A CLEVER PLOY

The intellectual one up-man ship in Independent India has always remained with a particular section of the society, educated in English medium Christian schools and inbreeding mediocrity relentlessly and yet considering the rest of the countrymen to be too naïve to understand ‘the essence of India’!

Led historically by the left of centre Jawahar Lal Nehru, this intellectually elite has traditionally labeled a contrarian view as ‘un-Indian’, and needless to say, they were totally cut off from the heart of the heartland. So though Nehru was a diplomatic failure in Kashmir in 1947 and a humiliating military failure in 1964, with considerable loss of territory and prestige on both occasions, his pet elite group who wrote our history and literature still praised and projected him as an apostle of peace with the white dove and the red rose and everything else! Peace at what cost, no one bothered to ask.

The cornerstone of Nehruvian politics was non-alignment, which in the eyes of those who chose to keep them open was heavily aligned towards communist friend U.S.S.R and away from capitalist villain America. This suited the local communists perfectly well and so they always remained his trusted intellectual bed-fellows. The fact that Nehru was allergic to a dissenting voice and an alternate opinion is amply evident in the history of Indian National Congress when he orchestrated the ouster of a duly elected Netaji Subhash Bose from Congress Presidentship. His arrogance and his ambitious obsession of becoming first Prime Minister of India was the single most important factor that resulted in the partition of our country. His political pussy-footing and appeasement of the elite Muslim class resulted in the still festering wound called Kashmir, and had it not been for the astute and efficient Sardar Patel, we were almost sure to have another one in Hyderabad. The Left and Left of Centre Thinkdom (LLCT) still considers the Nehruvian era to be the golden era of Indian politics.

This was the era when cream-de-la-cream picked and chose members to be included in their elite club, and excellence and performance were most certainly not the only criteria of selection. One had to think like them, eat like them, drink like them, write like them, recite like them, create like them and perform like them to qualify for membership to that club of pseudo-intellectuals. So we had a bunch of politicians, babus, authors, playwrights, historians and socialites who were intellectual carbon copies of the accepted ‘elite model’. They were the ones who got all the cushy jobs, important positions, prestigious awards and the responsibility to document history as they deemed fit! Thus the contrarian view never saw the light of day in geopolitics, in society and in history. So actually the champion of ‘Unity in diversity’ was never fond of a diverse point of view.

Mrs. Indira Gandhi was a step ahead. She could not see the contrarian world beyond the tip of her historic nose. Any disturbance to her tranquility was treated as a fly on that nose tip. The contrarian view was now hunted down, penalized and incarcerated and that is what the infamous Emergency was all about. As he dared to think differently from the establishment, a Gandhian like J.P. was thrown behind bars. The pet courtiers of the ruler – the politicians, the babus, the journalists, the intellectuals, the authors…all toed the line and those who dared to think differently heard the proverbial ‘mid-night knock’ on their door and were behind bar in no time without any recourse to justice. Incidentally even after this blatant outrage of democracy only one author, Fanishwar Nath ‘Renu’ had returned his National Award.

Mrs. Gandhi’s rule was followed by a non-descript phase of coalition governments which were more concerned with their mere existence and exist they did in a unique way. Steeped in deceit and stooped in corruption they looted the exchequer but even while doing so they kept the pseudo-intellectual elites satisfied by throwing at them mostly bones and at times leftover meat in the form of awards, promotions, positions and distinctions! Their job in turn was to lick the master’s feet and bark at all those who dared to offend.

Then there was a tectonic shift in May 2014. A very old political dispensation, which was licking its past wounds in the wings, got an opportunity to govern with absolute majority and the Left & Left of Centre Thinkdom (LLCT…remember) was thrown into oblivion. The present government had a past experience of governance and knew by now what all was wrong and what all needed corrections. Whether in history or literature, religious or social interactions, science or arts, business or politics they were poles apart from the LLCT. Friction was bound to happen, but they did not have the numbers in the parliament. People had rejected their ideology of inaction, preferential action, coercive action and perverse action and voted for a proven performer. It should have ideally been a ‘no contest’ and we should have surged ahead like the PSLV rocket into the next orbit……..but alas that did not happen!

There were two factors responsible for our failure to change gears – one in each thinkdom. The government was burdened with a few loose nuts which threatened to dismantle the rocket – who speak before they think and who have grossly misinterpreted the mandate for growth and progress. The LLCT were now bereft of political patronage and left orphaned. Many of them were being undeservingly pampered as they were fruits of the same political dispensation and now were owners of newspapers and TV channels, procured by the corruption money they had looted all those good old days. So how do they pay back their LLCT masters – by sabotaging the Indian growth story by planting the story of intolerance on His Master's Voice! As if on cue the entire pseudo-intellectual literati and glitterati started chanting the ‘intolerance’ mantra and returning their National Awards, which they might have never received had they not been fruits of the elite tree!

So yes, this is a clever ploy……if you lose politically try to harm your opponent extra-politically. But who is being harmed most? It is always the poor farmer, the yet to develop villages, the unemployed youth, the closed mills and the clueless middle class. But again, has the LLCT ever cared for them? When in power they looted and cheated from fodder to coal to games to the entire spectrum (pun intended). And now that they are out of power they disrupt parliament, manufacture disinformation campaign and make a mockery of the mandate of the people! When was India not intolerant? Nehru, Indira, and their LLCT tribe are the epitome of intolerance. Could you call any of them a fascist and a ‘maut ka saudagar’ openly in the last 68 years? Think again…….who needs to be tolerant?