Fasting by Proxy

The adversaries of the Congress Party have been crying hoarse over the night Police action against Baba Ramdev. Some even likened it to Emergency Days. This may be due to passions running high since the timing chosen for the Police action may be ill-advised. Conversely, the people who assembled there are supposed to know the repercussions of such assembly, which became unlawful assembly. May be this is a technicality? But then everything happening is a mere technicality. On his part, Baba Ramdev has under-estimated the brute rule of law, when invoked, and over-estimated the popular responses and the political windfall his fasting would fetch. This certainly was a religious congregation under the guise of Civil Society. If allowed to continue, his fast would have triggered more and more such fasts, tearing the democratic fabric apart. Suppose tomorrow a few Muslim Priests or Buddhist Monks or Christian Priests emulate him demanding reasonable or otherwise demands, what will happen to this country? Allowing such proxy-campaigns is fraught with the danger of the Indian Republic going banana republic way. Those who support such ill-advised assemblies must bear it in mind that we are living in a functioning democracy. We should not carry the protests too far lest the society fall apart. Admittedly, everyone is rightly disgusted with corruption and black-money, but this should not encourage the people to blindly support those suffering from Lime-light Seeking Syndrome. To this extent, the action of the government is justified in ordering crack-down against the politically motivated Proxy-Fast.