Populism As An Antidote To Anger

Populism as antidote to anger

‘Courage is contagious’- Julian Assange

Canadian essayist and author of non-fiction and novels too, John Raslton Saul, interviewed on his way to the Jaipur Literary festival 2014, spoke elliptically, in difficult to understand and subtle concepts, like literary figures often do.

Writers, tend to explore the evolution of ideas against a backdrop of real events. It is for us to surmise what they see as cart, or ekka gharry, if you want the sports version, and what indeed, as horse.

This one, Mr. Saul, is trying to put some life into the Indian PEN Chapter. You could call it his bureaucratic purpose in coming here. But he has been before as well. That makes you think. And India does qualify as an instant addiction. Where are you going to get to see so much life?

But, Saul did say one thing in his interview, amongst several obscure things, with Karan Bhardwaj, that resonated immediately with what’s being going on in India.

Paraphrased; he said populism is a sign   of anger. Interesting comment, this, and instantly right if you think about it.  But which end of the stick? Is it a dissatisfaction with governance, corruption, or, since it is perpetrated by people, either in power, or seeking it by making populist promises; is it a kind of bribe to make the anger of being neglected and exploited go away?

Is it the equivalent of the ostrich burying its head in the sand, as just a gesture, too little too late, but still capable of causing axphysiasion?  

Did enigmatic beauty and consummate actress Suchitra Sen die this week at age 82, or the day that  her soul mate Uttam Kumar died three decades ago? If you let it, it can haunt you. Besides, you know the truth, and it is most impressive.

The action is a little bit like busy parents making ‘quality time’ for their children, and hoping hard that they won’t consequently be cross with them.  But what do people at the receiving end of populism think of it? Are they viewed as reparations, compensation for injustices and harm done, designed to assuage hurt, or entitlements, or katputli puppetry, starring themselves as mute puppets of no consequence either way?

Are recipients of populist measures grateful, or provoked, into even greater anger under the surface by the staged generosity? After all, recipients of largesse are expected to make happy, and keep the transaction simple between the perpetrator and the victim.

Is the chowkidar-style worn muffler accompanied by a tubercular cough this winter’s statement? And the Gandhi cap, abused with paper manifestation and slogans, the actual, the authentic, cap for all seasons?  

Sadly, everyone is rattled enough by the AAP manifestation to adopt that silly cap. BJP personnel wear a saffron version with ‘Modi for PM’ written on it. Mayawati has a much more chic light blue Gandhi cap with dark blue elephants on it!

Only Congress moves around bare-headed, possibly shame-faced,  or in jaunty Himachali topis! There is no real respite though. Their man in the hills is battling corruption charges.  Not very well, but just like the octogenarian manifestation he is.

The Congress Party believes it is justified in its bounty to the underprivileged and poor because they are both impoverished and deserving. This much is obvious. They do not answer the question as to why such a situation obtains, after 66 years of independence, for so many, and with the Congress at the helm of affairs for most of these years. Why has the country failed to grow and prosper with so much potential?

Instead, Congress has thought fit to just step up the largesse, like Cicero’s Romans, with their bread and circuses.  That was in times BC. But Congress is positioned shamelessly with this lurid excuse for an excuse masquerading as action, just prior to the general elections 2014.

It is a kind of veiled apology perhaps, like a roué might make to his much betrayed ‘beloved’. To the public, it is an ointment offered, to rub on the bruises of anti-incumbency. The Congress policy makers probably do not like to introspect.

Why do it, when there is such anger against its non-performance and corruption. Congressmen and women like to say, and believe, that their achievements have not been properly publicised. Congress does not see or accept that it has not performed, and been corrupt, to such a massive degree. It prefers to be populist, and wants you to forgive and forget. It wants a third term in a row.

Most economic observers feel that unless a reformist and stable government emerges after the elections, the Indian economy could go into a downward spiral for at least the rest of this decade. This is on top of the fact that it is already halved in GDP terms over the last five years. But there are enough foreign governments who do not mind if this is so. A weak India is easier to both exploit and bully. China is the one that got away, while America was away, trying to tame the USSR.

But two Asian superpowers without being particularly beholden to the West would be intolerable and make it very hard to dominate South Asia and the Asia-Pacific. Japan is already feeling the pressure from China, and much of ASEAN has capitulated to the Chinese dragon, hidden under the niceties of diplomacy.

India is being encircled by China, and pushed around on occasion so that it knows its place. And America wants a vassal state in us, plain and simple, as the price of its support. They cite Pakistan to us privately, while damning us with faint praise publicly, and suggest we learn how to behave with the globocop, meaning themselves, from our thoroughly compromised neighbours. To the US, we are no better.

There are indeed gains to be made, the dog will get his bone, but the Faustian pact is a must.

So what is it that people in the Congress party and in rag-tag  NGO-bred outfits like the AAP who openly favour Maoists and separatists actually want? Who briefs them, and whom do they get their real sustenance from? Why are they so willing to sell the country down the river, and in the case of the Congress, plunder the country mercilessly while they are about it?

That is not to say the anti-corruption crusaders, swearing by all that his holy now, won’t be audaciously corrupt once they get their own feel properly under the table.

The Americans don’t much like Narendra Modi, and it has nothing to do with Godhra, though much is always made of it. America likes its ‘friends’ to be pliable like Tony ‘poodle’ Blair of the UK, the custodian of the much vaunted ‘special relationship’.  TIME Magazine has recently said as much. Though its body copy is still couched in terms of the visa issue, and how this might change because of President Obama’s bias towards the US ‘national interest’.

But the truth is, the Americans perceive Modi as not easy to push around. And in the meantime, in the run-up to the general elections, the powers that be in this country have to keep Modi safe from massive security threats and very real dangers to his life.

The US is not looking forward to a NDA government. It has had a bad enough time trying to get Congress/UPA to do its bidding, given our inconvenient but functioning democracy. Now the prospect of a right- of-centre NDA coming into power, and determinedly putting the interests of India, particularly its security and economic interests, first, is not very exciting to them. And God forbid if the NDA, should it form the next government, proves less easy to corrupt.

How on earth can it still be business as usual for the US then?

(1300 words)

January 18^th, 2014

Gaautam Mukherjee