(This article was first published on 24 June 2018. It has been reposted from The Quint’s archives to mark George Orwell’s death anniversary.)

The comments are predictable on social media. Along with the choicest abuses (very non-sanskari and something our tradition would never have allowed us to do, we must say), we are branded either as Congressi dalals (Congress agents) or BJP bhakts, depending on the content of what we write. There is hardly a word on whether what we have written is cogent or not.

No critical feedback which we would love to get and act on, no pointing out inconsistency in the line of argument and no effort to counter the argument persuasively.

What we observe instead is an all-out war to decimate even the tendency to differ. There is a desperation to crush, in the inimitable words of celebrated British novelist George Orwell, “the essential crime (thoughtcrime, in his words) that contained all others in itself.”