Why Hindu Rashtra is an impossible dream: reality is Hindus have no power

Do you want India to be a Hindu Rashtra? I am guessing a very large number of BJP supporters will say yes. Immediately, they will be confronted with a barrage of questions. What will be the position of minorities in your so called “Hindu Rashtra”? Are you advocating for a Hindu Pakistan? Do you want to leave modern democracy behind, go hundreds of years back into the dark ages and have theocracy?

At this point, BJP supporters will likely defend themselves. They will speak of Hinduism in cultural terms and of India that is Bharat as a civilization state. They will point to nations such as Japan or Israel, which maintain a close knit cultural identity while being highly advanced, technologically sophisticated modern democracies. Even perhaps the United States, where Christian belief informs every aspect of political life, including that of the alleged left.

Of course, the critics won’t listen to any of these clarifications. They will call you Nazi, Taliban and ISIS. And they have the media power, the money power and the lung power to make these labels stick. You don’t stand a chance.

In spite of this, much of the Hindu right is still emotionally invested in this debate over Hindu Rashtra, engaging with people, listening to counter-arguments, clarifying this or that. Here is the sad part. Your critics at the New York Times are not engaging with you, rather they are keeping you engaged. On the ground, they know that you are already finished. But debates over Hindu majoritarianism are a useful tool to keep you distracted, dreaming like you have actual power to do anything. Majoritarianism? We Hindus have nothing…

You keep promising not to misuse your power. They are actually laughing at you. They know that you have no power.

Tough realization this. Pessimistic too. But real in many more ways than most of us would like to accept.

The other day, the Prime Minister was in Kerala, holding a rally in Palakkad. There, he made a rather unusual analogy. Taking aim at the gold scam, he spoke of the Left Front as Judas betraying Jesus for thirteen pieces of silver. Think about why he had to do that. Because he understands the reality of the demography of Kerala.

The share of Hindus in the population of Kerala is currently hovering around the 50% mark. Despite its efforts, everyone knows that the BJP has no actual chance of winning in the state. Not in 2021. Perhaps not even in 2026. It might be ten years before the BJP becomes a contender for power in Kerala. Looking at the demographic trends among Kerala youth, there is no doubt that Hindus will be a minority in Kerala by then.

We Hindus represent the last surviving large pagan culture on earth. As a culture, we are pitted against the three big global monopolies: the religion of peace, the religion of love and the religion of equality. These three big powers are toying with us by raising faux alarm of Hindu majoritarianism. They don’t fear us one bit. They are laughing at our situation. The Hindu right may think they are fighting back, but they are not. They are merely negotiating terms of withdrawal. The politics on the ground reflects this. The fears around Hindu majoritarianism would make sense only if Hindus actually had the majority needed to dictate terms! They don’t. As in several patches of the north east, in pockets of Goa, in Kerala and increasingly in Andhra Pradesh, they don’t.

On the ground, the “debate” over Hindu majoritarianism actually looks something like this. Imagine Jeff Bezos wants a large jhuggi jhopri colony in Delhi cleared away so that he can build the global HQ of Amazon. When he arrives in Delhi, he finds that a daily wage laborer is leading the protests against this. So Bezos steps off his Mercedes and tells the daily wage laborer: My man, I have heard that if you had $180 billion, you would be a Nazi.

The daily wage laborer is extremely offended. He comes up with 100 reasons why he will not be a Nazi, even if he had $180 billion. Bezos watches him explain with amusement playing on his lips, even as the jhuggi jhopri is being bulldozed in the background. That is how the New York Times looks at us when it cries about Hindu majoritarianism.

That daily wage laborer, in all likelihood, will never be worth $180 billion. So he might as well stop explaining why he won’t do evil things with $180 billion.

Just like that, there is never going to be a Hindu rashtra. There is never going to be a Hindu Pakistan. We would be lucky if, in a few generations, we don’t become an extension of the actual one.

So let us forget about Hindu rashtra. Instead, let us begin a practical negotiation for safeguarding the basic human rights of Hindus.

Are you a little tired? How independent media speaks truth to power

“Kerala’s sweetheart as she is known is contesting from this constituency,” says Nidhi Suresh of Newslaundry, as her car makes its way through scenic Mattanur. The apparent goal? To interview K K Shailaja, the world famous health minister of Kerala. As I watched the Youtube video, I tried to steal glimpses of god’s own country, unspoiled by the spread of BJP. Folks, the future is narrow roads, broken pavements and shiny political posters. As a kid, I remember reading 2021: A Kerala Odyssey.

Anyways. I first became aware of Nidhi Suresh yesterday, when I came across hundreds of people on social media praising her journalism. Due to her polite yet determined line of questioning, BJP’s 88 year old debutant politician E Sreedharan had been forced into an unsightly retreat during an interview. Now, the BJP currently has just 1 seat in Kerala’s 140 member assembly, the only time it has ever won a seat in the state. Opinion polls suggest the BJP could capture up to 3 or even 4 seats this time. If Nidhi Suresh can ask such fearless and probing questions to a tiny opposition party, I was excited to imagine what she will do before a cabinet minister in the ruling government.

Both powerful women did not disappoint. If Nidhi set new standards for independent media, the minister did the same for political honesty and transparency. I would encourage everyone to watch the full thing, which is on Youtube here. To begin with, K K Shailaja’s husband positioned himself between the minister and the interviewer, leaned backwards and made himself comfortable. This meant that both Nidhi and K K Shailaja had to sit up, with the interviewer having to stretch out her arm to get the mike close enough to the minister’s face. Witness this, folks. This is what things will look like in the future, when patriarchy has finally been consigned to the dustbin.

I will now summarize and paraphrase their questions and answers a little, just to keep things short and give you the highlights. Also, because I am sort of rude, I will insert a couple of my own observations here and there about the flow of their conversation. For the full context and the full conversation, you can always refer to the video on Youtube here.

