Why is the free world making an enemy out of India?

India is the world’s largest democracy. For almost seventy years now, the Republic of India has operated under the same constitution, with peaceful transitions of power and democratic elections. In doing so, India’s constitution and democracy significantly predates several prominent European nations, such as France, Spain, Portugal and Poland.

Beyond elections, India also built the socio-legal infrastructure around democracy long before several Western countries got their act together. Indians have enjoyed universal adult franchise, equality under the law and non-discrimination in public spaces since 1950. In contrast, the United States was reeling under government mandated racial discrimination in schools until 1954, in public spaces until 1965 and interracial marriage was illegal in many American states until 1967.

By all objective standards, this makes India a pioneer among democracies. Today, as the world’s largest democracy prepares to take its place among the world’s five largest economies, the free world has occasion to celebrate.

Yet, why is the free world looking at India with a jaundiced eye?  Why are they pointing fingers, trying to bracket us with Iran, China, Turkey, North Korea and other enemies of freedom?  Why do they reject the assertion of our sovereignty and civilizational identity?

When India intervened to rescue Bangladeshis in 1971, the free world was not kind to us. When India declared itself a nuclear power in 1998, we were hit with crippling sanctions. Today when India is offering asylum to the marginalized Hindus and Sikhs who fled from Pakistan and Bangladesh, we are being hit with the worst of Nazi comparisons.

From an Indian point of view, it begins to look like the rest of the free world does not want us. Or at the very least, they resent our existence and identity. They are making an enemy out of us.

This savage attack on India is being spearheaded by a handful of internationally known media outlets. These are media outlets which have sympathetic headlines for the chief terrorist of ISIS but not the democratically elected Prime Minister of India.

The anti-India sentiment has been driven so far by a vicious misinformation campaign. So much so that commonplace and common sense decisions by the Indian government have been shown as sinister violations of human rights. Take the Citizenship Amendment Act, which provides targeted relief to six persecuted religious minorities from three countries that share borders with India.

These three countries happen to be both Muslim majority and officially Islamic countries, which is why Muslims don’t make it to the list of persecuted minorities. It’s as simple as that.

Similar provisions would likely be found in the laws of almost every other democratic country. Making a common sense list of religious groups based on demographics and geography as a matter of administrative convenience has rarely been seen as impinging on freedom of religion. For example, every German state draws up a list of specific religions which receive state benefits, while others get left out. Belgium has a very similar structure for state support to religions. Incidentally, while Islam receives state support in Belgium, Hinduism does not. Does this make modern Belgium a Nazi like state?

And yet, an innocent act of justice by the Indian government has been twisted and portrayed as a crime of monstrous proportions. One can only blame ignorance and a certain lack of willingness to learn about India. And also age old suspicions and prejudices against Hindus. And shall we say, something uncomfortably similar to old school racism…

Why are we entering this mindless conflict when India and the rest of the free world face the same enemies both on the external and the internal front? The people who attacked the United States on 9/11 thought exactly like those who attacked us on 26/11. And these people have been collaborating for a long time.

The British have their John Corbyn, who went to lay a wreath on the graves of terrorists who plotted the massacre of Israeli athletes at the Munich Olympics. We in India have those who glorify the memory of Yakub Memon, one of the terrorists behind the Mumbai serial blasts of 1993 that killed 257 people. These groups are coordinating as well, borrowing each other’s rhetoric.

After the Paris attacks of 2015, the French Government moved to close dozens of radical mosques. As part of a larger move against Islamic fundamentalism, European countries such as Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France and Latvia have banned the burqa. Countries such as Germany, Italy and Spain have all moved to restrict hijabs or face veils under various circumstances.

Why then are India’s moves to counter radical Islamism being seen with suspicion?

It is for the West to understand that making an enemy out of Indians helps no one, least of all themselves. India’s rise on the world stage is irreversible. At the same time, the average Indian feels no hostility towards the West. All they want in return is friendship and respect.

Rarely has the world been at a point where morality and practicality converge so effortlessly. Why then is the rest of the free world refusing to do the right thing?

Happy New Year folks!

Why has democracy been dissolved in Kerala?

It’s the end of the year and so I don’t want to write long boring articles. Just short pointed ones. So here is one with two simple observations and two takeaways.

The Constitution is actually in danger. But not where our intellectuals want us to think.

What is happening in Kerala? Who dissolved democracy over there?

First of all, look at the tone of the headline. “Kerala Governor says … ”

It’s good for media to be factual. But I can’t help wondering if the media would have been so factual if it was a random person making an allegation say about being stopped by gau rakshaks and harassed for a leather bag? Or perhaps someone who thought a broken church window was evidence of a sinister plot by the Prime Minister against against all Christians.

But this is just Governor of Kerala making an allegation. And the accused is not the Prime Minister of India but an eminent intellectual.

If the Governor of Kerala can be stopped from speaking, is there a shred of democracy left in Kerala? Or a spark of shame left in the CPIM government of Kerala?

This is a video from earlier this week, showing CPIM workers surrounding the car of Karnataka CM B S Yediyurappa and hitting it with sticks. Everything is clearly on video.

