Washington: The United States should be able to call out the tearing of the Indian national flag outside Madison Square Garden in New York by Khalistani extremists a “disgrace”, with the same clarity it uses to condemn antisemitic vandalism, mosque attacks and temple graffiti. Until it does so, America’s invocation of “free speech” will sound less like a commitment to principle and more like a justification for looking the other way, a report has stated.
On August 29, while Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) chief Mohan Bhagwat spoke at Madison Square Garden in New York about unity in diversity and the Indian diaspora’s responsibilities towards the countries they live in, a starkly different scene unfolded outside the venue.
Khalistani extremists, including elements associated with the terror group ‘Sikhs For Justice’, were seen tearing and stomping on the Indian national flag, with one protester tying it to his foot for the cameras. Additionally, slogans of “Khalistan Zindabad” and anti-India chants were raised in the presence of New York police, a report in Khalsa Vox detailed.
It noted that this was not an act of protest but a blatant insult to the national flag of a sovereign nation, staged on US soil against a visiting Indian public figure and millions of Indian-Americans for whom the Tiranga carries deep significance.
“Bhagwat’s appearance was billed as a ‘Universal Oneness Celebration.’ Inside the hall, he told the diaspora to be loyal first to their karmabhumi—the United States—and argued that India’s unity does not require everyone to share the same faith. Outside, a fringe separatist current answered with the oldest tactic of the Khalistan campaign abroad: desecrate the flag, smear the Indian state as illegitimate, and dare anyone to object. Indian media and circulating video captured the tearing and trampling. Indian-origin bystanders pushed back. The police largely stood by,” the report mentioned.
“This pattern is not new. Khalistan activism in the West has repeatedly used flag-burning, temple vandalism, threats against diplomats, and glorification of violence as political theatre. India has designated SFJ and its leading figure as terrorist entities. The United States has not. That gap is the opening through which this street theatre keeps walking,” it added.
According to the report, the real surprise is not that a small separatist lobby exists, but the ease with which American officialdom treats the humiliation of another democracy’s flag as simply an expression of free speech guaranteed under the First Amendment to the US Constitution.
“Flag burning of the Stars and Stripes is protected speech in US jurisprudence. Extending the same shrug to the systematic, targeted abuse of a partner nation’s emblem—while that partner is a major security, economic, and diaspora partner—is a political choice, not a constitutional inevitability,” it stressed.
(IANS)