Nidhi: Shailaja Teacher, I want to start by asking you; do you feel like a rockstar?

(My comments: Fantastic question Nidhi, right off the bat. Now we can find out if Shailaja is one of those arrogant rockstars who always goes around telling everyone that they are a rockstar.)

K K Shailaja: I never felt like that. Some are saying like that, but we are working always … I have a very good team with me … Thousands and thousands of workers are actual heroes.

(My comments: That answer could have gone wrong in so many ways, but she handled it well. Her inherent humility did the trick for her.)

Nidhi: … You had to fight Covid … you hold the position of Health Minister and now you are contesting as an MLA … are you a little tired by any chance?

(My comments: She is a politician holding a cabinet portfolio, actually doing the job that fits the description of that portfolio and now also contesting an election! Of course she is tired. The question is : can Nidhi get her to admit to this unprecedented burden?)

K K Shailaja: I have to rise early … start my work at 8:30 am … it will end 9 o’ clock, 9:30 etc… and after that also we have so many meetings… we can sleep after 12:30…

(My comments: That’s our beloved ‘Teacher’ for you. Just putting the facts before us and letting us decide.)

Nidhi : Were you surprised when party fielded you from Mattanur or was it surprise only for media?

K K Shailaja: I don’t know why media surprised … Mattanur is my place.

(My comments: Any young people watching, please take notes. This is how a seasoned journalist teases out the inside scoops. Also appreciate how K K Shailaja is open and transparent about inner workings of her party)

Nidhi : Something else I want to address is the political killings in Kannur….

(My comments: Brace yourselves, folks, because this is going to get heated. Just watch how Nidhi speaks the truth to power. As blameless as K K Shailaja is, as part of the ruling government, I believe she must answer on the killings of RSS workers in her state. Anyway, I am sorry to interrupt. Let Nidhi continue with her question)

Nidhi (contd) : Will you be looking at how to curb political killings at least in this constituency?

(My comments: My pulse is racing. Will she say “yes” or “no”? If she says “no,” this could be a massive embarrassment for the CPM. Not easy for the folks in power to face an expert journalist such as this.)

K K Shailaja: We are against political killings…

(My comments: Phew! That was close. But I know Nidhi will press her further; I just know she will)

Nidhi : … You have grown up in politics… Are political killings a new phenomenon, or was it also there when you were a student?

K K Shailaja : It is not a new thing …

(My comments: The questions are getting tougher by the minute. But K K Shailaja is calm and collected as always as she proceeds to give us the scholarly context on the history of political killings in Kerala. Perhaps that is why they call her ‘Teacher.’)

Nidhi: One thing I want to ask is in Mattanur in 2018, there was a young Congress worker Shoaib who was killed by 4 CPM members … initially the CPM denied but later expelled 4 people from the party. … His father has said that nobody from CPM has yet visited them or offered any condolence….

(My comments: Thank you Nidhi for asking this question. Be it the murder of Congress worker Shoaib or the murder of RSS workers, the ruling government in Kerala must answer. )

K K Shailaja : We are not against any family … at that time, situation was like that, their enmity and …. but Shoaib’s incident is not the only thing, there are so many things like that…. Any death or any kinds of killings are not correct.. And I am not going deep into the incident…

(My comments: This was the toughest part and K K Shailaja handled it with grace and humility. Fate is fate. We all have no control over the ‘situation,’ least of all the ruling government.)

Nidhi : Coming to your Covid related work … you have received a lot of international awards …

I will not go into the rest of the conversation. I am sure Nidhi is trying hard to ask tough questions on this. But with all those awards that ‘Teacher’ got, what is there to even ask?

The conversation went on for a while after that. Nidhi asked more questions about being a woman politician, about male attitudes, both to her and her husband. She ended by asking what message the minister would like to give to young people.

Now that was really inspiring. I think you would now have a much better understanding of why we need independent media that can speak truth to power.

Let me leave you with an exercise. You have four sentences below. Three of these are taken from Orwell’s famous dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty Four. The remaining one is taken from the slogan of one of India’s most independent and fearless news organizations. Can you spot which one it is?

(1) War is peace

(2) Freedom is slavery

(3) Ignorance is strength

(4) Pay to keep news free

Your time starts now. Shailaja Teacher is watching you…

The essential difference that puts BJP ahead of TMC in Bengal

Yesterday was Phase 1 of the all important Bengal elections. There were very few surprises. High voter turnout, as is the rule in Bengal. Allegations of EVM malfunction, as you would expect from TMC. And of course, poll violence, which is standard for Bengal. Along with media cover up of that violence, which is what happens in all non-BJP ruled states.

The one interesting point of the day was a now viral (alleged) conversation between Mamata Banerjee and a small BJP worker. The way the CM pleads with a small political worker for some help in Nandigram shows the level of panic in the TMC camp. Not that we needed any new clues. The panic has been evident in every word, every abuse and every rant from the TMC supremo in the last few months.

The BJP is ahead for sure at the moment. These were the regions of Bengal that they had led in 2019. They were going to do well again. The question is : just how well? Did they manage to turn it into a sweep? Chances are that they have. You should have seen the faces at The Dyer yesterday when their ground reporter gave them the bad news. A few days earlier, they had a good time hanging out at Jadavpur University and talking about the good old days when Bengal was in love with Stalin. But yesterday was time to embrace reality.

Even though the BJP is far ahead at the moment, it will run into more difficult territory soon. The hardest nut to crack will be the Kolkata and South 24 Parganas region. If you see the map of Bengal in 2019, the divide is obvious. The state is split right down the middle : the north and tribal regions swept by BJP. The area around Kolkata is swimming uniformly in TMC’s green.

As difficult as it will be for BJP to breach this last bastion, I don’t think it is possible for TMC to stop the BJP juggernaut now. This is not just because of the BJP’s sweeps in the other areas. I believe the BJP will pick up a number of seats that would otherwise have been won by TMC.

The difference: discipline!

