It is becoming an increasingly disturbing trend as to how Indians are now seeking out reasons to show agitation, grief and discontent – and bringing public life to a grinding halt.
Fine. That is acceptable to an extent.
But unprecedented deaths in these situations cannot be justified under any circumstances. Whether the public grievance is real or imaginary, it is provoking a riot and an apparently inevitable death of a number of people, that cannot be ignored. The bottomline is that this is a practice so wasteful, so pointless that it is hard to believe that the people involved are not realising it!
Frenzied fans of the thespian Rajkumar went on a rampage in Bangalore, pelting stones and targeting vehicles in and around the stadium where his body had been kept. Six persons, including a police constable, were killed in the violence.
Why? Why did the people have to resort to violence because someone died of perfectly natural causes? Why did they have to resort to burning down buses and stalling everything? What is the whole point!?!
The latest this is that now, residents of Vadodara are rioting because an old dargah that is two centuries old was demolished by the local municipal corporation. So far five people have been killed and several injured. Curfew was imposed in the area to put a stop to the gruesome killing, especially after an unruly mob of 1500 set ablaze a car burning alive a muslim gentleman, late on Tuesday night. In the Vadodara incident, the government bodies claim that they were only going ahead with a well-announced demolition drive aimed at all kinds of illegal structures, including shops and temples as well. The demolition order was preceded by an effort from Muslim organisations to have it declared as a heritage structure, which was refused by the mayor of Vadodara. The mayor’s justification was that there is no dearth of such places of worship that spring up on public land and that they should be treated like any other illegal structure.
A weird incident - A couple in Gujarat exchanged wedding vows over the telephone after the bridegroom could not make it to the ceremony due to violent clashes in the bride’s city.
What all this really tells us that Indian people are not capable of managing discontent without having chaos on the streets and public areas, which leads to the pointless and tragic deaths. It is as if mobs looting, damaging and burning public property and stalling a normal life have become the symbols of protests and anger in democratic India.
All the sane and probably more effective methods of raising objections or debating have become useless and irrelevant. Killing, violence and unrest have become the first choice of the aggrieved!

The irony of it all? While all of this is claimed to be in public interest, it is the public that suffers the most.

A textbook used at schools in Rajasthan compares housewives to donkeys, and suggests the animals make better companions as they complain less and are more loyal to their “masters”, an Indian daily reported on Tuesday.

“A donkey is like a housewife … In fact, the donkey is a shade better, for while the housewife may sometimes complain and walk off to her parents’ home, you’ll never catch the donkey being disloyal to his master,” the newspaper reported, quoting a Hindi-language primer meant for 14-year-olds.
The book was approved by the state’s ruling (party name deleted) government but has sparked protests from the party’s women’s wing.
State education officials in Rajasthan, known for its conservative attitude towards women, said people should not be upset by the comparison, the paper said.
“The comparison was made in good humour,” state education official was quoted as saying. “However, protests have been taken note of and the board is in the process of removing it (the reference).”

This is bad. Really really bad. I am at a loss for words. Related news pieces (Google News) can be found here.