CPI(M)s youth wing, unleashes a cowardly attack on K'taka CM Shri @BSYBJP . It was the driver's evasive action that helped the CM escape from further brutality.
State police didn't take any precautions even after getting security threats in advance.@Tejasvi_Surya @amitmalviya pic.twitter.com/drWFJ0PzTX

— BJP KERALAM (@BJP4Keralam) December 24, 2019

If a Chief Minister can be attacked like this in broad daylight, one can only imagine the reign of terror in Kerala. Forget democracy, or dissent, or free speech, where is the State?

Does it exist any more?

Suffice to say that if a high security individual had been attacked like this in the US for instance, their security personnel would have opened fire on the rioters. If the rioters had escaped with their lives, I am sure they would be looking at 20 years of hard prison time at the very least.

What happened to the rioters here? Does anyone know? Were they even arrested? Has the Govt of Kerala apologized to Karnataka CM for the breach of security? Has the CPIM as a party apologized to B S Yediyurappa? Why not? What gives them the ego to go on like this? And why doesn’t BJP make more noise about this?

At the beginning of this post, I said I would make two observations about the whole thing.

The first is this. The Kerala Governor is doing fine. At least he got a national stage to state his grievance against Irfan Habib stopping his speech. But spare a thought for possible young historians who might have dared to express a dissenting thought in front of Irfan Habib. The man has saddled India’s history establishment for decades.

What do you think happened to possible young voices who might have tried to challenge his worldview?

The second point is this. Why is BJP not making a bigger deal out of this. The attack on B S Yediyurappa was no laughing matter. What stops the BJP from demanding an apology from the CPM and the Govt of Kerala? The BJP could have put its entire machinery into pressuring the Communists to apologize to Yediyurappa. But it didn’t.

This is the problem with the ‘right wing’ ecosystem in India revolving so completely around a single political party. Whether we like it or not, the real priority of a political party is to win elections. At the moment, the BJP sees Kerala as almost unwinnable in the short term. Which means that the party has no real interest in pushing the envelope in Kerala. From an electoral point of view, it’s a waste of energy and resources.

And thus, the Govt of Kerala gets to pretend like Constitution and democracy simply do not exist. Contrast this with the opposing camp, which has many interests at many levels: from elections to media to academia. As a result of this, the left is able to fight a battle at multiple levels. Because they have separate dedicated teams for each task. They have their digital, mainstream and social media henchmen, their Bollywood influencers, they have their “fact checkers,” they have their puppet intellectuals, they have their foreign academic contacts. Each group is capable of acting autonomously and striking a blow.  Even when the Congress has no immediate electoral prospects, they can get their act together.

The right simply does not have that. Without proper division and delegation of tasks, everyone ends up doing everything and always focusing on the next election at hand. And that is how way too many political opportunities are left behind.

 

Dear liberals, don’t communalize metaphor like “Go To Pakistan”

Social media has been in turmoil today over a video that supposedly shows a Meerut police officer tell a group of persons to “Go to Pakistan.” Unfortunately, the police personnel in question had been faced with a mob raising slogans of Pakistan Zindabad and possibly threatening to pelt stones.

Liberal commentators, left wing and Islamist politicians have now seized upon these words to claim that law enforcement action by UP police is some kind of crackdown on dissent. They have been trying to draw comparisons with the worst excess and purges that happened under authoritarian regimes, ironically most of them leftist or Islamist.

However, taking words like “Go to Pakistan” literally shows a high level of cultural illiteracy among the intellectuals of India. And a refusal to understand the poetic metaphors used by common people on the street.

The expression “Go to Pakistan” must actually be read in the cultural context in which these words are said.

The word ‘Pakistan’ is used to refer to the proverbial enemy. This enemy could be anything. Like poverty or unemployment or untapped human resource potential.

So when the UP policeman told the group to “Go to Pakistan,” he was actually lamenting about how these folks are ruining their lives when they are led astray by unscrupulous politicians spreading misinformation against the Citizenship Amendment Bill.

Thus, “Go to Pakistan” is a line that rebukes Indians who are not living up to their human resource potential. It is a nationwide slogan of resistance. That we will not fall for the devices of those who mislead us.

Do not communalize the words “Go to Pakistan.” It’s a poetic metaphor. And we all know that any kind of imagery, no matter how offensive, is automatically acceptable as long as it is a metaphor.

Taking the expression literally would be culturally illiterate. And we would never want that, do we?

 

Worst of 2019 : Caravan asking caste of fallen Pulwama jawans

The year is practically over. Unlike the end of the last year, when the fever pitch for the General Election was rising with each passing day, politics is really winding down. It is time to take stock of the year that went by.

Yesterday, I wrote about what I found to be ‘best of 2019.’ It was a light hearted article, meant mostly for fun. But then, it got me thinking. What was the worst thing that we saw in 2019?

Indian politics and Indian media hits many new lows every day. Even today, a prominent celebrity reporter says he saw only tricolors and portraits of Mahatma Gandhi at anti-CAA rallies. This when anti-CAA rioters have stone pelted school buses. So there you go: there may be just 5 days left in the year but there are always new and promising candidates for ‘Worst of 2019.’

So I am really taking a risk here announcing the “worst of 2019” with still 5 days to spare in the year.