Indeed, while the Modi factor in elections has been analyzed no end, the role of party discipline in BJP’s victories has often gone unnoticed.

What is discipline? Much like war, it is about holding fort in face of adversity. It is not just a question of daring. It is about having a machinery that functions even when things are not going their way. I use the word ‘machinery’ very meaningfully here. People are not machines. That is why morale matters so much in any contest. Discipline is something that allows people to rise above themselves and deliver peak collective performance no matter what is happening to morale.

The toughest election that BJP faced since 2014 was actually in Gujarat. Everything had gone wrong for the party. They had to change their Chief Minister twice. There was a caste revolt, voter fatigue, everything. With each successive day, Rahul’s campaign was gaining. The election happened in two phases. If you look at the first phase, the Congress was actually ahead!

Can you imagine the reaction of an ordinary BJP worker to that kind of feedback? Losing the PM’s home state, which is still closely identified with his personal prestige. Can you imagine what the repercussions of losing Gujarat in 2017 would have been? That fear itself could have sent the party cadres and their leaders into paralysis.

But it did not. The BJP put up a brave face. Everyone from leaders to cadres. They counted their strengths, pulled all the levers they could. They thrust their fears into the back of their mind and fought for the day. They held the line. And they won.

The same goes in Bihar. After Phase 1, the NDA had been all but wrecked. The JDU was performing miserably. The LJP gambit had clearly backfired. The crowds were pouring into Tejashwi’s rallies. His shock and awe tactics could have made the NDA give up and run. Again, they did not. They stood back and fought. And they got home. If you listen to BJP leaders when the exit polls came out, they didn’t expect to win. Their victory surprised them.

That is what party discipline is. They were sure they were losing, but they were able to separate their actions from their emotions. And they did such a fantastic job that they actually won.

Does TMC have this kind of discipline? Hardly. What happens when after 3 phases, the TMC gets the feedback that BJP probably has 3 times as many seats as they do? They are going to scream even louder and more desperately than they are now. Their cadres will get the message and begin moving away.

What will happen then? Every seat where TMC was marginally ahead will end up in the BJP column. Mamata will deploy her lung power even more abusively. In return, her critics will get even more vocal. Small ground cadres will begin to think about themselves and their own future. A number of them will start wondering if it is such a good idea to stick with TMC any more. They will wonder if it is a good time to go soft on BJP. Perhaps send feelers into the other camp to see if they are still recruiting.

As Mamata gets harsher, her cadre will get softer.

A number of them will ask: what happens after Didi loses? Does her nephew have it in him? Does it make sense to continue?

The results from Bengal are on the proverbial wall.

Bangladesh liberation and Modi: What liberal disbelief says about our world

The other day, PM Modi mentioned in his speech that he once had to go to jail during a satyagraha for the liberation of Bangladesh. The liberal ecosystem hit back with a storm of ridicule. Now Modi is taking it too far, they said. What else has he done, they demanded. Fought in the Second World War? Been the first man on the moon? One academic even insisted that nobody ever went to jail for demanding Bangladesh.

They did not know facts nor did they wait for facts to emerge. They were absolutely certain he was lying. Of course, he wasn’t lying. They were soon confronted online with an army of BJP supporters showing off old newspaper clippings about thousands of Jan Sangh workers courting arrest for this cause in 1971. The movement even finds mention in the official citation from the government of Bangladesh awarded to the Late Atalji in 2015. As for Modiji himself going to jail, it is mentioned on the back cover of a book that he wrote in Gujarati as far back as 1978. Even the video footage of the Jan Sangh rallies of 1971 is still available from the archives of the Associated Press.

We could let this go as just another case of self-satisfied liberals making fools of themselves on the internet. But there is more here. Because what we find believable and what we don’t says a lot about our world.

Why did the liberals reject Modi’s claims outright? Because they made a number of fundamental assumptions about our world. First, they assumed that if there is anything good, only the Congress could have struggled for it. The Congress is the hand that feeds them. So they assume that all the good in the world is due to the Congress only.

The second assumption is more insidious. Even if the satyagraha did actually happen, they assumed Modi would not have participated in it. But why? Because they don’t really believe that someone could participate in political struggles for decades, stand out from the crowd, gradually rise through the ranks and finally make it to the top. The top Congress leadership does not have origin stories like that. They are born into privilege, with their CVs already written out for them the day they are born, with only the dates remaining to be filled in. One day, when mummy or daddy feels that the time is right, they are given their inheritance: party general secretary, vice-president, prime minister or PM candidate, whatever seems best.

If you think about it, Modi’s claim was actually quite believable on its face, even very likely. We should expect that he took part in all major Jan Sangh agitations; even played a lead role. That is probably how he distinguished himself and gradually rose through the ranks. The old newspaper clippings say 10,000 Jan Sangh workers courted arrest, but how many of those 10,000 became PM? How many became so much as an MP? But Modi did, because he had extraordinary political talent.

But when the liberal elite thinks about politics, they don’t even consider talent, just birth and favoritism. That is why Modi’s life and struggles feel like lies to them. A number of liberals have tried to dig up dirt and discredit the story of the boy who sold tea on the railway platform at Vadnagar. Did he sell tea only on the platform or inside the railway coaches also? Did he sell just tea or also biscuits with it? Another potential lie to be researched here. Was his family poor, very poor, slightly poor or very very slightly poor? All questions of interest.

Because that’s how liberals think. Almost everything that the liberal elites have in life is through birth or through favors. It came from the families they were born into. It came from the networks at overrated schools and colleges where they went with their famous last names. So they assume everyone is the same way. Modi’s story does not seem real to them. There’s no way he sold tea on a railway platform. There’s no way he could have organized rallies and protest marches. Indira, Rajiv and Sanjay had all the privileges in the world but they could not finish college. How could Modi have finished a college degree on the side while struggling full time against the Emergency? It must be lies. Where is his degree certificate? Where is his father’s license to sell tea on the railway platform in the 1950s (yes, someone actually filed an RTI to demand this information).

