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Murder Most Foul

Sometimes I wonder whether we deserve what we have.

We have the loveliest beaches, the finest mountains, the most exquisite valleys, forests that never seem to end. We have amazing monuments that pay tribute to our rich history. From the Taj Mahal and Fatehpur Sikri to Jaisalmer Fort to the Golden Temple to Sarnath and Nalanda and some of the most gorgeous churches you are likely to see anywhere. We have festivals like Pushkar and Kumbh that are breathtakingly unique. We have birds and animals that have vanished elsewhere. We have women who are the most beautiful. Flowers that are the rarest. Music that is unique. Artistic talent that does not exist anywhere else in the world.

Yet how do we treat all this? Shabbily.

The argument is always the same. We are too poor a nation to worry about such things. Let us first worry about the basic necessities of life. About jobs, homes for the poor, drinking water. Why worry about vanishing forests and ruined beaches when we cannot give our people the simplest amenities? Why are we so busy protecting our historical monuments when our cities are bursting at the seams and civic problems are getting from bad to worse? Why worry about bride burning and dowry deaths? Once India gets on her feet, all these will disappear. As for animals, let human beings first survive and then we will worry about why tigers and peacocks and spotted deer are dying.

In other words, we are ready to forget all the wonderful and precious things that our forefathers have preserved for us, from the music of Maihar to the toys of Bastar to the rhinos of Kaziranga to the unique healing herbs that have kept alive our ayurvedas, simply to ensure that modern India gets a better present. Fine. Fine if only it were true.

The fact is that this is not true. As we are destroying our past, we are actually destroying, almost simultaneously, the present and the future for all of us. We are not getting more jobs. We are not getting better drinking water. We are not even getting more roofs over our head. Instead, what we are destroying is not just our heritage but also our dignity as a people, as a nation. We are telling the world that we do not deserve to get what we have.

You can find any number of excuses to vandalise your past. You can say the Taj reminds us of how we were colonised for three hundred years by a bunch of barbarians from Central Asia. You are right. We were. But, following that specious argument, if you allow Shahjahan's work of art to be destroyed, you are no better than those who broke down our temples and built mosques out there. If you set churches on fire and say that India does not need to remind itself of the British Raj, you are no better than the piratical Portuguese who spread their gospel by the sword.

In one week we have killed 13 of the rarest tigers in the world, 80 peacocks, our national bird, 12 spotted deer in different parts of India through criminal callousness. Yet those who have done this are walking about as free men. Zoo keepers, wild life wardens, park officials, the very people who are supposed to take care of our priceless heritage, are guilty of animal slaughter and yet, instead of punishing them in the severest and most exemplary manner, the government is allowing them to get away with their lies. Commissions are being appointed to cover up the simple fact that most of these people make their livelihood not from protecting rare animals but by trading in them.

Everyone knows that tiger bones are swapped for guns and drugs. That the shahtoosh trade in Kashmir funds militants. The direct nexus between wild life trade and terrorism has been extensively recorded. Those who vandalise our environment, kill off our rarest animals, pillage our natural heritage are the same people who sponsor terrorism. Directly or willy-nilly.

By turning a Nelson's eye to such crimes, we are giving militancy a free hand and allowing these rascals to go free. These are traitors. They are predators who work hand in glove with the most dangerous criminal elements even as they pretend to be protectors of our zoos and parks.

Naveen Patnaik is as culpable as Farooq Abdullah. They are both turning a blind eye to such dangerous crimes because it suits them. They know that those who trade in wild life and the environment are making money that goes towards funding weapons and drugs. Yet they look away because their friends and political allies are involved. That is why people are being sent from the Centre to give them a clean chit because the Centre cannot afford to lose their support. It is political blackmail. Murder, not accident.

Luckily, this time they were caught. The media stumbled upon the killings.

Frightening? Of course it is. But unless we realise that it is not possible to look at the future without protecting the past, such crimes will continue. We must understand that India is a holistic nation where the past, the present and the future are interwoven. We cannot allow one to be desecrated without risking the others.

Pritish Nandy

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