Shivaji Would Have Ordered Hacking For Injustice to Lakshmana Kailash, Victim of Tyrannies

Times of India on November 3, 2007 reported a sad story of an innocent young man.

“In the early hours of August 31, Lakshmana Kailash K was asleep at his home in Bangalore. He was woken up by eight policemen from Pune who came knocking on his door and waved the Information Technology Act, 2000, in his sleepy, terrified face. Get dressed, he was told, we are taking you to Pune for having defamed Shivaji. Lakshmana protested that he didn't know anyone called Shivaji.

The policemen said that they were talking about Chhatrapati Shivaji and that an insulting picture of him had been uploaded on the Internet networking site, Orkut. The trail had led them to his computer in Bangalore. Turning a deaf ear to his protests, the cops took him to Pune and put him behind bars. Along the way, the 26-year-old Lakshmana, who works with HCL, learned that what he was being arrested for was a case that had triggered riots in Pune in November 2006. Political parties had forcibly closed cybercafes and gone on a rampage over the posting of the illustration which had poked fun at Shivaji.

Lakshmana was released after spending 50 days in jail, three weeks after the cops claimed to have nabbed the "real culprits".
“
This reminded me of the infamous case of P Rajan, an engineering college student during Indira Gandhi’s emergency.

Why does the state do this in the name of Shivaji- one of the most tolerant, sensitive and fair rulers India produced? (Akbar, Ashoka & Krishnadev Raya are luckier. No one still does this in their names!)

In 17th century, Shivaji- enraged at this gross injustice to a common man- would have ordered hacking of arms of erring staff of the ISP who apparently gave wrong IP address to the police.

Meanwhile, Lakshmana Kailash’s only consolation can be….


Artist: Charles E.Martin The New Yorker 16 Nov 1957