But after much thought, I realized that no act in the whole of 2019 can be so low as what we saw the Caravan do after the Pulwama attack. I am not even talking about this headline.

The Pulwama attack united the country behind one single cause : to avenge the killing of our jawans.

Growing up in India, I am no stranger to terrorist attacks. But Pulwama was the first time I felt something in the air. Random people I was passing on the street were talking about it. I was walking down a hallway and happened to hear someone talking into their cell : also discussing the attack. The sense of gloom and desire for revenge seemed to have filtered down to every citizen. Nobody wanted to ‘move on,’ which used to be our old stock response to the terror attacks of yore.

I would say the two feelings feed off each other. After Uri and the surgical strikes, India realized that we had a new security doctrine in place. That we could realistically expect revenge. Till now, we never did anything and so people never expected anything. So it looked like people just went about their lives without caring too much. But in reality, they had just made peace with the fact that it is our lot to suffer, shrug off and move on.

Once that equation changed with the surgical strikes, the real emotions came flooding out. There was anger and there was despair. But there was also anticipation to see how India would strike back. An elderly relative called my mom a few days later to complain, “Ten days have passed and still no revenge. What is the government doing?”

For a generation that grew up expecting not the slightest bit of retaliation for Kandahar, for Parliament attacks, for Mumbai train bombings, for 26/11 … this was certainly a new India.

And so, with the nation united, the elite media could have only one instinct. How to divide? And how do they divide us? Caste of course.

That headline from Caravan is distasteful enough. But when you get to the details in the article, you see that it is horrifying beyond imagination.

Yes, it is not for nothing that I believe this is the worst of 2019.

Just imagine. A family is grieving. Parents crying for their son, perhaps a wife crying for her husband, maybe even a child crying for their father. The body may have come home in several pieces, if any of it is identifiable at all. It would probably take a heart of steel to simply look at the remains.

And now imagine. In the midst of all this, a call comes. An elite journalist is on the phone. They don’t care about who your son was. What was his life, what were his hopes and dreams. They want to know the caste of your fallen son. Because they couldn’t figure it out from your caste neutral last name.

Indeed, if there is one thing that must scare the Ajaz Ashrafs of the world, it is people with caste neutral surnames.

Imagine being at the receiving end of that phone call.

Imagine being the journalist and alleged human being who makes that phone call.

Imagine being the editor who approves the publication of such an article.

And finally, imagine being the media club that applauds this lowly, shameful act.

And maybe then you would understand just how deep our media has buried its moral compass.

Terror has no religion, but a fallen soldier is not allowed to have a caste neutral name. Elite journalists will dig it up for us.

Dear Ajaz Ashraf, you truly are the worst of humanity. And most certainly, the worst of 2019.

Best of 2019 : My favorite Youtube video is that of Raghav Bahl explaining how Priyanka Gandhi will shake up politics

The year is coming to an end. And what a year it was. Since 2014, the biggest fear in the hearts of BJP supporters used to be : what about 2019? Will it turn out to be another 2004? That ghost has tormented us for 15 years straight.

Well, this was the year that ghost died and was buried.

In politics, there is never a dull moment. Never a reason to roll into a blanket and go to sleep, thinking there are no threats on the horizon. But the torment of 2004 was deeper. That election suggested that Congress is essentially invincible in Indian politics. That any other party succeeding is just a flash in the pan. Just a matter of time before things get back to ‘normal.’ The Gandhis believed in it. They said so both explicitly and implicitly. Remember how Rahul said that if India is a computer, the Congress party is its default? Many of us, including me, actually believed in it.

The liberal ecosystem of course believed in it very strongly. And 2019 was the watershed year when Modi and Shah changed the presets of Indian politics.

Now is a great time to go back and laugh at all the ecosystem folks who reveled in the belief that the Gandhis would always come back.

Who was the biggest flop of 2019? Surprisingly, it was not Rahul Gandhi. It was Priyanka Gandhi.

For a laugh, let me present to you my most favorite political youtube video of all time. If you want to see what smug foolishness in operation looks like, no better way. This is one for the ages.

That’s Raghav Bahl of The Quint at his smug and foolish best, relishing how he thinks Priyanka Gandhi’s entry has put BJP on the backfoot. I will tell you to watch the full video, because every second is such a gem. Bahl stops almost at every sentence, only to sneer at what he thinks is Modi’s plight.

Yes, what would scare veteran Modi more than an incompetent dynast taking uncertain footsteps in a political world where she has never dealt with a single challenge ever?

Here’s that smirk. It is my all time favorite.

Yes, in the video, Bahl actually makes fun of PM Modi’s speaking abilities, believe it or not. Says that two guys can play the alliteration game (i.e., Mazboot – Majboor from Modi, to which Bahl adds his own Magroor). Not just two guys, Mr. Bahl, practically everyone can play the alliteration game. But not everyone can connect with 17 crore voters. That’s the difference.

Now wait for the best part. It is good that Bloomberg puts up clear subtitles, even though the video is in English.

Let me get to the best part now.

And apparently, Priyanka’s entry has already led to 6% positive vote swing for the Congress in Uttar Pradesh. But wait, that’s not enough.

