Why is it so difficult to accommodate a different opinion?

There has been a wive of great intolerance in the last few years. It is true that there had been incidents of severe violence and religious and ideological intolerance before too but the recent years have been witnessing this intolerance level to quite a great extent. Recently there was news of A Kashmiri vendor being beaten by two saffron-clad men in Lucknow. Another incident was reported wherein a youth was beaten up mercilessly during an interview by a group of people for speaking against the central govt. On job issues. People who stand an speak against the policies or criticizes the govt. are labelled as anti-nationalists or are boycotted. What is this new India? Why accommodating or even listening a viewpoint different than ours enrages us so much?

India is a nation with a huge diversity of the population. We have people of so many religion, caste, and creed. There are people who favour different ideologies and political opinions. Above all is the right to freedom of speech which the constitution provides us. Everyone is free in a country like India to speak up what he/she feels like then why is it so difficult that we are becoming so intolerant to others views?

A person who is not resembling the same view as yours necessarily need not to be against you. It is just a matter of opinions. The problem starts when we create a boundary before us which does not let in another idea than ours to cross our minds. This leads to debates and even worse is that we come across such pathetic scenes in our day to day lives of violence flooding our screens.

If this is the fear to not let any negative or criticism propagate then this democracy would lose its meaning in India. It would more become an authoritarian rule where freedom of speech will just be caged in the papers of the constitution. Until and unless we attain societal freedom, the freedom, which the constitution given us is of no use.

We have seen many killings like that of Gauri Lankesh, and boycott of other journalists. This can also be connected to the several mob lynching incidents happening in the country. What is the root cause? The same, the intolerance towards a different set of opinions. If this continues then soon we will land to a world in which no free voice would ever be able to prosper.