Rajiv Gandhi's assassins: Why are Political Parties silent?

The morale of our political parties has been declining day by day. After the Anna Hazare episode, it is the time for another political drama over the assassins of former Prime Minister Rajiv Gandhi. The hullabaloo began with a resolution passed in the Tamil Nadu assembly on Aug 30, 2011, demanding the President of India to reconsider the mercy petition of three convicts in the brutal assassination of Rajiv Gandhi. The Tamil Nadu assembly has extended a wrong precedence by this. It is something unimaginable in any other nation.

Following this, Chief Minister of Jammu and Kashmir, Omar Abdulla tweeted about a hypothetical situation if the same happened in the case of dreaded terrorist Afzal Guru.

The biggest tragedy here is that all political parties, from regional to national level, remain tight-lipped over the issue even though the resolution questioned the fundamentals of national sovereignty.

Actually, Omar Abdulla had put forward a very sensible question even though his intention is highly dangerous. Why Indian society's reaction to Tamil Nadu assembly resolution has been muted. Some times our political parties do not have not the guts to answer this.

But the answer is simple. They never want to risk their electoral prospects by opposing the Tamil feelings. After the last election debacle followed by high profile corruption scandals, the Dravidian brigade DMK has been searching for a magic wand to regain its space in Tamil Nadu politics. Obviously, they have to exploit the Tamil feelings. And Congress requires DMK for the next Lok Sabha election. When DMK tries to play the Tamil card, puratchi thalaivi also has to sing the tune with the regional sentiments.

Dreaming an alliance with AIADMK in the next Lok Sabha election, the nationalistic BJP has also decided not to comment on the issue. As politics is the art of possibilities, every political party tries to gain momentum from any event, no matter whether it helps the people or not.

The issue (the brutal murder of Rajiv Gandhi) was purely a terror act. The culprits - Perarivalan, Santhan and Murugan, who seek clemency now, had challenged the sovereignty and democratic set up of India. Yet our political parties have been crying for them. Definitely, we can expect this in the case of Afzal Guru and Ajmal Kasab also.

*Dipin Damodharan, who is based in Kerala, is a Citizen Journalist for OneIndia. The views expressed in this article are solely that of the author and do not necessarily represent those of Oneindia.in or of Greynium Information Technologies Pvt Ltd. *