Bahl thinks that with “a little more gumption,” Priyanka could get an extra 8% on top of that, taking the Congress to 20%.

Ha! This is the kind of remark that can only come from a true Pidi who is completely clueless about politics on the ground. Do you know what kind of effort it takes to move a freaking 8% of vote? A little gumption? Seriously?

But Lutyens has no clue about how to move votes on the ground. Politicians campaign for 5 years trying to move 5%. Here Bahl speculates that Priyanka can add 8% between Jan and April, on top of the 6% that she swung on Day 1. A total of 14%!

What does it tell you? That Pidis like Bahl are under a magical spell of the Gandhi aura. Thinking they can do amazing things that mere mortals cannot even dream of. Which is downright silly, especially when you have the two most incompetent people : Rahul and Priyanka, in mind.

Don’t stop laughing yet. This next fantasy from Raghav Bahl will make you fall off your chair.

Oh imagination! Thou art so fertile. Raghav dreams up a massive rally in Lucknow where Priyanka opens with “How’s the Josh”?

Heh! Anybody can say that line. But you first need to win the confidence of crores of people so that they want to respond.

Wait, but Raghav has something in mind about the possible response too!

He might have got that part right. After all, the Congress received thousands of votes in Uttar Pradesh 🙂

And now comes the part which personally offends (and amuses) me the most because Raghav makes a fool of himself in every possible way : accusing other people of ignorance while showing off his own in the most arrogant possible manner. Culminating in an embarrassing factual error that makes him look like he failed the twelfth grade.

Now you might think he got that right. Indeed, Rahul + Priyanka = 0+0 =0. Except he is only quoting Yogi Adityanath, who he will mock next.

Actually, Yogi Adityanath has a college degree in real mathematics, but let’s go on.

Raghav says Yogi mistakenly used the plus sign, when he should have used a division sign…

And he asks what happens when you divide by zero? Yes, indeed Raghav tell us : what happens when you divide by zero?

NO!

One divided by zero is not infinity. Here’s the graph of 1/x:

Notice how when you approach 0 from the right, the graph shoots straight upwards.

When you approach 0 from the left, the graph swoops downwards.

That means the answer is not infinity. It is undefined.

Raghav should actually ask Yogi Adityanath to explain the difference.

You see what happens Raghav when you believe in the ‘inestimable strength’ of the Gandhis?

Why is BJP losing the art of winning small?

Nov 2013. The ruling UPA at the center is already in shambles. Modi’s star is undoubtedly rising. But in order to rally voters around him for a final push, he needs a knockout punch. Something spectacular to put the Congress on the mat and break its spirit. The Congress ecosystem, though on the defensive, is sowing all sorts of doubts. Can the BJP win with Modi as the mascot outside of Gujarat? Will the nation “accept” Modi?

These questions may sound unreal now, but they were very much around in late 2013. To neutralize them, the BJP needed to put up a show so convincing in the three Hindi heartland states (Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh) that the Congress ecosystem could not spin its way out of it.

At the time, Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh were already in the bag. But Chhattisgarh was not. The Assembly is tiny. Raman Singh is a popular CM, but he is battling two term incumbency. On top of that, the Congress is riding a huge sympathy wave after a Naxalite attack wiped out much of their state leadership in the summer. In the first phase, 18 of the 90 Assembly seats have already voted, 12 of them in Bastar. The saying goes that who wins Bastar rules over Chhattisgarh. The BJP must have known they were losing Bastar. And there were just 7 days to go for the second and final phase of polls.

It is at this moment that BJP does something remarkable. Modi and Raman Singh fan out across the rest of the state, doing tiny rallies wherever possible (the population of Chhattisgarh is not high enough to support the kind of “massive” rallies that we associate Modi with). In the course of 5 days, they turn the old saying on its head. The opposition has focused so much on winning Bastar that they have left the gate open in the remaining 65+ seats mostly in Central Chhattisgarh. Most of all, in seats where the Congress is incumbent. Modi and Raman Singh focus on these seats, targeting local anti-incumbency against sitting Congress MLAs.

On counting day on Dec 8, 2013, the BJP is sweeping Rajasthan and Madhya Pradesh. But Chhattisgarh is a heart stopping contest with Congress seemingly ahead. Around 4 pm, one Congress inclined channel (guess who?) even stops its Chhattisgarh ticker because nobody knows what is happening any more. By 6:30 pm, the story is clear. The BJP has won 49 seats, as many as 10 more than the Congress’ 39 seats. The vote share gap? Less than 0.5%!

Ask the BJP how important it was to snatch a win in Chhattisgarh in 2013. The stunning 3-0 scoreline, along with Congress’ wipeout in Delhi, sent the UPA packing even before the General Election campaign started.

There is a reason I went into so much vivid detail. Because it shows that in politics, the art of winning small is as important as the art of winning big.

Now consider what happened in Jharkhand yesterday. With 33.5%, the BJP got even more votes than JMM and Congress put together. But it ended up with just 25 seats out of 81. It won most of its seats with big margins, but lost almost every marginal seat.

This has been happening a lot. In Haryana in October, the BJP’s vote share was 9% more than the Congress. A near double digit lead in vote share usually translates to a landslide. But the BJP did not even get a majority. It won 40 seats to the Congress 31.

