IIM Bangalore faculty asks corporate India to 'de-fund' hate speech

Bengaluru: A group of current and retired faculty members at the Indian Institute of Management Bangalore (IIMB) has asked leaders of corporate India, to "de-fund" the spread of misinformation and hate speech through news channels and social media.

In an open letter, written in their personal capacity, 11 present and six retired IIMB faculty members have said that they are drawing the attention of corporate India leaders to the "fragile state of internal security with an increasing risk of violent conflicts in the country."

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Noting that over the past few years, an open and public exhibit of hatred towards minorities in public discourse has become common practice in India, in political discourse, television news, as well as on social media, the signatories said, the usage of othering, dehumanising and demonising language while referring to minorities has reached alarming levels, and acts of violent hate crimes, often by organised and radicalised groups, against minorities have seen a rise.

"The inaction of police and security forces during recent communal riots, as well as the acquittal or pardoning of culprits involved in rape and mass murder during previous instances of riots, coupled with the silence of authorities, has signalled a glaring level of complacency in place of urgency by the government," they said. Further suggesting that these trends concern corporate India, as they point towards an increasing risk of violent conflicts in the country, they said, in the worst case, such acts of violence could culminate into a genocide, which would annihilate the social fabric as well as the economy of the country.

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Corporate India, which hopes to reach new frontiers of international growth and innovation in the 21st century, cannot afford to live with even a small possibility of such a scenario, they added. The signatories to the letter are: Anubha Dhasmana, Arpita Chatterjee, B K Chandrashekar, Deepak Malghan, Hema Swaminathan, Krishna T Kumar, Malay Bhattacharyya, Mira Bakhru, P D Jose, Prateek Raj, Raghavan Srinivasan, Rajluxmi V Murthy, Ritwik Banerjee, Shalique M S, Soham Sahoo, Srinivasan Murali, and Vinod Vyasulu.