Just before the Indian election results were out on May 23, 2019, there was a spurt of articles in international media highlighting the true nature of Modi’s personality, divisive and polarizing, given to hyperboles, with an intrinsic hatred for anything intellectual, unapologetic Hindu nationalist, with scant respect of either truth or decency. It was not that international media had suddenly turned against Modi but rather analyses were based on observations of the person who built his entire life on total deceptions where his frequent claims to contradictory version of his own life didn’t add up to a logical truth. But given that in the five years of his first term he multiple times obliterated the borders between myth and history, unintentionally or intentionally distorted the history and historical figures, it hardly surprises anyone that he would add layers to his arid life built on tunnel vision that would not add up.
While it would be hard to not acknowledge the gargantuan scale of his win yet it would be, at the same time, hard not to understand the power of his singularly divisive agenda of fear and hatred, inculcation of victim hood in Hindu psyche and priming it for retribution against what they call as a millennium of foreign domination, in relegating the real issues of governance to the background. From north to south and east to west, people voted for Modi for creation of a Hindu nation and assigning his massive victory to anything else simply doesn’t count, it’s an out loud message to minorities and dissenters that notion of an inclusive India had gone far too long.
The image of Modi as savior of Hindu didn’t built up in last five years of his rule. The foundation of that image was laid when he went on air on that fateful day of the Godhra train burning and demanded charred bodies brought back to the state capital of his Gujarat; then he let hell loose on the Muslims of the state in the following days. The camps set up for the escaping Muslims were out loudly described by Modi as children producing factories and Hindus of the state roared in approval and the rest of the country’s majority people took a notice of him. From that point on it was a potent mix of business and ultra Hinduism.
His dominant government in Delhi since 2014 might have not fulfilled many of the promises, but he didn’t waver in his vision of division and cruelty. He maintained a steadied silence when his followers embarked on lynchings and killings overtly on the basis of religion; he unleashed a down right economic cruelty when he made 86 percent of people’s money redundant and famously made fun of it. Steve Forbes called that act as awful and immoral but nothing Modi ever did could be termed as Moral. How many people can forget a desperate call by Ahsan Jaffry to Modi when Hindu marauders attacked the Muslim dominated area during the 2002 riots in Gujarat only to be taunted? The only issue on which Modi remained steadfast in past years was to show the minorities their place and to strangulate all institutions of secularism, turn education and history into farce, fill scientific conferences with sessions on mythology.
The people voted in overwhelming numbers through the breadth and length for Modi, as a brilliant analyst called, they bought his vision of Hinduism hook, line and stinker; anyone trying to cloak it with a patina of vision probably doesn’t understand the term visionary. Nehru was a visionary, who built the edifice of democracy in a country full of contradictions yet didn’t become an autocrat. India might survive another five years of total domination of Modi, it will emerge a different place with scathed minorities. Five years is a long time and given his propensity for bluster and awol at the time of attacks on minorities, the country for now is headed into a dark cave without knowing where it does end. Those from the majority who voted for Modi with gusto should not get too complacent, strong men need to feed their egos and find scapegoats for failures and never hesitate to turn their hoodlums on anyone. It’s like you created a Frankenstein’s monster.
No comments:
Post a Comment