In Rajasthan last year, the Congress vote share was just 0.5% more than the BJP. But the Congress won 99 seats and coasted to form a government, while BJP lagged far behind with just 73! In Madhya Pradesh, the BJP actually won more votes than Congress, but got 5 less seats. Another state was lost to Congress. In Gujarat, the BJP had an 8% vote share lead, touching 50% of the vote, but barely got a majority. In Karnataka, it was the same story, with BJP getting 104 seats, just short of the majority mark of 112. The JDS came in and formed the government with just 35 seats!

The poor vote to seat conversion ratios across the board must worry the BJP. The party is getting more votes than it ever has, but seats are barely increasing. Often going down. It is now the Congress that has perfected the art of surviving in the cracks. In politics, even playing dead can be a strategy. The party now offers to lie low and play second fiddle to anything that moves.

When BJP wins, it wins big. With 303 Lok Sabha seats. The BJP is able to do stunning things. In one election cycle, it takes Assam and the entire North East. The BJP enters Bengal, casually kicks aside the CPM and Congress and becomes the main challenger to Trinamool.  The decades old CPM government in Tripura is busted as BJP jumps in vote share from 2% to 43%! But the same BJP is unable to edge past the JMM and Congress in Jharkhand.

How could this happen? It has to be failure of targeted messaging on the ground. Some kind of micro level loss of narrative. It means that in tough contest seats, the party is unable to identify swing voters, tell them what they need to hear and get them to booths on voting day. This indicates organizational weakness creeping in, maybe even an inability to focus on hyperlocal issues. There are always 1% of voters who might be voting for something so simple as laying 100 meters of pucca road in their locality. Some voters might just choose to rotate governments instinctively, by habit. Is the BJP failing to reach that 1-2% sliver of voters in time?

Perhaps, in one of life’s great ironies, the many “Modi waves” have taken a toll on the mindset of BJP leaders, workers and supporters. The BJP contested 150 seats or so in Maharashtra and won 105. No party in Maharashtra has won 100 seats since 1990 (other than BJP itself, which got 122 in 2014).

But when the results came in, you could feel the gloom in BJP ranks. No wave?

Meanwhile, the Congress seemed elated. They had hit double digits.

The sense of “loss” in Maharashtra showed in the days after the verdict. Even with an outright win. The Sena made most of the opportunity. And the Congress made it to power, even with a fourth place finish.

The many Modi waves seem to have primed the party, its workers and supporters to think only in terms of 2/3rd majorities or more. Winning so big that the other side can’t even get the post of Leader of the Opposition. This simply cannot happen every time.

This is no longer funny and has become a serious problem. You can’t set the bar so high that you set yourself up for disappointment.

Everyone knew that BJP was facing a tough battle in Jharkhand. The sense of being under pressure was supposed to bring out the best in the party’s spirit. To fight to the last for every vote and every seat. Instead, did the lack of a wave cause the party to feel less enthused about the election? Perhaps some BJP leaning voters were left sitting at home. Remember that just 1% or so could have made a huge difference. The BJP could have crossed 30 seats. That might have been enough to form a government with AJSU, some independents and breakaways from JVM(P).

This problem needs to be solved immediately. In its first term, Modi sarkar had one lucky advantage. The “incumbency cycles” in many small states were actually in its favor: places such as Uttarakhand or Himachal Pradesh. Additionally, it was going to be on the attack in Uttar Pradesh,  Haryana, Maharashtra, Jharkhand, Assam and so many other places. All the way up to Karnataka, four years into Modi’s term.

This was important not just psychologically, but also logistically. Without its own state governments, the welfare schemes of the Central government would never have been implemented.

With the prominent exception of Bengal, the BJP enjoys no such luxury this time. Not until the very end of this second term, when we get to the familiar trio of Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.

We can expect that the attitude of non-BJP state governments will be one of total non-cooperation, even outright unconstitutional. Some are questioning the sovereignty of the Indian state in matters of citizenship law. At least one Chief Minister, who may or may not be of unsound mind, has called for the UN to intervene and hold a referendum.

With the BJP needing to be constantly on the defensive in this term, there are two valuable lessons. The first is that the party has to go back to the art of winning small. Of negotiating tricky situations with voters and winning tactical battles of narrative in every locality and street corner. The second is to remember that power is forever fickle. And that now is always the best time to implement the party’s agenda, both cultural and economic.

Never a better time to overhaul BJP’s Jharkhand unit

Phew! Believe me friends, this could have been a lot worse. My nightmare was of a Chhattisgarh like wipeout. It turned out to be nothing like that.

The results I would say have turned out to be the perfect mix of pain and assurance for the party high command to now step in and do the needful in overhauling the state unit in Jharkhand.

On the one hand, there has been no drastic loss of popular support for the party. In fact, the vote share of the BJP is actually 2% more than it was in 2014. At the same time, the party has suffered all the outward humiliations : sitting CM Raghubar Das has lost miserably from Jamshedpur East. The Congress ran the BJP a close race in Ranchi and BJP’s C P Singh may still lose by the time of final results. This in a seat where BJP is generally miles ahead of Congress. The BJP has also been defeated in Bokaro.

