Two youths allegedly refused to give up a seat reserved for senior citizens for an aged Muslim man on the Delhi Metro recently, and asked him to “go to Pakistan” if he wanted a seat. However, angry fellow passengers intervened, forcing the youngsters to eventually apologise to the elderly man.
The incident came to light after activist Kavita Krishnan recounted it in a Facebook post.
According to Krishnan, when the elderly commuter asked one of the two youngsters to vacate the seat, the youths refused. Guessing correctly from his appearance that he was a Muslim, one of them said:
This seat is for Hindustanis, not for Pakistanis like you. If you want a seat, go to Pakistan and get it there.
At this, Santosh Roy, National Secretary of All India Central Council of Trade Unions, who was sitting opposite, intervened and asked the youngsters to apologise.
A group of young men now jumped to the two youths’ defence. One of them even caught Roy by the collar and told him too “to go to Pakistan”.
However, incensed fellow passengers took on them just in them, forcing the group to back off. Later, Roy, along with the elderly man, took the two youngsters to a police chowky at Pandara Road and left.
However, when he visited the police chowky a few days later, he found that the man had accepted an apology from the duo and had decided not to pursue the matter.
Roy also found the two youths at the chowky, and they apologised to him profusely. They were accompanied by their parents, who said that their sons had “done a shameful and wrong thing”.
Krishnan writes that the current atmosphere had prompted the youths to abuse the elderly Muslim gentleman.
Those men had been emboldened by the prevailing communal climate to think they could get away with abusing a Muslim person... But the most important thing is that a communal remark by two men did not go unchallenged by bystanders, ensuring that the men who made the remark had to withdraw it and apologize to their victim.
“Perhaps they will reflect on the immorality of their own behaviour– since it met with public opposition rather than public support,” Krishnan concludes.
(At The Quint, we are answerable only to our audience. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member. Because the truth is worth it.)