A few months ago, one liberal tweeted out a fake thread listing all the malls, retail chains and gas stations supposedly owned by members of Modi’s family (both real and imaginary). Although every item on that list was fake, liberals promptly believed it and the thread went viral. Why? Because that’s how liberals have always experienced the political class. How could Modi possibly be different?

When you examine the things that liberals will believe without question, you begin to understand their world. Remember the supposed Associate Professor at the Department of Journalism at Harvard University? Could a spectacularly unqualified person with no PhD and no peer reviewed publications be directly appointed a tenured faculty member at Harvard? Sure, why not? Does Harvard even have a department of journalism? It doesn’t matter. They swallowed it without question. Because it confirmed their idea of how the world works.

But tell them that someone was born in a poor household, worked their way through the ranks of a political party and became Prime Minister. Get out, they will say. You must be lying.

Where is “Bengal model” : a non-intellectual response to the intellectuals of Bengal

Intellectuals occupy a unique position in Bengali society, or so they believe. These people live the life of the mind, or so they say. They read endless books, though all on the same subject. They watch countless movies from around the world, with or without subtitles, though all have the same basic plot. And ultimately, they express themselves, through writing or art or film, in really predictable ways. Even though they never actually take part in the life of ordinary people, they tell us what to think.

As polling in Bengal draws near, a number of these artists and performers have taken to Youtube to tell us that they are not neutral. Good; they don’t have to be. And while they show a rapid succession of headlines attacking the Central government and Chief Ministers of BJP ruled states, they do not name any political party. Very well, I can play along.

They warn us of some big pandemic like threat coming towards Bengal. This threat will sweep away everything that Bengal is supposed to stand for. Which reminds me: what does Bengal stand for?

Let me ask a fundamental question. Why so much negativity, such anger, in how these intellectuals express themselves? Bengal has been a bastion of liberal, secular and progressive politics for 70 years. As the election unfolds, why not show off all the wonderful things that this liberal, secular and progressive politics has done for the state? Why not show off the “Bengal model” to the world?

Surprised? But why? Why does nobody ever speak of the Bengal model? Let us see: the state allegedly had the best economic planners, the most independent thinkers, the most vibrant space for dissent and the most social harmony. You say that all this is coming under threat now. Very well then, show us all what you have achieved in all these years. Show us the skyscrapers, the rivers of milk and honey and the long lines of people from other states flocking to Bengal for work.

You speak of a dangerous ideology coming into the state from outside. You talk of how this ideology has spread everywhere, like a pandemic. But, how come their ideology has spread and yours did not? You say you believe in education while the outsiders are murkho (illiterates). Then how come you get outwitted by the illiterates at every turn? Is it possible that your ideas do not produce tangible results?

Indeed, why the fear of the ideology of Gujarat spreading into Bengal? Why not go to Gujarat and fly the glory flag of Bengal? Make a Gujarati language video and promise to teach Gujarat how to become prosperous like Bengal. Who is stopping you?

This is what is called a sanity check. It is not found in your philosophy books nor in clouds of intellectual cigarette smoke. As a general rule, if you are paranoid about outside ideas and outside people, you must not be very successful yourself. Do you know how many Bengalis are forced to work in low wage, low skilled jobs in Bangalore? And yet, when a young leader from Bangalore visited Kolkata to take on your Chief Minister, he was met with paranoid name calling and the tag of bohiragoto (outsider). This is an admission of your failure to deliver for the people of Bengal. And the fact that you take pride in this makes you a loser.

You have forgotten who is the incumbent in this election in Bengal. Or you would rather not discuss it, because you cannot bring yourself to admit the truth. But, whether you like it or not, this election in Bengal is about asking you questions. Once upon a time, Bengal used to lead India. What have you done with India’s industrial and intellectual powerhouse? You will have to answer these questions rather than pointing fingers at outsiders and calling them names.

And what has become even of Bengal’s famed cultural sphere? One hundred years after Tagore, are you not stuck rehashing his plots and characters? The most ‘original’ thing you have done since is replace his lyrics with vulgar street abuses and go around on Saraswati Puja showing them off on your body. Yes, the photos from Rabindra Bharati University went viral. It’s a free country. Do whatever. But don’t be surprised if people stop taking you seriously. And then you have to hide behind made up regional pride.

Once upon a time, Bengal was a land without fear. The British used to fear the rise of Bengal, which is why they had to partition it. Swami Vivekananda took his ideas all the way to Chicago and shared them. Today you intellectuals are teaching Bengal to fear the Bihari Hindu next door because apparently Durga is ours and Ram is theirs. Imagine what you have become.

You want to see the cultural influence of Bengal? Every year, tourists flock to Kanyakumari to see the spot upon which Swami Vivekananda mediated. Everyone in India wants to claim the legacy of Swami Vivekananda, including the RSS students organization, the ABVP. India’s national anthem was written in Bengali. The popular Vande Mataram? Also Bengali. If Bengal could do all this when India was not even an independent country, imagine what it could have done since independence. Who is to blame here? The outsiders?

In 2012, when Narendra Modi set out to win his third election in Gujarat, he began a month long Vivekananda Yuva yatra across the state. In 2021, Mamata Banerjee wants to win her third election in Bengal. The other day, the official handle of the TMC tweeted out: “Bengal rejects Gujarati manifesto.” Feeling small yet? Tell me again how you are educated and everyone else is murkho (illiterate).

Since 2012, Modi has taken his Gujarat model all around the country. What have you done since? Hidden in your own mohalla grumbling about outsiders? And now that the Gujarat model has come to your neighborhood, all you can do is call them names and look for ‘traitors’ on the inside. The other day, a Bengali theater actor announced that he is joining BJP. His liberal director fired him on the spot. Big win for your ideology, I must say.