For the first time since Jharkhand was created, the BJP is no longer the single largest party in the Assembly. The BJP had held on to this status even at its lowest ebb in 2009. Although note that at the time, Jharkhand was so fractured that BJP came joint #1 with JMM, winning 18 seats each. This time BJP is much ahead of that, but JMM seems even farther ahead.

The fun of course is in the vote shares. The BJP is way way ahead of everyone else with over 33% votes. The JMM has 19% and the Congress 13%. If you add them, it’s still a bit short of the BJP. Wait…we forgot RJD, which was also in the alliance. If you add their 2.5% votes, you finally get past the BJP.

This is what it takes to overcome BJP in Jharkhand. Three parties standing on top of each other. I believe this was also the first time the BJP fought without a single alliance partner. No AJSU. No JDU. Nothing.

Incidentally, if BJP had taken AJSU along, it seems they would have clean swept the state. The AJSU got almost 9% of the vote. Add that to BJP’s 33% and you can see what would have happened. Why the BJP didn’t take AJSU along is something that I simply don’t understand.

What did I say? BJP stands both rock solid and humiliated in Jharkhand. Perfect mix of pain and reassurance. Now they have five full years to redesign the party.

Because indiscipline has run rampant. Big leaders in Jharkhand lose their own seats all the time. That’s no surprise. But Das did not lose to an opposition candidate. He lost to Saryu Rai, (essentially) also of the BJP, who contested as an independent. Shows you how much dissatisfaction there is within the party.

And when C P Singh struggles to win Ranchi, that has to be dissatisfaction among workers and core supporters.

In 2014, some of the existing BJP leadership in the state was moved to Delhi. Like Arjun Munda. Raghubar Das was brought in. Clearly, he failed to take control of the party. And there is forever a section that longs for return of Babulal Marandi. As a side note, Marandi looks frail and old now. Nobody quite knows why he has spent all these years in the cold.

For too long, BJP leaders at the state level have had it way too easy. And Modi’s overwhelming popularity made it worse for them. They coasted along, forgetting to take the party and people along.

Ironically, the JMM, an outfit known for chaos, looked far more disciplined and single minded in the election. Hemant Soren began by conceding defeat in the Lok Sabha election. Never made any attempt to challenge PM Modi (that would have invited disaster in Jharkhand) and focused purely on the state leadership. He played perfectly within his limitations, stuck to tapping family connections and nostalgia in tribal seats. You can see the result : with 19% vote he has 29 seats. With 33% vote, the BJP has around 26.

By the way, on India Today yesterday, Hemant Soren laughed off all attempts to provoke him on the tribal vs non tribal issue and insisted the state is for everyone. You hear that Mamata Banerjee? You must be the only politician stuck in a time warp, still playing the silly regionalism card. It stopped working 10 years ago…

If I sound vaguely positive about Hemant Soren, it is for a reason. Remember that JMM is an old BJP ally. Even now, they would be BJP allies in a heartbeat if a phone call were to come from Delhi. I don’t think that would be a good idea. The BJP is way too much ahead of JMM in the state to offer them an alliance and CM post. Worse, the illusion of being in power would distract from the truly important task of rebuilding the state unit.

In many ways, since 2000, the BJP was often stuck in an illusion of power won through compromises in Jharkhand. When the domicile law related agitations happened many years ago, it jettisoned Marandi and brought in Arjun Munda as CM. A genuine mass leader was lost there. Then Munda continued, always a little short of majority, leaning on independents and random smaller parties for support. Was JMM an ally or not? Nobody knew. So the party stumbled on, almost always in power, but rarely in saddle. The problems stayed under the surface.

In 5 years, BJP can come back and sweep Jharkhand. An uncomfortable alliance would be worse than waiting 5 years and getting some homework done.

To BJP supporters I would say: do not be distraught. Do not psyched by the fact that JMM has gone into this election with a Congress tag. Leave Dilli media to enjoy what it will. If Congress had contested this election alone, they would have struggled to win 5 seats.  In fact, Congress contesting alone would have been locked in a tough contest for 4th or 5th place with CPI(ML)(L), JVM(P) and other parties that you probably never heard about. You know the United Goans Democratic Party (UGDP) also used to win a couple of seats in Jharkhand (not joking…look it up).

If Congress wants to live in some illusion about Jharkhand voting for Rahul Gandhi, let them be. We can look beyond that.

Btw, as I am about to post this blog, the EC website shows BJP and JMM at 28 seats each. Still not giving up. It isn’t easy to shake BJP from its single largest party status.

Why anti-CAA riots have affected me so much : a personal testimony

I dare say that no political event since 2014 has affected me as deeply as the anti-CAA riots that have swept the country. Perhaps even before 2014. Nothing has shaken me up quite as much.

Sometimes I wonder : is it that I care so much about Pakistani Hindus? Liberal and Islamists are rioting in the streets. Property is being damaged. People are getting hurt. Is it all worth the trouble? Do the tears of this man, for example, move me that much?

