Come to think of it, if push comes to shove, the Naokhali Hindus will be the first ones to disappear from the face of Bangladesh. And to think that Mahatma Gandhi went to Naokhali to bring some semblance of communal harmony to the communal riot-hit district in 1946, even as the bald-headed vulture perched in rows and rows on wall after wall after gorging heavily on human flesh.

The pictures still exist of the vulture and the dead and are often displayed in Social Media by the overzealous Hindu. Those Hindu who fled the then East Pakistan were the fortunate ones. They at least had their lives spared and intact. In 1947/48/49, 28 per cent of East Pakistan’s population was Hindu. Today, 8 percent is the limit. The rest have disappeared/assimilated in the Muslim ranks or many of them have left their ancestral places for West Bengal or other parts of India.

Asked the other day what the Modi Government was going to do about the Bangladesh Hindu’s plight, BJP spokespersons wandered into distant alleys and cul-de-sacs. It’s now apparent to the ‘andhbhakts’ that the Bharatiya Janata Party is a sham party. And Modi, perhaps, the charlatan he is made out to be. In fact, with the beard and head of silvery grey hair, he looks more and more like the Sphinx of Giza, unresponsive and uninterested, except in trotting out vaccination numbers which could be true or false!

Behind the curtain, however, there’s much happening. And there seems to be an agenda. The media behaviour over the last couple of days let the cat out of the bag. The evening of October 18, for example, all the primetime talk shows on all the ‘godi media’ TV channels had the same topic: “Afghanistan to Kashmir to Bangladesh the Hindu is in danger.”

It was as if a single puppeteer was guiding the show, all the shows. Of course, BJP spokespersons on these shows did their best to deflect accusations that the killings in Kashmir were Modi and Shah’s failure. They held forth on Afghanistan and Taliban, Pakistan and Mehboba Mufti, and the dead Ali Shah Geelani! Anything but answer the question; “What the hell were Modi and Shah doing about the targeted killings of Hindus in Kashmir?”

And the rest of the political talking heads on these shows were no less callous. They, too, chose to take the discussion into political alleys that suited their paths to electoral victories in the forthcoming 2022 assembly elections. Every one of the various parties’ spokespersons, including the BJP dude, had eyes squared on the impending elections.

So much so, the Hindu and the Muslim, the Christian and the Buddhist, and the Jain and Sikh, could all have fallen off a cliff and it would have mattered little to these political stumps on TV. And, if the endangered Bangladeshi Hindu had ever thought that Narendra Modi – the ‘Hindu Hriday Samrat’ – would descend on Naokhali – perched on a flying chariot pulled by winged horses – the poor fellow should be forgiven.

If anything, Narendra Modi and the Bharatiya Janata Party stand accused of playing with Hindu sentiments worldwide. For all the lies they have spoken since and before coming to power, the idols of Hindu gods and goddesses should look down on them and laugh at them and the rakshashas can have the balcony.

The Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh is another Hindu drumstick that has been throwing the aphrodisiac at the Hindus telling them that they have “only one country” on the planet and not the 56/57 that the Muslims have. So BJP gadfly Subramanian Swamy tweeted “attack Bangladesh and bring the Hindus home” but nobody BJP replied or retweeted!

The long and short of it is, the BJP and Narendra Modi can only talk like they own the Himalayas. Otherwise, as we get closer and closer to 2022, and perhaps the worst electoral drubbing that the BJP could face, all that the Hindu, the Muslim and the Christian – the Sikh – the Buddhist and Jain, can do is have a cracker-less Deepavali and hope no Pulwama is waiting in the wings. Somebody has already warned of more surgical strikes! (IPA Service)