If your liberal, secular and progressive values had done any good, you would have something to show for it. You would have the Bengal model to show the world. You don’t have any. You just have your small minded paranoia and name calling. But paranoia is not the new strength. Poverty is not the new wealth. Being predictable is not the new creativity. These are old traits of every loser in history.

MVA government fiasco and Modi sarkar’s forgotten “scam free” tag

Will the MVA government survive this fiasco? Yes, it probably will. Both the NCP and the SS have too much to lose from the collapse of the alliance. The Sena has its own Chief Minister, so they would never destabilize the government. The NCP will never get a better deal than it has now, not even from the Congress. And the Congress will stay along for anything that gives them a taste of power. Who in their senses would let a cash rich state like Maharashtra slip out of their hands.

That said, the MVA in Maharashtra has lost a crucial asset over the last week. They have gone into full UPA 2 mode. Hit by scam and public ridicule, they are merely marking days in office. Meanwhile, governance is in the absolute pits. Coronavirus is out of control, vaccinations are slow. This is what happens when the government is focused purely on political survival.

Imagine if a government like this had come to power after 2019. Congress 100 seats, maybe SP+BSP 50 seats, TMC 35 seats, DMK 25-30 seats, TDP+YSRCP 25 seats, RJD 10-15 seats … and so on. Imagine what would have happened when the pandemic hit even as the govt was fending off hafta vasooli allegations against its ministers.

On the bad side, Maharashtra is one of our most crucial states, accounting for 14% of India’s GDP. When Maharashtra suffers, our entire economy suffers. Luckily (and I use that word with much trepidation), the state govt does not seem in a mood to lockdown no matter how bad things get. If this is a deliberate strategy, I welcome that. If they are simply too distracted to figure out a roadmap for lockdown, I will still take whatever I can get. So that’s that … we just suffer through the second wave, lose precious lives and just hope for the best. Grim but true.

For the BJP, this has been nothing short of a reawakening in Maharashtra. A few weeks ago, after the results of Panchayat elections, I had expressed my doubts about the BJP’s condition in the state. The heavy arithmetic of the alliance seemed to be working and the BJP was simply unable to pin down the government on any issue. I had also remarked how strange it was. Normally, when the single largest party is forced to sit in the opposition, it has tremendous moral high ground. In such situations, the ruling government gets no honeymoon period and no benefit of doubt from the electorate. They are judged very harshly from Day 1.

Incredibly, this did not seem to be happening in Maharashtra. Due to its stranglehold over Marathi media, the MVA was able to put together a honeymoon of sorts. Even more incredibly, the BJP with 105 MLAs did not seem to be punching at full potential.

Things have finally changed. Just how much things have changed shows in how journalists openly confronted the Big Man during his press conference.

This was a potential UPA2 moment for MVA. Because many of us still remember UPA2 like it was yesterday, we forget that it has now been seven years since Modi came to power. Do you realize what that means? Those entering college today, those who are expressing political opinions for the first time in their lives, were just 11 years old or less when the big scams of UPA2 broke. They remember nothing. They don’t know what it is to open the newspaper every day and read “SCAM” written on top. In fact, a number of them might not even have heard that word. They don’t know there was a time in this country, when “scam” was considered a normal part of governance. It is not just UPA which had scams: Atalji’s NDA govt had its own scams. Scams were just something that happened every few months; they came and went.

The young folks in college today don’t know about this. And honestly, this was a mounting danger for Modi sarkar. In his first term, Modi sarkar often spoke proudly of its “scam free” tag. To date, I believe this is one of the biggest achievements of Modi sarkar. But the tag would have meant nothing by 2024. Because older people don’t remember scams and young people don’t know what that is.

It was sort of ironic actually. In fact, I believe the BJP itself stopped talking about “scam free” govt by 2017. People had forgotten already what a scam is.

The BJP needed someone to remind people what scams look like. And MVA has given the BJP a big visible opportunity. It’s looks even worse for MVA because people are no longer used to hearing about stuff like this.

But most importantly, the whole incident has brought Devendra Fadnavis into his own. I always thought he was one of the BJP’s best assets. I have always seen a future PM in him. But in the last two years, he seemed weighed down, like a batsman going through a prolonged spell of bad form. It was kind of pathetic to watch him being shipped off to other states as election in charge or something. These are like first steps towards withdrawing from real ground politics. I wondered if his bad form was taking him towards retirement.

Fortunately for Fadnavis, form is temporary while class is permanent. After several years, I see Fadnavis creating a buzz around himself and his work. He is getting noticed by the public, making a difference. Now he has a huge job on his hands : finding a way to achieve a single party majority for BJP in Maharashtra. If he can do that, there is no stopping him.

Darr ka mahaul: Why has India’s most honest reporter not been on air for the last 3 days?

He is the voice of the voiceless. For the millions of people – students, workers, farmers, women, Dalits, tribals, who feel disenfranchised ever since the BJP came to power in 2014, he was the one true hope. Every night, for one hour or so, his followers could tune in to his show and escape the harsh reality of their marginalized existence. No more fear, no more hopelessness, no more intolerance. Only justice. He would announce himself in his sobering voice and his topic for the day. The powers that be would be tried in his court and always found guilty.

This was real journalism; speaking truth to power the way it was supposed to be.

Except, where has it been for the last three days? Why has the light gone out of our lives? Why is there darkness everywhere?

Did something happen in the news that India’s most honest reporter had to go into hiding? Perhaps there is a story out there that he doesn’t want to cover? Why not? Is he scared? We know that cannot be, for he is fearless. Then, the question is : what are his incentives?

And in the meantime, what happens to his millions of followers? Without his nightly show telling them what to think, where do they go? Last I heard, they were so much in love with him that they were adding his name to their own. It was their homage to him and his fearless reporting. One night on his show, he acknowledged the affection of his disciples. What a day it must have been for them!

Think about that: half the folks at Singhu border have changed their names in support of him. Imagine entire villages full of people, all with the same name, marching in lock step behind their dear leader. Sounds exactly like all free societies, right? Now, is there any journalist in the whole world who can command such loyalty?

