Facts ignored: What the complaint against Kumar Vishwas reveals about the 'illicit relationship'

Oh dear. It seems that the Twitter mob has jumped the gun yet again. All it took was a news flash that AAP leader Kumar Vishwas had been summoned by the Delhi Commission for Women over a complaint filed by a female party volunteer. That bit of news immediately mutated into news of ‘illicit relationships’ and even ‘molestation’. The tweets ranged from calls for him to undertake a ‘potency test’ to calls for him to get arrested by the BJP, because he had ‘ruined a womans family life’. Zee news , which has been in a running battle with the politician ran the news with the headline, “Kumar Vishwas summoned over illicit relationship charge, he says `ha..ha..ha`” [caption id=“attachment_2226506” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Ibnlive image[/caption] In fact, ‘Kumar Vishwas’ was the number two trending topic in India, at the time of writing. Here are some of the tweets outraging on the subject:

But lets take a closer look at the allegation itself. Nowhere does it mention molestation, or even illicit relationship. All the reports indicate that the aggrieved woman, in fact, wants Vishwas to dismiss the rumours which link her with him. Lets break it down. She says there was no affair, and she wants him to also state it, because apparently her husband her left her over these unfounded rumours. The fault, if any, as far as we can see, seems to lie with her relationship with her husband, who has left her despite her protestations of her innocence. How this has translated into Vishwas’ fault is a testimony to the wonder of social media. The allegations themselves, made by a man claiming to be one Ajay Vohra, have remained unsubstantiated so far. To date, no one has claimed to be the sender. “All leaders (who received the email) asked the man to come forward with the allegations. Where is he? Even today, I dare the sender to reveal his identity. It is easy to create an email id and send emails to everyone,” Vishwas fumed on a TV channel when asked about the allegations. The fact is that Vishwas has already strenuously denied all rumours of a relationship with this person. And despite past claims that there is an incriminating video, none have surfaced. And given the frequency with which sting video and audio recordings fly around these days, it’s a little difficult to believe that one exists. But despite the glaring lack of any substance, Twitter has been quick to pass judgement – both back when the rumours first surfaced and now that a complaint has been filed with the DCW. As pointed out by Firstpost senior editor Sandipan Sharma in Aprl, “For the Twitter panchayat, this is a crime that deserves pronto public execution of Vishwas’ character. In its blind, irrational fury, the online khap has turned into the accuser, investigator, judge, jury and executor. It has replaced rumours with evidence, fertile imagination with investigation, collective bias with judgment and hashtags with fast-track courts. And now again, Twitter has been eager to ignore the facts in favour of outrage. No one it seems, has bothered to read the complaint itself. This lack of interest in the facts is doing no favours to the woman, who has filed the complaint precisely to kill the rumours of any sexual relationship.  So it’s all a bit ironic when BJP leader Ashwini Upadhyay calls for police action because this “incident has ruined the girl’s family life” As to what Vishwas should do at this point, is entirely up to him. Should he speak up and beg the woman’s husband to come back to her? Should he protest the woman’s innocence as she has demanded? Both options seem a little ludicrous and counter productive. A denial is not going to get the ‘Twitter khap’ off Vishwas’ back. In any case, whether he keeps silent or speaks out aloud – all over again – the facts will remain the same. There was never an affair or molestation. So what are we all going on about?