Untamed Mind of Fanatics

Yes, to me a fanatic is one who in the score of various irrational or ridiculous reasons commits grievous crime. Let me tell you the premise why I was pushed to this writing. Last week I read “Man kills son, sister and niece to appease Hanuman” in one of the tabloid. Wow, Holy Spirit in its furor to reach sanctity. Welcome to the world of parricide, fratricide, matricide, patricide or whatever cruel killing of your own people (of family and country) under the aegis of Religion, God and righteousness. May be the crime has been happening over centuries but I would like to throw my own thought to the current horrid scenes I have been seeing, reading and hearing. I have been listening to quite a lot of news about persons killing their own sons or daughters or wives or fathers or sisters or aunts, not necessarily associated with religious causes but also ridiculous reasons attached to it.

We have heard a lot about religious fanatic where a person performs some holy handwork of obliterating people claiming that their religion is better than the other. We were asking for zero tolerance against terrorism with stringent laws (POTA and other state centric crime laws) and we have internal religious terrorist with zero tolerance against other religion. Take frictions between Hindus and Muslim; it’s a sheer pleasure to claim superior identity over each other. Vishwa Hindu Parishad in the name of Hindutva had done wonderful job to take pride in their religion. Christians and Muslims being a minority in India have been constantly raced over by majority Hindus to show their chauvinism. Muslims and Christians have done their act too and not to mention Jihad’s and Christian Maoists.  These fanaticisms are not limited amongst religion; it has its impact within sections of a particular religion. The divide between upper and lower castes in the Hindu society would add to the fascination of fanaticism. Upper caste believes that he is close to God and lower castes have no right to enter temple and pray God. I believe God is omnipotent and he can’t be shared. But these people do. The dalits being lower caste group have been ghettoized from the place of upper castes and you should have heard atrocious act by these upper castes. Naked parading of dalit women, head shaven in front of mob, beating up to death, mass raping…are these signify the upper castes. I see only upper ness in their caste and not in their character.  

There is other sect of spiritual extremists who were so much obsessed with the thought that sacrificing bloods of people and offering them to God would yield them sorcerous power. Holy God…when did you start asking for blood of your own people. I don’t know what the heck are they going to do with such an ill-causing power? I was watching a program in national geographic channel titled Occult where they have been showcasing the practice of Occult and witchcraft by some tribal people in parts of Jharkhand. (A report says that these practices and killing of people are widely prevalent in the tribal regions of Jharkhand, Orissa, Chattisgarh and Parts of Andhra). When asked what was the reason for them to do this. They claim they have been treated very badly by other sects of society and want to harm them with their witch handiwork and also not to mention they want to use their power to make money. I don’t believe in superstitions but a little thought of fear was instilled inside when I see with my own eyes on the screen where a sorcerer made cock motionless with the spray of so called divine water and some rituals being carried out with mantras chanted. Is this for real? Whatever, it has always been treated as a bad ominous and we tend to reject people practicing it. There have been instances which claim that the lives had been lost by craft work of witches. There has been blind superstition on the part of uneducated people in the tribal sections of Jharkhand. The general mob accuse that the death of a woman had happened because of the bad spell by the witchcraft and they also attribute the occurrence of Chicken pox in that region to her. These people were always skeptical about any bad outcome and never had any dimension to the occurrence of an event. Whatever bad happens in there, it is because of black magical spell by witchcraft. These people indulge in such barbarous act where they drag the women (considered as practicing witchcraft) out of her home at night, beat her ruthlessly and burnt her alive. What an astonishing act to weed out the bad element without any serious thought. You should not be surprised to hear that your own brother/family member could indulge in killing. In the programme televised by NAT GEO, I saw a nephew killing his aunt in the farm field when she was alone, with the help of a blade dissected head out of her body and carrying it to the village and claimed to have killed the witch without much repentance. May be we should award and honor him for saving lives of several people.

Not to mention about people who believed in doing any fanatic act to uphold their community. I heard the following gory act by people in the recent news. There was a married couple who belonged to two different communities. The parents, who felt it was an ignominious to their community, got hold of these couple and tied them to a pillar and lynched them with solidarity of the public. Moreover their death has never been reported. What a pathetic and sick parent they could be in this planet. To marriage we need two good hearted souls and not the so called enigmatic religion or caste or creed or race to hinder. How come a father and mother could come with such a brutal way of punishment to save the honor of community and not a single consideration of losing their loved ones. What blinds their brain; the fanaticism towards community. Throw community to dump yard and show some characters of being humane.

There exists other shade of fanatics; sex maniacs. Have you listened to the news during the advent of anti-Christian act by religious fanatics? A nun was gang raped by those brazen people who claim to be patronizing a religion. I never heard any religion that insures raping a moral and legal act. This harrowing incident happened at some convent in Orissa. We should bestow them with national bravery awards. Moreover, we should not lose our attention to the pleasant news we hear from some of the ashrams. Child has been raped by God men, sexual harassment and these places are affluent with money hailing from learned people like you and me. I don’t blame the good ones existing to serve humanity.

The ridiculous shade to fanaticism could not be resisted. The following news had been taken from internet and this happened some two years back. A 25-year-old school dropout of the some village 'sacrificed' a six year old boy in a temple deep in the forest near the village. After brutally axing the little boy to death, he offered the boy's blood to the goddess for fulfillment of his desires, including relief from a gastric problem. I can’t stop laughing; killing a person could cure your gastric problem.  This should find a place in one of the greatest and weirdest scientific discovery of ailments. That 25 year old sucker doesn’t have a modicum of brain to function as a human.

The other fanatics motivated by drink, greed, ignorance and anger should also be taken into account. There was this incident where a father heard about the miracles performed by some bapa, who claims that he will give back your son's head once it is chopped off. The child's head was chopped off. The man lost his son. You can be ignorant but not to the extent of losing your common sense. A laborer allegedly killed his four-year-old son in an inebriated condition on a particular night. Drinking could ease you to kill you own kins and why don’t you kill yourself with drinks of poison. There was a father who killed his own son to claim insurance of 1 lac. I am afraid to see if people are getting so greedy to kill your own sons and daughters. There have been instances where angry husband had bludgeoned his wife over some trivial issues. All these men are real fathers of all the above mentioned “***CIDES”.

These events cannot be stopped but can be triggered at ease. It’s difficult to tame these fanatics. The superficial thought about occult has been deeply enrooted in the minds of tribal people. Even to cure a disease they go to these magical occults. These people have not been educated and are not exposed to any facilities we have in urban. Let’s hope the globalization and economic development would slowly advent into these regions which would impart education, jobs and welfare. We should bring about the awareness to these people of what act they have been mired with.  We need to bring a change in their obstinate minds that killing is not a solution. It is the perception we need to change towards people and we have a lot of other things to do in our life. We need to portray the happy life they can lead with education, work and contribution to society.

I don’t know I categorize all those people who are enthusiastic in attempting reprehensive act as fanatics. Hope we will try to be good and live as a normal human without ugly thoughts.