For some individuals, the momentous occasion of Narendra Modi ascension to the Prime Ministerial post severely and irredeemably impaired their understanding of patriotism and loyalty towards one’s nation. The hatred harboured by these individuals for PM Modi only intensified as the time went by. The animosity reached such epic proportions that hating Modi and by extension, anyone who espoused his ideology, became more important than standing by national interest.
Besides the Modi government, the Republic TV and its Editor-in-chief Arnab Goswami, who has unabashedly stood on the side of national interest, have been the latest object of their ire for vigorously promoting nationalism and unsparingly calling out those who incite anarchy and pander to the anti-national forces.
Recently, two of such individuals who are still smarting PM Modi’s reelection in 2019 and Arnab Goswami’s growing prominence in the Indian media landscape, WSJ journalist Sadanand Dhume and former Chief Minister of erstwhile state of Jammu & Kashmir, Omar Abdullah, ‘liked’ a disparaging tweet by a Pakistani barrister to Republic TV after the latter invited him on its show to debate on “Rift between India and Pakistan on the Spy issue as Two Pakistani officials from the embassy in Delhi expelled by India over spying”.
The Pakistani lawyer, Asad Rahim Khan, turned down the invitation offered by Republic TV and wished evil upon them to maintain peace between the two countries. “Thank you for your invitation. If I wanted to hear a fascist lunatic scream for war for an hour, I would listen to Joseph Goebbels’ old speeches. For the sake of peace between our countries, may your channel die a quick death,” Khan responded in an email to Republic TV.
Both, the invitation by the Republic TV and his scathing riposte was shared by Khan on his official Twitter account. The tweet was liked by WSJ journalist Dhume and politician Omar Abdullah, both of whom have a predilection for Pakistanis, along with many other Indians who held fervid ill-feeling for PM Modi and Arnab Goswami.
Republic TV’s invitation for Arnab Goswami’s show tonight, with the response. pic.twitter.com/aJ4IP5Ji16
— Asad Rahim Khan (@AsadRahim) June 1, 2020
For starters, it is profoundly ironical that a Pakistani is preaching sanctimonious sermons about peace between India and Pakistan to an Indian news channel, on a day when two Pakistani diplomats were caught red-handed indulging in espionage activities against India. Any reputable man from any other reputable country would have felt a modicum of embarrassment even responding to a news channel of a country against whom his fellow countrymen were caught spying, but Asad Rahim Khan, being a Pakistani, whose figurehead Prime Minister continues to whip up an anti-India frenzy on social media websites periodically, used the opportunity to seek grandstanding by laying claims to lofty ideals of envisioning peace between the two countries.
Secondly, Asad Rahim Khan is no proponent of peace and good-will as he would have us believe. Khan has glorified terrorism in Kashmir on more occasion than one. He had recently attempted to humanise the Hizbul Mujahideen terrorist Riyaz Naikoo by characterising him as a ‘resister’, thereby lending legitimacy to the terror activities and violence he was involved in. Besides, Khan also described the Modi regime as ‘Fourth Reich’— a futuristic Nazi regime that had employed coronavirus to brutalise Kashmiris.
“Just as the Nazis exploited typhus, the Fourth Reich uses corona to brutalise Kashmiris, ravage healthcare and execute resisters like #RiyazNaikoo. The UN’s unprecedented OHCHR report seeks a Commission, its highest-level probe for global crises,” Khan tweeted in a post uploaded on May 7, 2020.
It appears that Khan was just recently stuck with the epiphany of having peace between India and Pakistan. Until May 7, 2020, Khan believed in ratcheting up the rhetoric against India and accusing it to be a modern-day Nazi regime that was bent on using coronavirus as a tool of repression against Kashmiris. It is pertinent to note that Khan Asad Khan drew on Pakistan PM Imran Khan’s allegations of fascism against India, notwithstanding Pakistan’s troubled history of having witnessed far more years of dictator rule than the rule of democracy.
In another tweet from 2019, Asad could not stop his inner Islamist from coming out in open. The day when the Supreme Court of India ended the protracted wrangling over the Ram Temple in Ayodhya and handed over the vexed land to Hindus for building a magnificent Ram Temple, Asad posted a tweet criticising PM Modi, India and the Indian judiciary that he claimed upheld ‘Kar sevak militancy’.
“A PM that compares anti-Muslim massacres to killing puppies, a parliament that passes bills to cleanse Kashmir, and now a judiciary that upholds kar sevak militancy…Each branch of the Indian state is a tribute to Hindutva, and a vindication of Jinnah,” the tweet by Asad read.
However, the hostility for PM Modi among scores of Indians such as Sadanand Dhume and Omar Abdullah is so deep-rooted that they have no qualms in disregarding the contemptuous and outrageous allegations made by Pakistanis against India. On the contrary, Dhume and Abdullah appeared to have revelled the denigratory remarks the Islamist Asad Khan made against the Indian News Channel. It didn’t matter to them that by expressing their approval with Asad’s response to the Republic TV, they were also supporting the Pakistani’s lawyer’s glorification of terrorists who are perpetually at war with India and threaten to disrupt the peace and sovereignty of the nation. Their hatred for PM Modi has blinded their responsibility towards the nation and caused them to take leave of their senses. It is time that they gain some semblance of sanity, and determine which side of the border do they truly belong!
