Instead of blaming BJP, he must face the charges
Tarun Tejpal clearly jumped the gun in trashing the charge-sheet filed against him on Monday, as “proof of political vendetta”. A day after the founder-editor of Tehelka and one of the country's most high-profile journalists accused Goa Police of “playing into the hands of their political masters”, supposedly by suppressing the closed-circuit television footage of the incident, a Goa court ordered on Wednesday that the video be shared with him and the defence. Now Mr Tejpal's accusations have fallen flat, with the sting taken out of them. This was to be expected as his allegations, high on rhetoric, have always been low on substance. On its part, Goa Police has made clear that the CCTV footage supports the victim's charges against Mr Tejpal. More importantly, the charge-sheet, which runs into 2,846 pages, is a document based on three months of intensive investigative work. This will be scrutinised in a court of law, so if there is even an iota of truth in Mr Tejpal's complaints, he will have the opportunity to redress his grievances during the trial.
Besides, there is nothing new about Mr Tejpal wailing about being politically targeted. Ever since the matter came to the fore last December, he has argued that the BJP Government in Goa is using the case to settle scores against him. This time too he has sought to portray himself as a journalist who is being unfairly punished for taking on the high and mighty. And for good measure, he has also added the bogey of communalism to his victim narrative — decrying that a “major party that is bidding to rule the great pluralism that is India is imbued with no tolerance of dissenters and critics”. Mr Tejpal hopes that this will allow him three benefits: First, deflect attention from the grievous crimes with which he has been charged; second, marshal support from the so-called liberal, secularist forces in the intelligentsia; and third, maybe bring him some political backing from the Congress in particular and the political left in general as they take on a resurgent Right in the upcoming general election. For now, Mr Tejpal's strategy seems to be failing on all three counts. Few in the public seem to have been swayed by his whining, and popular opinion remains strongly against him. The country's mainstream left-liberal intelligentsia has also been reluctant to support him openly despite his exhortations that his case is a “warning shot across the bows of all liberals and opponents of communal politics.” Even his political patrons seem to have abandoned him, at least in public. At this point, Mr Tejpal has played all the cards at his disposal — the victim card, the free Press card, and the communal card. None of them has reaped any result. Instead of persisting with this campaign of calumny against the state machinery in Goa in particular and the BJP in general, Mr Tejpal will do well to re-focus his efforts on the legal battle that lies ahead of him. He needs to defend himself, not accuse others irresponsibly.