Except, where is their dear leader? Why is he hiding from the biggest story in the country right now?

What does he have to fear on his show? It is all his. He does not have opposing views on his show, not even for token reasons, just to shout them down. There is no shouting on his show ever. Because the only voice that is allowed is his. Let alone bring on people who disagree with him, he rarely ever hosts people who agree with him. Because even if people agree with you, they might word it somewhat differently. And since he always has the truth and the only authorized version of the truth, he is the only one who ever speaks on his show.

In fact, that is supposed to be what makes his show so great : that he is the only one who speaks on it. Bringing in other people would induce cacophony. That would make his show just like the shouting matches on other channels. Things work so much better when you have only one view and only one voice to express it. And when that voice is guaranteed to give us the truth, why would we want to hear anyone else?

Even his employers are scared of him, or at least in awe of him. He once said that he does not allow his employer to cut up his show and upload snippets of it to Youtube. That would be sacrilege. Imagine dismantling the Mona Lisa into fragments. If they did that, would you be able to appreciate the sublime greatness of the masterpiece? Now, I am a small person. I would not understand either the Mona Lisa as a whole, or in parts. But I know other people would. His show is just like that. He insists that his show must be uploaded to Youtube as a whole.

If he had his way, he would probably insist that people only be allowed to watch his show on youtube or on TV as a whole as well. No getting up halfway, no eating or drinking, no switching channels midway. You must stand to attention while watching him make his historic announcements on a nightly basis. I bet half the folks at Singhu border already do this.

So where is he? Why is he hiding from his own show? And his own followers?

Others have tried to shut him down before. He always found a way to reach them. He spoke to them from behind a darkened screen. Only a voice from the ether; no visuals. When the intolerance grew too much, he found even more novel ways of reaching out to his followers. He brought people with painted faces to speak on air in language that sounded like gibberish. Except it was not gibberish. It was a coded language that only his followers could understand. From the mind of a genius to his loyal disciples. No fascist government could have intercepted that line of communication.

But things are different on the media landscape right now. There is a big story on the prowl. If you are on the scene, you cannot possibly ignore it. But if you choose to take that story by the horns, you will have to speak real truth to real power. And there will be no international awards for speaking that truth.

That’s why radio silence. No black screen. No painted face. No mimes. Just silence.

To his followers I say: this silence is the reality of your savior. Ye chuppi hi aaj ka show hai…

Cash welfare schemes are the new norm – Modi should announce UBI before opposition does it

Before the 2019 elections, there was only one point at which I thought Modi was definitely losing. It was some time in March if I remember correctly: on the day Congress announced the NYAY promise. Six thousand rupees a month to the bottom 20% of the population.

While announcing the scheme, I remember Rahul looking all smug, smacking his lips and then saying: “Shock ho gaye na?”

At least I thought his smugness was justified, at least at that moment. Rs 6000 a month is a lot of money for most people in the country (including me). Could you really blame a poor person for setting everything else aside and voting for it? For a while, I thought it would create a wave in favor of Congress. For me, it will remain a mystery how the Congress failed to actually win the election despite a promise like this. So poor was the Congress communication strategy that the promise failed to percolate to the grassroots. Also there was some confusion over whether they meant Rs 6000 with no questions asked … or a top up (i.e., if you already make Rs 4000, the govt tops it up with an additional Rs 2000). By the time the election actually began in April or heated up in May, the whole NYAY thing was completely forgotten.

How the BJP managed to stave off that threat should really be a case study for the ages.

There is a second possibility that has loomed over my head ever since 2019. Can the BJP be sure that NYAY promise won’t be back? Again, before 2024, ten thousand rupees this time. The Congress will be richer from the 2019 experience of flopping miserably. This time, they will work out the media strategy well in advance, do their homework and learn from past mistakes. A campaign that promises a big cash handout for everyone might easily win the day.

If you observe the progression of our politics, you will see that it is going exactly towards that. Ever since India created this efficient financial super highway of Aadhar enabled direct benefit transfer, it was only a matter of time before politicians would begin promising cash. The system actually works and is by and large, corruption proof. How could politicians not be using it?

In fact, the BJP has already done a preliminary version of this in 2019. That would be PM-Kisan. Although the amount is relatively small, the principle is essentially the same.

The blueprint is unmissable in the current round of Assembly elections. In Bengal, Mamata Banerjee is promising Rs 1000 per month to each SC/ST family and Rs 500 per month to each General Category family. In Assam, the Congress is promising Rs 2000 per month to housewives. In Tamil Nadu, which has always led in this kind of scheme, I think the DMK is promising Rs 1000 per month, which the ADMK countered by offering Rs 1500 per month plus 6 free gas cylinders (lol).

Sure, the BJP will still win Assam and likely Bengal, but there is no mistaking the direction in which things are heading. The BJP is clearly behind in this race. Sure, they have PM-Kisan, but that is still a targeted benefit for a specific group. The “universality” is missing. And the universality is the USP of such schemes — simple to understand. Do you have a heartbeat? Then, you will get money. Got it? Yes.

I am neither mocking the idea of universal basic income nor advocating for it. All I am saying is that this is where things are going. If the BJP wants to remain ahead of the curve, they better catch on to it. Big announcements — which are simple to understand are carrying the day. In Bihar, the 10 lakh jobs promise was catchy and simple … and would definitely have won the day if not for determined action by women voters. In essence, this is no different from a big farm loan waiver promise, which many parties have used multiple times.

Next year in Uttar Pradesh, I have no doubt that Congress and SP will announce a big cash dole promise to the voters. And they will apply a scaled up version of Tejashwi’s promise of “10 lakh govt jobs” on Day 1. Promises like these can queer the pitch for any ruling govt. Nothing wrong about it either from a political point of view : the opposition is going to try anything and everything.

