The word secret spawns a range of emotions in one’s mind. A state, for obvious reasons, needs to protect and take measures to prevent dissemination of information that is of secretive nature. What happens when one puts political preferences before the safety of the state and the statesman? This is exactly what happened today as a politically motivated person, namely, Tehseen Poonawalla posted what seems to be the tentative schedule of the PM for a specific date.
Tehseen Poonawalla has always taken an adverse view of the incumbent government and had his share of anti- government and specifically anti-Modi rhetoric. This is justified in a democracy but this rhetoric should not compromise the security and safety of a statesman.
The tweet came in response to the announcement of fast by the prime minister on 10th of April against opposition’s disruption of Budget session. The tweet by Poonawalla has an attached picture of the tentative schedule of the PM Modi on 12th of April. Poonawalla circled the section with the mention of “Breakfast on Board”.
What Poonawalla might have missed that it is possible for one to skip breakfast and the prime minister does not travel alone. Thus, just because one does wish to fast do not necessarily mean he would pressurize others to follow suit.
In our Indian democracy, there has always been a sort of self imposed and regulated line of political culture where two people from two different and at times contesting point of view have showed restrain for the betterment of the collective democratic principle of the country.
Tehseen Poonawalla with this tweet, while failing to prove his initial point of PM misleading people by stating that he is on fast actually exposed this new kind of vitriolic nature of politics that this new age political activists harbor. In his quest to de-legitimize the Prime Minister, Poonawalla has in turn exposed the shallow nature of his political rhetoric and the vindictive approach he possesses.
The next point and the most important one here is the one of security, as pointed out by a lawyer on twitter –
https://twitter.com/ippatel/status/984324171978035200
As per the lawyer, this is a punishable offence. If the lawyer’s claims are indeed true, this is indeed troubling. Poonawalla must understand the possible consequences of such irresponsible behavior and the security implications of his vindictive act.
This political rhetoric does not only compromise the security of the PM but also is a violation of official secrets act , as the lawyer claims, which explicitly forbids spread of such information.
Its one thing to have different political ideas but to put the safety of an elected head of state at risk is sheer to score a political brownie point is just reprehensible. Such brand of politics should be avoided if we wish to foster and sustain a democratic atmosphere in this country.
Whether there will be a legal response from the incumbent government remains to be seen. It would be interesting to mention here that a BJP worker, namely Anup Pandey, was arrested for publishing minute to minute itinerary of Prime Minister’s visit to his home constituency in March this year. Anup Pandey is among one of the people that PM Narendra Modi follows on Twitter. Thus, it would be only just that the authorities take the necessary steps to ensure that the law of the land prevails. If the charges as alleged by the lawyer are proven and no action is taken, the message would be that it’s completely fine to compromise the security of the PM and the state just because one disagrees with the incumbent’s political views.
As of now we can only hope that people rise above such petty politics and work together to strengthen the democratic fiber of this country.