In the personalised politics of today, the media is pitting personalities against each other. For the past several days it has been Priyanka versus Modi shadow boxing because Rahul Gandhi cuts no ice. In the election heat and dust we forget that Priyanka Gandhi is the wife of Robert Vadra who made his millions from shady real estate deals and that she is therefore not in a position to take the moral high ground. But that pretty face and the fact that she is half Italian seems to wow us. It is true that our minds are deeply colonised. We are addicted to fair skin and believe they can do no wrong. Aren’t these signs of a nation imperilled?
Narendra Modi is used to wisecracks and speaks of his 56″ chest as if that alone is good enough to drive governance in this country of myriad complexities and cultural diversities. Why is it that in a country known for its age-old wisdom; a country that discovered the “zero”; a country that gave birth to a statesman par excellence in Chanakya, is now driven by the politics of pettiness where self-projected leaders talk of personal frailties rather than show the 1.2 billion people of this country a vision of what we want India to be twenty years hence? India’s demographic profile is that of a young country. The youth are looking for hope in an otherwise forlorn scenario where the rapidly falling value of the Rupee also reflects every Indian’s fall from grace. Who can restore our national pride?
There are many who believe that national pride or Indian ‘nationalism’ is a dogmatic idea as it inclines to strait-jacket us into one people, one nation etc., when we are, in fact, several peoples, races and religions. But the reverse is also true. As long as Indians are lumped as vote banks based on their religious affiliations (Muslim, Hindu, Christian, Sikh, Jain etc., ) or racial origins, we will continue to be divided along those lines and politicians will fish in these murky waters to further divide us. The politics of hatred has ruled us for over 60 years. We carry such horrific baggage of the Partition, of the 1984 anti-Sikh riots of the Godhra violence that we are restrained from moving ahead. Those of us from the North East remember the 1962 Chinese invasion and believe we were almost discarded by the nation. If we continue to nurse these hurts, I am afraid they will never heal. And wounds that don’t heal turn cancerous.
India is a mature democracy. The polity should set the standards of engagement for politicians. Sadly the cacophonous electronic media has only queered the pitch further. Some sanity has to set in before India implodes. The dance of democracy is not necessarily always a happy sight to behold. There are ugly sides to it that we need to repair.