Never forget that they burnt buses and trains because this man will get Indian citizenship pic.twitter.com/UW5zxo2EsM

— Rahul Roushan (@rahulroushan) December 21, 2019

His voice breaking, this  unfortunate Hindu recalls his life in Pakistan. How they had to celebrate Holi under wraps. And how good he feels now that he is in India. In fact, he loves it so much that he has celebrated Holi multiple times this year. Then, I look at his poverty stricken life and wonder how this man could be so happy with so little.

Because, for the longest time, he did not even have the simplest rights that we take for granted.

Well, but there is so much more misery in this world. We have learned to look away. Why am I losing sleep over this man and his family? Am I secretly a Mahatma?

Probably not. The reality is that when I see this man’s eyes, I fear for myself. I fear for my own future.

What happened to him and his family in Pakistan could one day happen to me.

What was the big crime that CAA did? Why are we facing so much hatred from liberals and Islamists? Why is media of the whole world condemning us?

All we did is restore the humanity of some of the most oppressed people in the world. Why did it make them so angry?

Let me see what their objection is. Some say the law is unconstitutional. Some say the law is morally wrong. Or both. But the Indian Constitution identifies classes of marginalized people *all* the time and gives them special benefits. Every Indian is familiar with this concept. Why am I having to repeat it and why aren’t they listening? Are they so dumb?

Unless, they are not.

They don’t seriously think the law is unconstitutional. They simply don’t like the people that it benefits, i.e., Hindus.

Of course, I always understood that India’s secular establishment is biased against Hindus. But there’s levels of bias. For the first time, I feel like I understand the full intensity of the hatred that the secular establishment feels towards Hindus.

For the first time in my life, I feel like I have been isolated and targeted as a Hindu. I feel like I am not wanted in my own country. I am merely being tolerated. There is a clock somewhere and it is counting downwards. Counting downwards to the point in the future where people like me are no longer around.

Counting downwards to the moment when my name and names like mine have vanished forever from this land. And any attempt to turn around the numbers even a little bit, or to stop the countdown, is being fought tooth and nail.

In 1947, an Iron Curtain was dropped across the Indian subcontinent. The rich and glorious histories of generations were crushed under it and lost forever.

But it did not stop there. The Iron Curtain is closing in on us. We’re trapped.

 

Jharkhand Exit Poll results are not surprising

Basically, there are three places in the country where I cannot bear to see BJP losing: the first is Gujarat. Because it is Modiji’s state. Then, there is Karnataka, because I live here. Then, there is Jharkhand, because it is my home state.

I have spoken minimally on the polls in Jharkhand, though I have been following them with much intensity. I did not want to talk very much because I knew prospects were subdued. Everyone I had spoke to said the same. There wasn’t much to talk about. Sometimes it is easier to just not talk about things that make me really depressed.

And the exit poll results? Not surprising at all.

And now the results are coming. On Monday. No escaping this. Let’s just face it and get it over with.

At this point, the credibility of Axis MyIndia is so high that it has basically rendered all other exit polls practically irrelevant. Yes, I know C Voter managed to show a hung assembly. But I believe CVoter holds the world record in predicting hung assemblies. So we will let that slide.

What remains are the Axis numbers: 22-32 for the BJP and 38-50 for the JMM-Congress-RJD alliance.

Sounds quite plausible. Hopefully, BJP will make it past the 25 seat mark. If BJP gets a bit closer to 30, buoyed by support from urban areas (which have surprisingly large number of seats for such a rural state), the BJP could still manage to keep the mantle of single largest party.

If it does not, this will be the first time ever that BJP will not have the largest party status in the Jharkhand Assembly.

Of course, there are many factors that led to this. The main thing certainly is the weight of the alliance arithmetic. The JMM-Cong-RJD are a formidable combination on paper. In response, BJP fought the election completely alone. Not even did BJP take its (relatively) trustworthy ally AJSU along. You might remember that BJP kept AJSU by its side even in 2014, when conditions were supremely favorable. This time the AJSU sensed BJP’s weakness and demanded way too many seats.

Sure, AJSU has hurt the BJP, but hasn’t AJSU hurt itself most of all? With the Mahagathbandhan winning an outright majority, Sudesh Mahato of AJSU has nothing to do.

For Babulal Marandi and his JVM, this is one more election cycle of staying irrelevant. He wins a handful of seats each time and they always go in vain. I feel bad for electors who voted for his party. I used to feel bad for Marandi too, but at some point, a veteran politician has to act pragmatic. When every “prodigal son” and daughter of BJP came back to the fold after drifting around for a few years, where does Marandi get his ego from?

Now, it goes without saying that BJP’s likely defeat will be lapped up by the liberal media as validation of their anger over CAA. If liberals are truly under that illusion, may their god have mercy on their soul. If this was a Modi election, BJP would have swept Jharkhand. Words can barely describe the popularity of Modi across the state. It’s just that at the state level, the electorate is very divided and focused on absolutely hyperlocal factors.

Nevertheless, liberals will use it to try and psych BJP supporters. Along with the mental pressure  (and physical threat!) they are trying to create with their anti-CAA riots. I am 100% certain this will end with a clear win for BJP. The optics of their protest is all wrong, full of wanton violence against innocents and centered around ‘certain’ types of institutions. They are only making the silent majority more angry. This simply does not work in an age of social media. And you know what happens when the internet is switched off? Even more scary rumors circulate.

