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Fasts, Hunger And Hunger Strikes
countercurrents.org | Anand Teltumbde | 05 July, 2011
Fast and Hunger
It is amusing that the country having a dubious distinction of being a home to world’s most hungry people should be shaken by the threat of hunger by a few. But that is what has been happening since Mahatma Gandhi forged them into a weapon. Interestingly, he referred to it as fast, not hunger strike, which it actually was.
Take for instance the case of Irom Sharmila from Manipur, who has entered the incredible eleventh year of her fast unto death. A poor soul, she thought, she was following Gandhian method and declared her protest as fast unto death whereas what she actually did was a hunger strike. Because, the issue she raised was the repeal of the Armed Forces Special Powers Act (AFSPA), which has virtually reduced the entire North East into a military state for the last five decades. It was too radical a demand for a fast; it had to be a hunger strike.
Magic of the Media
It is interesting to see how media differentiated them. While the media went gaga over the fast of Anna Hazare and Baba Ramdev, it had almost ignored Medha’s although the issue it had raised related to life and death of the slum dwellers in Mumbai in contrast to the surreality of corruption or abstraction of black money, the formers blew up. All of them were Gandhian in their approach but they differed in their appeal. The abhorrence of the latter is really a reflection of their loathing for the majority of people of the lower classes, who are seen to shape the politics. Naturally, media was all out to promote it to maximize their gain.
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* This Post is uploaded on July 05 2011.
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