called an Indian, says Tarun Vijay.

She looks exactly like my daughter. Rebellious, unyielding and speaking her mind with confidence. 

To me it doesn't matter what she said. Yes, it was all against us. It’s no use saying what she said was thrown down her throat by someone else. She can make up her mind, and let it be so.

I am a father and know what it takes to hear when your child speaks what you may not like. But listen I must.

And trash all those who threaten her or use bad language against her.

Even if I completely disagree with what she says, I must, as a father, as an Indian, protect her rights and her dignity. Otherwise I am not entitled to be called an Indian.

And her legacy makes me salute her family. Those who love their country and soldiers must make sure that the families of the soldiers too get the same izzat and affection which we give the soldiers.

It can’t be a conditional affair. 

I remember my daughter, a proud Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad activist, used to say exactly what I did not like to listen. 

But I had to listen to her. That’s what being a father entails you to do.

My satisfaction lies in the fact that those whose predecessors were jailed by the Nehru government for supporting China in 1962 and who insulted the Kargil warriors of 1999 in the JNU campus, had to take shelter in the Kargil legacy. 

That’s enough for me. 

It proves that a soldier protects his motherland when he is alive and also protects the people who abused him after he has attained martyrdom.

That’s the soldiers' legacy for me. Like the Ganga.

And there is a story behind what I said.

In the ’70s, there was a huge uproar over animal fat being mixed in a brand of vegetable oil manufactured by a certain company. The criminals, all influential people, were supported by a shankaracharya.

The outrage against him grew and several pieces appeared against him in the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh’s Panchajanya. The then S chief, M S Golwalkar, chided the editor and said, ‘You may disagree with him, but respect his legacy and his ochre robes.’ All fell silent.

War killed your father, yes. But Gulmehar beta, don't be such a stubborn young girl. 

Your father was killed in a war that was started by the same country who killed thousands of your own countrymen in Mumbai and everyday in Kashmir. You act like you are in a denial. This is exactly where your fellow Indians can come to your rescue.

After all, it is but the duty of the elders of the house to make them understand life better. 

It is commendable how the young generation today fearlessly voices its opinion. They say their voices are muffled and yet they appear with such panache on panel discussions. How the media uses such young minds is sad. Let them not be used for petty TRPs. 

It is no longer about who is patriotic or not. If she respects her father’s sacrifice I fail to understand how she does not realise he was doing it for his motherland. For her to say ‘Bharat ke tukde honge’ is in so many levels a gesture of disrespect to her father. 

However, I don't blame her. 

The people who supported such views were the same people who are taking shelter behind the Kargil legacy today.

The cowards who show their bravado in a protected, unchallenged environment through their terror tactics and muscle power keep silent when the brothers of Kargil warriors are shot dead in the Valley and in the Maoist-infested areas.

I have never ever seen a JNU left activist paying tribute to the soldiers, condemning the mad, communal violence of the jihadis or take out a candle march in support of the poor villagers who fall victim to their violence.

Nor do editors ever show their support to the families of the armed forces. Even for the sake of looking ‘independent’, they have never even reported on the killings of the RSS/BJP workers in Kerala.

As if RSS-BJP people getting murdered is a matter of satisfaction and not a matter of outrage.

That is the India of their dreams. Elimination through violence and then taking out candle marches for peace in the evening.

I have never seen these peaceniks ever protest against the barbaric ‘stoning of women to death’ in Pakistan and other Islamic countries. That’s a secular act of protecting women’s rights, they think, perhaps.

But they must protest against Zionist policies, attacks on Palestine, and the rights of Muslim refugees, at India Gate and at Jantar Mantar.

They, like their co-brothers in Maoist lands, have waged a war against India and her patriotic people.

Today the adherents of Communist ideology along with Wahhabi Islamic-fascism have become the biggest threat to national security and social harmony. It must be banned. 

It’s how USA protected its land and people. It’s how the Indian government must act.

Like the 9/11 perpetrators who took advantage of American liberal values and democracy to demolish the very same institutions, they are taking advantage of Indian democracy, Indian Constitution and liberalism to attack and demolish these very institutions. 

Protect the Constitution or perish. There is no other alternative.