A pre-Christmas plea: let us make India secular again  

The RSS-BJP has sucked the joy out of our lives in the same vulgar and messy way Snoopendra Modi sucks mangoes. Not all of us are miserable though — BJP members and their business/ industrialist cronies are rolling in money like well-fed ATMs.

Sometimes I get this disconcerting image of Amit Shah in my head where he impersonates Scrooge McDuck (Donald Duck’s money-mad uncle) and dives into an Olympic-size swimming pool packed with 2000 rupee notes. Fortunately, he’s wearing all his clothes. I’d probably have a fatal heart attack if I visualised him in swimming trunks — he’s no Daniel Craig. I know this for sure because I once saw footage of him emerge from the Ganges snorting.

Party leaders from certain non-BJP parties who give the BJP “issue-based” support on their vile bigoted bills have probably earned enough to buy little islands in Ecuador like alleged serial rapist and murderer Smarmy Nithyananda, who reportedly named his island Kailaasa. BJD Leader Naveen Patnaik will probably call his island ‘Ecquidistant’, the AIAMDK leader (he’s so insignificant I don’t even remember his name) will call his island Amma-Daddy, BSP leader Mayawati will probably call her island ‘Ambedkar’ even though it really should be called ‘Gowalkar’ since she always follows the diktats of the BJP in Parliament.

NDA ally and JD(U) Leader Nitish Kumar is a different kettle of fish altogether. He voted for CAB despite the entreaties of two of his party’s senior members. Fortunately, his party has just declared that it refuses to support NRC because CAB + NCR leads to concentration camps. But it’s far too early to celebrate. If his despicable antar aatma kicks in when the time comes to stand up and be counted, he may as well buy an island too and call it ‘Underthe-table Aatma.’

Then there’s the rest of us who do not get any happiness out of seeing our fellow citizens lynched, humiliated and persecuted like never before in India. We are watching askance as the RSS-BJP get into full Nazi ‘Final Solution’ mode and seem determined to exterminate Muslims. Even their beloved caged parrot Zafar Sareshwala, who is invited by news channels to praise Snoopendra Modi ever so often, has started whining and deviating from the script. And why BJP Leader Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi praised that discriminatory Citizen (Amendment) Act beats me. Maybe he is completely lacking in vision like our ‘ Modi-is-God’ public intellectuals” in 2014? His descendants will probably yank his photographs out of the family album and paste them on dart boards.

The BJP has even ruined my spontaneous midnight snacks. The bread is buttered, the tomatoes are thinly sliced, and then when the clock strikes the midnight hour I shudder and lose my appetite. Because this is usually the time the three witches from the RSS-BJP shake the President and Governors awake and execute yet another of their evil plans.

The Ek dhakka aur do (give it one more push) chants of the same Hindu mob that demolished the Babri Masjid are now being repeated for the Indian Constitution. If we don’t act now, someday nothing will be left of our Constitution.

So wake up and hit the streets! The protests against the Citizenship Amendment Act across the nation have had a Prozac like effect on me. I am overjoyed when I see Indians of all faiths stand shoulder to shoulder. Snoopendra Modi doesn’t like it though, and he blew his dog whistle at a rally in Jharkhand: “People who are setting fire (to property) can be seen on TV... They can be identified by the clothes they are wearing,” he said. So very Star of David! The Delhi police dutifully responded to the dog whistle and attacked students of Jamia Millia University. I’m angry but yet I feel upbeat when I see universities from across India stand in solidarity with them.

The most hard-hitting anti-CAA placard I have seen so far is this: “Dear Hindus, we rejected Islamic state in 1947. Now it’s your turn to reject Hindu state.” Bang on!

Put on your walking boots and let’s serenade Snoopendra and his sidekick with that famous Nancy Sinatra song: “These boots are made for walking/ And that’s just what they’ll do/ One of these days, these boots are gonna walk all over you.”