The horror unfolding at Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity is awful and would make any sane person’s blood boil. Babies born to unwed mothers sold to the highest bidder, in a sordid tale of human trafficking. In fact, there were also reports that as many as 280 babies are missing from the Missionaries of Charity.
With sex scandals and rape cases tumbling out of the Church’s closet, it was obvious for questions to be raised. But the patron saint of hypocrisy and chief sermoniser Rajdeep Sardesai was busy shielding the Church and drawing wildly false equivalences instead of asking the questions a journalist should be asking.
Rajdeep, after a long spell of silence, tweeted that the baby-selling scandal is ‘shocking’ BUT, the criminal acts of few should not be allowed to ‘tarnish the legacy of Mother Teresa or make this about Christianity’.
He then proceeded to draw a horrid equivalence that only insults the children being sold like products. He asked if “a robbery in Tirupati temple tomorrow become about Hinduism”?
Numerous scandals are being exposed with respect to the Church recently. There are scandals, rapes, and now, there is a human trafficking scandal that tumbled out of the Missionaries of Charity’s closet. The Church’s magazine today published an article that shielded the rapist and blamed the victim for the crime committed against her.
When one looks at Rajdeep’s tweet, one realises that the zeal with which the Church Magazine protected the organisation even at the cost of grave insensitivity is mirrored by many journalists who shy away from asking real questions.
Apart from the glaring insensitivity of Rajdeep’s tweet, in his bid to protect Christianity and the Church, he has exposed his hypocrisy even further.
Rajdeep has often shamelessly tried to justify crimes against Hindus and blame all Hindus and malign the religion. For example, when Hindu activist Prashant Poojari was brutally murdered, Rajdeep Sardesai had no problems assigning a “political context” to the killing. He went on to explain how Dadri was a brutal murder that must be condemned by one and all, and he was right, but Prashant Poojari’s murder had a context, and the brutality couldn’t be compared.
After the conviction of Lalu Prasad Yadav, Rajdeep Sardesai had proceeded to peddle an extremely casteist narrative giving the impression that Lalu was convicted because of his caste and some others were not because they belonged to “higher castest”. In effect, to prove that Lalu was an innocent man, he was willing to malign not only the Judiciary but also Hindus for cheering the conviction of a scam accused.
When 2 BJP workers were successively murdered in West Bengal, Rajdeep Sardesai ironically took to Twitter to urge everyone to ‘hold their peace’ until a thorough investigation was conducted and asked people to ‘stop playing politics over dead bodies in Bengal’. He was referring to the 2 BJP workers who have been found brutally murdered and hanging from trees in Purulia district of West Bengal within a week. Incidentally, Mamata Banerjee, Bengal Chief Minister’s nephew had not too long ago stated that he wanted to make Purulia ‘opposition free’. The BJP has squarely blamed the TMC government for murdering BJP cadre.
It was ironic that Rajdeep Sardesai would take this line of argument, considering when a boy called Junaid was lynched, he was quick to conclude that Hindus were responsible and that Junaid was killed because he was carrying Beef. The courts had rubbished the claim later and asserted that he was killed over a seat dispute.
In fact, when the horrific Kathua rape had happened and some lawyers, who were later vindicated by the Bar Council of India had demanded a CBI enquiry, Rajdeep was one among many who had tried to “shame Hinduism” and all Hindus.
For some reason, Rajdeep painted the ones seeking a CBI enquiry as people supporting the rapist and then proceeded to shame Hinduism.
In the light of Rajdeep’s history, who is now reportedly out on bail after conducting a fake sting operation, his sermonising with respect to the human trafficking scandal at Mother Teresa’s Missionaries of Charity was amusing to many.
Twitter too reacted to his insurmountable hypocrisy.
Prof Anand Rangarajan, who has been responding to Rajdeep and exposing his hypocrisy in style, also commented on his brand new u-turn by calling him the “Michelangelo of Hypocrisy”.
All rise. Michelangelo has entered the Sistine, gathering his lungi into a knot and shimmying up a drain pipe like a coconut tree climber to paint this masterpiece.
And WHAT a masterpiece. The Renaissance Man of Indian journalism is at the peak of his powers. (h/t @iAnkurSingh) pic.twitter.com/c1OdwJlVs2
— Anand Ranganathan (@ARanganathan72) July 10, 2018
Some were too exasperated to comment.
Offered with no comment. pic.twitter.com/IDxBomE3dB
— pracchannAstrin (@WordOfTheFree) July 10, 2018
It was pointed out by one user that on 9th, spokesperson of Missionaries of Charity was on a debate with Rajdeep and how the “journalist” kept “interpreting” what the Spokesperson was saying and drew the conclusion that this was a one-off incident and shouldn’t be used to blame entire Missionaries of Charity.
Yesterday, Missionary of Charity spokesperson was on show with Rajdeep and twice Rajdeep ‘Interpreted’ what Spokesperson said on the show. He says & I quote “You’re trying to say that this is one off incident and shouldn’t be used to blame entire MoC”, spokesperso “Yes, exactly”
— Mihir Jha ✍ (@MihirkJha) July 10, 2018
While nobody expects the controversial journalist to reform, it is bemusing that the ethical standards maintained by Rajdeep are only lower than his intelligence, since clearly, he is not even intelligent enough to mask his hypocrisy effectively.