I get the feeling that the BJP has not yet sensed this shift. They are still enamored of their round of welfare schemes like toilet, gas and electricity. And this time it is water connections (check out the blazing speed at which Jal Jeevan scheme is progressing). Yes, toilet and gas and water are cool, but if someone is offering cold hard cash, it would not be surprising if the electorate takes up the offer.

Modi sarkar is fast approaching the halfway mark of its second term – I think they have until Feb 1, 2023 to announce a Universal Basic Income. If the fifth year begins and no UBI is on offer still, the Congress will promise it and begin an entire mass contact program around it. Whoever has to play catch up will be in serious trouble.

Now, you could ask how does it matter. Say the BJP announces UBI of X rupees a month. What can stop the Congress from promising X + 500 a month?

That is where I think public psychology comes into play. The vote catching power of UBI lies in its novelty. Once somebody has already implemented it, political gains from promising a bit more of the same are marginal. In every election manifesto, the opposition promises a slight increase in this or that benefit. Voters don’t even take this seriously most of the time. They know there are no guarantees in matters like this. A manifesto promise can shake up the election only when it is something fresh that people can genuinely look forward to. If it is a fresh and novel offer, the voter knows the incoming new government is guaranteed to implement it.

Feb 1, 2023 : I would eagerly wait to see that budget.

Spate of Modi rallies suggests BJP expects clear victory in Bengal

I don’t remember exactly when, but I believe this is from one of Amit Shah’s old interviews. He explained in detail the purpose of the BJP “organization.” To keep ears so close to the ground that your network of karyakartas can tell you the outcome of an election even before the first vote has been polled.

Because of this, I believe there are two people who know in advance the outcome of every election in India : Modi and Shah.

In the last one week, Modi has addressed rallies in Purulia, Kharagpur and today in Bankura. There can be no doubt that he expects to win this election.

It is true that the BJP campaign flagged a little in the first 10-12 days of March, at a time when it should have been peaking. A number of factors went into this. There was Mamata’s injury. She did not get sympathy like she hoped, but she did manage to take up TV space for 3-5 full days in Bengal. Every moment spent discussing allegations and counter-allegations about her accident was a moment that the opposition could not use to make its case against her. This was also the time when the BJP decided its tickets. Given BJP’s bright prospects and the number of newcomers, the ticket distribution was bound to create some kind of circus. You can see it as lucky or unlucky for BJP. In some sense, it became a double whammy at the same time as Mamata’s injury captured all the attention. Or you could see as lucky for the BJP: the ticket distribution circus was going to happen anyway … they got it over with at a time when even a powerful campaign would have got no media attention.

The overall narrative building period is over. The election is now down to phase by phase contests. And PM Modi is putting everything into the first couple of phases, where the BJP would expect to do very well. These are the areas that the BJP swept in 2019 and would expect to sweep again. These are the areas where the “internally marginalized” folks within Bengal live. The card of insider vs outsider will not work at all here. As far as these people are concerned, their number 1 sentiment is that the Bhadralok crowd around Kolkata does not give them due representation.

Earlier in the week, the fumble in the BJP campaign became obvious when Amit Shah arrived to address two rallies. He did one and the other in Jhargram has to be canceled (technically, he did address it, but virtually). The official reason was “helicopter problems.” Whatever that meant, he spent most of his visit holding lengthy discussions with state leaders. The TMC was overjoyed and insisted that the BJP was staring at defeat.

However, this was followed up with three Modi rallies in the rest of the week. Whoever thought the BJP was lacking in confidence must have got the message. The BJP is not backing off … and not settling for anything less than a clear victory. The Prime Minister is going phase by phase and so is Amit Shah. No election campaign can go by without ups and downs, but the sheer energy and commitment that Modi-Shah team is bringing to the table here is remarkable. They are just not going to let Bengal slip : the state simply means too much to them. Remember this?

I can assure you Amit Shah meant every word, every letter of this. Bengal meant a lot to him. In his victory speech on May 23, 2019, he went on and on for ten minutes without even naming the state. He even mentioned Arunachal Pradesh but not Bengal. Then, he stopped, smacked his lips and said five times: Bangal ke andar… It was the most special of all, the showstopper on May 23, 2019. This is not hyperbole. Indeed, there was nothing more special for him that day.

Those who have become slightly nervous about the BJP’s prospects in last few days should see the energy that both leaders have thrown into the campaign. They are simply not going to back off. They insist on winning and they will win. If that means that Shah will have to stay awake till the last vote is polled on April 29, he will.

On the flip side, whatever the TMC’s belligerent rhetoric, they are yet to show a single sign of a party that is actually winning. The tension shows on Mamata’s face, but there is more. Let me list the signs quickly.

The first was sitting ministers resigning from the government and crossing over. There are many elections where the incumbent goes in expecting to lose. But somehow there is something about being in power as a minister that nobody wants to risk their chair, even when they are staring at certain defeat. Here we have multiple Cabinet ministers who resigned and joined the BJP. Becoming a minister is work of a lifetime. The only time they will risk losing even five minutes of this is when they are 100% sure that it will pay off after the next round of elections.

The second was the mad dash to announce new welfare schemes in January : the so called “Duare sarkar” or government at your door. My personal belief is that the electorate tends to close a “window” of sorts about a year before elections. You actually get four years, not five. Anything you do after the fourth year does not count in elections. Governments still try and usually the bigger the initiative announced, the more likely they are to lose.

The third is when one side tries to alter its rhetoric and present a face that their real coalition is bigger than what it actually is. Any side that starts bargaining for allies midway in a campaign is clearly not expecting to win. The TMC had appealed before to CPM and Cong for support. This week, Mamata Banerjee repeated her appeal to “Marxist friends.” This is not a symptom of a party that is hoping to win. This is someone who is already wondering if there could be a way to bring new partners on board after the results. This strategy, too clever by half, rarely succeeds. Once you begin mentally exploring a strategy of getting “close to majority” instead of actually winning a majority, you have conceded the game already. You are revising your own aims downward … and when you are aiming low, the fall can accelerate very quickly.

