Vishwa Mohan TNN
NEW DELHI: After soccer star Bhaichung Bhutia, it’s Kiran Bedi who has refused to run with the Olympic torch here on April 17. If Bhutia endorsed the cause of the Tibetans against the Chinese crackdown in Lhasa, the high-profile former IPS officer has reservations about the “highly suffocating” security around the event.
“I cannot run in a cage,” Bedi told TOI. “The security measures will reduce the torch run into mere tokenism and formality.” But what about safety of the Olympic torch in view of Tibetan protests disrupting the relay in various parts of the world?
“I understand we need security. But being a democratic country, we ought not to suppress democratic ways. Let them (Tibetans) demonstrate on one side and let the relay happen too,” she said. “I am for a balance. Run the torch with a sense of participative space and manage dissent (Tibetan protests) without snuffing it out.”
Bedi’s outburst came a day before a Chinese team arrives here to take a look at overall arrangements.
On the elaborate security arrangements at Rajpath, Bedi said: “If there is so much fear, then let the police enforce Section 144 (of CrPC). Why turn Rajpath into a jail? It’s a highly secured place. There is no need for barricades. Policemen ought to manage it well. They can be in plain clothes and make arrests, if need be.”
“We are a democracy and are used to handling dissent. Why should we be so hyper on this?” asked Bedi, who recently stepped down as director general of Bureau of Police Research and Development, apparently in protest against being overlooked for the post of Delhi’s police commissioner.
Expressing solidarity with the Tibetans, she said: “What’s wrong if Tibetans are asking for their own home? Tibetans are homeless. They have been thrown out of their own land. They are fighting for a cause. You and I too will fight if we face the same situation.”
“From the human rights point of view, I feel the Tibetans need their homeland back. We, as citizens of the world, must speak for their rights,” she added.
But Bedi favours an iron fist to deal with violation of law. “If they (Tibetans) violate rules, they should be suppressed,” she said. On Aamir Khan deciding to take part in the relay, she said: “He can run in such an atmosphere, I can’t. If there is one (person) less (in the relay), it should not make any difference… There is no contract that I have to run. I was not paid to run.”
