How Sharmistha’s arrest for anger, not agenda, exposes liberal hypocrisy

New Delhi: The arrest of Sharmistha Panoli, a 22-year-old law student, from her Gurugram residence by Mamata Banerjee's Kolkata Police has once again exposed the dual standards of India’s so-called champions of democracy. 

For a cohort that never tires of sermonising about freedom of expression, the celebration of her arrest betrays a glaring hypocrisy that goes far beyond one viral video.

Yes, Sharmistha said something offensive. She said it in response to Pakistani trolls mocking India after Operation Sindoor. She realised the mistake. She deleted the video. She apologised.

But for the self-proclaimed defenders of liberal values, who usually swarm social media with hashtags against "authoritarianism" when one of their own is detained, this was not enough. 

This time, the arrest was acceptable. Even celebratory. Because Sharmistha is not one of them. She is not part of the approved ideological ecosystem that considers itself the sole custodian of democratic values in India.

For them, democracy is always under threat, just not when someone they disagree with is arrested.

This is not a sweeping generalisation. It’s a pattern. 

When AltNews co-founder Mohammed Zubair was detained, the same digital tribe erupted in protest. Zubair himself, when confronted by an X user drawing a comparison with Sharmistha, effectively justified her arrest. There was no ambiguity in his stance.

1. Zoobear was arrested in 2022 and sent to Tihar jail for 25 days for his tweet in 2018 ( For sharing a screenshot of a movie clip from 1983)

2. Zoobear wasn't given any 41A notice by Delhi Police, He was arrested when he had come to Delhi police station when they had served a…

— Mohammed Zubair (@zoo_bear) May 31, 2025

His tacit approval was amplified by fellow YouTubers like Ravish Kumar. 

Suddenly, the gravity of arresting a young woman for a social media post didn’t feel like an emergency. 

Because this time, the system wasn’t “fascist”. It was West Bengal Police under Mamata Banerjee’s regime.

It is important to draw a distinction here, not in the moral value of the remarks made, but in the intent and context. 

Politicians across the spectrum, particularly during elections, routinely make inflammatory remarks. They get away with them by invoking the "heat of the moment".

But somehow, that logic doesn’t extend to Sharmistha, who made her remarks in the heat of another kind of moment, a national conflict, in the middle of a psychological war with Pakistan following Operation Sindoor. 

Her emotions may have clouded her judgment. But unlike professional politicians, she acknowledged the misstep and apologised.

So what exactly makes her a bigger threat to democracy than elected officials who spew communal venom with political calculation?

The most chilling aspect of this case isn’t the arrest. It’s the reaction to the arrest. A video of Sharmistha being taken into custody has gone viral. Not because it exposes abuse of power, but because people, some of them ordinary Bengalis, others belonging to the self-styled liberal elite, are celebrating her humiliation.

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The background chatter in that video says more about India’s present fault lines than any political debate ever could. 

There is a visible divide between West Bengal and the rest of the country. A divide fuelled not by linguistic or ethnic tensions, but by a growing appetite for political vengeance.

Janasena leader and Andhra Pradesh Deputy CM Pawan Kalyan perhaps said it best: "Secularism isn’t a shield for some and a sword for others. It must be a two-way street."