The fourth symptom is the desperate effort to get sympathy after what was obviously an unfortunate accident. The TMC hoped in the initial hours to make it the turning point of the election. The fact that they were looking for a turning point shows they knew the election was going away from them.

Final point: notice how Bengal police reacted. Quite simply, I was aghast that the local police said quite clearly that it was an accident. Of course, the TMC will use the fig leaf that the police right now is under the EC and not the TMC govt. But just think from the point of view of a local police official in Nandigram. The EC might be the boss right now, but it will be gone in six weeks. In case the TMC comes back, those police officials will surely regret this. Again, I cannot believe they actually dared to go against what Mamata Banerjee would have wanted them to say. The bureaucracy always knows who is winning an election. And if we know one thing about the bureaucracy, it is that they don’t like to take risks.

Is Covid back?

I really did not want to talk about this. I have been watching the numbers climb for the last several days with increasing apprehension. I thought pretending not to notice would make the problem go away. It did not. It is March again. Is March 2021 going to be as miserable as March 2020?

At the top of the concerns is the economy. If you see early 2020, there was a consensus among rating agencies that India was set to bounce back after a year of slowdown. Obviously, that did not happen. The pandemic crushed all hopes. Particularly ill fated for India, because that would have been our comeback year.

A year later, we are at the jumpoff point again. We suffered a horrible year, but we rebounded much faster than anyone expected. For a while, they all said that India’s economy would contract the most due to Covid, but we proved them wrong. In fact, it turns out now that the negatives were almost all concentrated in the Apr-Jun quarter when we were in complete lockdown. Once the lockdown lifted, India went back to work faster than pretty much anyone had anticipated.

In early March, the optimism was peaking again. Again, we have a near consensus…perhaps even bigger than last year, that India’s GDP is set to rock this year. Most estimates go well above 10% and even the worst don’t go below 7-8%.

So when I see Covid on the horizon again, I feel something like a pit in the stomach. Of course, I feel like swearing out loud at the Chinese government, but that does not help very much in the real world.

The stock market has picked up the trickle of bad news on Covid and is falling again. How much of it is justified and how much of it is panic remains to be seen. But who can blame people for being nervous?

I read some of what people are saying about the economic impact of a second wave. The only house to say anything concrete is Nomura and they say the impact will be “marginal.” Now, we know how these reports generally go. They start all fine and dandy and then slowly walk back their predictions. Hopefully, there is a lack of over-optimism in the post pandemic world.

However, the Nomura reports do make a solid point. The second wave has not just hit India, but a number of other countries around the world. In fact, Europe is facing its third wave right now. Yet the economic impact elsewhere has been nowhere near the devastation caused by the first big wave. The reasons are rather obvious. First, people, businesses and governments have adapted a lot already to a new normal. Second, governments have realized that lockdowns work very little. Unless we can be China, which we can’t. And of course, third, we have a vaccine now. In fact, several of them.

So that’s encouraging. And while we have seen sporadic reports of small lockdowns here and there in India, most of these seem ornamental.

More than our policymakers, I have faith in our people. This is actually not a flattering statement about our people. Rather it is a simple statement of facts. No matter what happens now, the fear factor of the virus is gone. People have stopped caring (and I am as guilty as the next person). Because the fear factor is gone, any harsh measure like lockdown would be tremendously unpopular. Neither the state government nor the central government would dare impose a lockdown today. Also, people are watching the political rallies with lakhs of people in them. Nobody is going to allow their business locked down, or be forced to cancel their trip to the restaurant.

This is one of those ironic moments when something good can come out of something bad. People have dropped their guard prematurely, which makes any lockdown devastatingly unpopular. This in turn keeps the government from trying it.

As dangerous as the Coronavirus is, there is no doubt at this point that the impact of a lockdown would be worse than that of the virus itself.

Last year was different. We did not know anything about the virus. When we saw rich western nations crumbling before the virus, it made our blood go cold with horror. Over one thousand deaths a day in the US? We had apocalyptic visions of what could happen when the virus rips through say Dharavi in Mumbai. If the US or France are reeling, how will our health system cope? In Latin American countries, there were images of bodies being dumped on the streets. What were we going to do?

Oh, what a nightmare it was. But even India’s biggest critics have to admit that things turned out much better than feared. Our systems did not collapse, there were no bodies in the streets and things held together.

There is no question of lockdown now. If we could fight the virus blind last year, with no vaccine in hand, surely we can fight now.

Right now, India is vaccinating some 20 lakh people every day. On some days, it rises to 30 lakh. I am pretty sure this is the highest number in the world each day. Just think about this : at this rate we could have vaccinated the whole of the UK in less than a month.

We are not a rich country, but our systems work. This I say with considerable pride.

But the scale is massive. Even if we do 1 crore people a week, it would take 130 weeks, which is more than 2 years! We have to keep accelerating because we are capable of it. In fact, India is probably the only country whose systems are capable of delivering it.

20 lakh a day is not enough. We need something closer to 50 lakh a day. We actually have the healthcare workers, the system and of course the vaccine manufacturing capacity to get this done. It’s like how India was testing a tad slowly in the beginning and catching a lot of heat for this last year. Then, we shifted into top gear. At that point, we began testing over 10 lakh a day, something no other country can compete with. The same urgency has to be brought into the vaccination drive.

Luckily, vaccine hesitancy is coming to an end. In January, there was a lot of skepticism (understandable) and people were focused on reasons not to take the vaccine. The sentiment seems to have turned 180 degrees : now it is all about demanding that the govt remove the age curbs and let as many people avail the vaccine as possible. And of course, PM Modi taking Covaxin played a huge role in this. One jab and PM Modi sucker punched the vaccine skeptics in the face.

Now we have to raise our performance level to 50 lakh jabs a day. Because we have to achieve those 12-13% growth rates this year. We simply must. If we lose this year, we are toast.