WILL YOU TOLERATE ME?
By Neel Anil Panicker
Will you tolerate me a little more?
Will you promise that you would not brand me an infidel, call me names, worse, threaten me with rape, murder, or harangue me day and night, scream your throats hoarse about throwing me into the Bay of Bengal?
Will you assure me that you would not set hired goons on me, have them beat me black and blue, scar me, main me, worse set fire to me in full public view?
Will you tolerate me a little more if I tell you I am a Hindu__
though not your regular cow worshipping, beef hating temple hopping type
But of a more watered down garden variety.
One who doesn’t quite know the Scriptures by heart as you most certainly do
One who doesn’t spend his waking hours flitting in and out of a hundred and one WhatsApp groups as is your wont___dropping dollops of pure Godly wisdom, absolute unadulterated manna from the skies
One who doesn’t spew vitriolic hatred against certain people whose names end in an epiglottal Khan, or a Bano or an Ansari or Qadri.
Sorry to disappoint you, my dear, but I am none of these; just another regular guy
who still makes friends irrespective of their colour, caste, language, culture, nationality, gender, or worse, which side of the political divide they belong to.
One who still believes that there’s hope for this great country that is ours to love and protect for we, its denizens, are not what you make of us or want us to be; but we are we___one nation, one beating heart___despite people like you.
So, my dear friend gone astray, will you tolerate me a little more and promise not to lynch me if I tell you I am a Hindu but sorry, not your type.
#neelanilpanicker #flash #IamaHindu #cowvigilanttes #lynching #mobocracy #India
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