By refusing to even acknowledge the violence, they are only making common Hindus realize that we are under siege.

For Jharkhand, not much will change either way. Believe me, the kind of intense party rivalry that is seen between political party supporters on SM is nowhere on the ground in Jharkhand. So, relax. Sab apne hi hain…

The only real problem is that the Church will likely get a free hand in Jharkhand now. The anti-conversion bill in Jharkhand is one of the strictest in the entire country. This act will now likely be diluted. Remember that even if the Central Govt brings a strict anti-conversion law, enforcement is up to the state police.

So, Jharkhand has just seen its first five year CM. And like most small states, it wants a rotation after five years.  It’s Hemant Soren’s turn. Five years later, BJP will of course storm into power.

Raghubar Das’s father was a laborer at the famous Tata factory in Jamshedpur (the city itself is called Tatanagar or more simply “Tata” by most people from there). He’s become Chief Minister. I believe he did a good job. He didn’t communicate well at all, from the beginning.

As for Hemant Soren, well he is just another of those lucky dynasts in politics. He’s got the CM post on a platter before. This time he will probably keep it for 5 years. After that, he can relax when BJP comes back, for another 5 years. Then, he will win again and be CM.  From this point onwards, Hemant Soren will spend 50% of his life as Chief Minister. It’s nice to be a dynast.

Well, I hope Hemant Soren does something good for my state and my people. I know. It is hard for me to write about Jharkhand without getting a little emotional.

One point of pride that will remain. Telangana is one state that has never seen a Congress Chief Minister. The other such state is Jharkhand. We will always have that.

Why challenges to CAA will likely get laughed out of the Supreme Court

Over the last few weeks, you must have heard over and over again the refrain : How can the government discriminate between people on the basis of religion? Doesn’t this make the Citizenship Amendment Act unconstitutional? And you might agree with that, especially if you are influenced by Bollywood thought leaders who have googled pictures of the Constitution for the first time in their lives.

Let me explain why all so called legal challenges to this legislation are probably going to get laughed out of the Supreme Court.

So let’s talk about the law. We have all heard of Articles 14 and 15 in the Constitution of India, which expressly forbid the government of India from discriminating between people on grounds such as sex, caste, religion, etc. This is enshrined in our Fundamental Rights, incorporated in Part III of the Constitution.

But we also know from our everyday knowledge that this is hardly the case in India. To give you a simple example, it was only the other day that Delhi announced free travel for women in all public buses. More serious examples would include of course reservations based on caste or economic criteria. Then, there is of course the Ministry of Minority Affairs, which gives everything from scholarships to job training to religious minorities.

Generally speaking, welfare measures for weaker sections, outlined on lines of caste, religion or gender are completely routine in India. All Indians are very familiar with this concept.

But what is the constitutional basis for this? How might the government make exceptions to “equal treatment for all”?

The answer lies in something called “reasonable classification,” based on the even more fancy sounding term called “intelligible differentia.” The meanings of these terms have been explained by the Supreme Court in the landmark R K Dalmia vs S R Tendolkar case (1958).

Simply put, the government action must meet two criteria :

(1) First, there must be a clear distinction between a group and members who are not in that group.

Here, the group in question is members of six religions (Hindu, Sikh, Jain, Buddhist, Parsi and Christian) who are refugees from three Islamic countries which border India (Pakistan, Afghanistan and Bangladesh).

(2) Second, the government action should meet the objectives for picking up that group.

Here, the group members face religious persecution in these declared Islamic countries. Since they have nowhere else to go, this Act grants them citizenship of India.

Notice that both criteria are extremely important. For example, women could be a clearly defined group. That meets criterion (1). Suppose the government were to pass a law tomorrow that entitles every woman to free Mickey Mouse stickers. This would be illegal, because it would fail criterion (2) : because the action of providing Mickey Mouse stickers does not meet the objective of women’s empowerment in any reasonable way.

But you can see how neatly the Citizenship Amendment Bill would pass both criteria (1) and (2). The Act clearly identifies a group and then take actions that will provide targeted relief to them.

But there’s more!

In case you have some lingering doubts, here is the icing on the cake.

The Supreme Court not only allows the government to make reasonable classifications, it also creates a presumption in *favor* of the government in all legal challenges to it.

In other words, if you were to challenge the CAA in the court, the entire burden of proof would be on you to prove your case. The Court will always start with the assumption that the law passed by legislature is constitutional and correctly understands the will of the people.

There you go. For those who hope to challenge the CAA in the court, it’s all but over.

Now you know what’s really happening. The liberals know they lost in the Lok Sabha and the Rajya Sabha. They know they are bound to lose in the Supreme Court.

And that’s why liberals know that the only way open to them is to physically intimidate the government and the majority community by stone pelting on school buses and burning trains. That is why you have all these liberals morally supporting the riots, spreading fake news, signing foolish petitions and frantically calling up media contacts across the world. Because they know their legal case is both unjust and hopeless.

Their only move is to intimidate the government at home and defame India abroad.  The one thing they don’t want is people understanding the act and what it does. Instead of reading their Instagram posts, let’s read our Constitution and Supreme Court judgments. It will foil their plans.