Thinking Aloud

Rohit Dhankar
“A democracy of people who can think only confusedly can neither make progress, nor even maintain itself, because it will always be open to the risk of being misled and exploited by demagogues who have within their reach today unprecedentedly powerful media of mass communication and propaganda.” [Report of the Secondary Education Commission (Oct.1952 to June 1952), Published by Ministry of Education and Social Welfare, GoI, 1972 (7th Reprint), p.24]
Lok Sabha Elections 2024 have given a blow to Narendra Damodardas Modi’s conceit—Modi ki guarantee, Modi ka pariwar, I am sent by the God for a purpose, He will not recall me before I complete that purpose, etc.—soaring high in the sky are brough down to the ground of reality. Good for Indian democracy.
These elections also have given a lease of life to the dynasty, with a mindless crown prince at the helm, and a train of spineless greedy sycophants behind. Bad for Indian democracy.
Elections have also given more power to ideologically blinded false narrative setters, who tell deliberate lies. Bad for Indian democracy.
The false narratives of democracy in danger, constitution in danger, Hindu majoritarianism, dara hua musalman, etc. have made deep inroads in the minds of the people. Caste division has flared up, Muslims are almost completely consolidated, maligned Hindus are at each-others’ throats. Given the fact of “people who can think only confusedly” and “demagogues who have within their reach today unprecedentedly powerful media of mass communication and propaganda”; and know very well how to build narratives over time; one wonders if these ills will go away in near future.
Now a coalition government will be formed in the centre; given the history of coalitions in India it will be weak and indecisive. I am neither given to forecasts nor am knowledgeable enough for them. But as common Indian citizen feel that certain things are likely to happen. My benchmark is 2019-24 and in comparison what might happen in 2024-29 worries me on the following points. This does not mean that 2019-24v was great and all good. I only saw it only as a counter push to decades old ills, the push which may not be all good in itself, but stimulates thinking in the minds of people as well as forces of the wrong doers to correct course. Which eventually may come to a more reasonable position politically.
Economic progress will be slowed down, because of indecision and emphasis on freebees. Welfare state will be interpreted as ‘free distribution sate’; and not as a state which works for people’s empowerment and socio-economic improvements.
Caste competition will intensify further. The millennia old problem of Indian culture is nurtured by all parties, politically institutionalised by congress, is here to stay. Now caste has transformed into a political entity; eradication of unteachability and even inter-caste marriages will not eradicate it. It is likely to destroy Hinduism and with it, Indian democracy, which survives because of Hinduism.
Secularism will be further distorted into minority appeasement, which has already killed the true spirit of secularism, that of religion having nothing to do with state policies. We never had true secularism; it was always a name for granting special privileges to minorities, especially Muslims. Ambedkar’s idea of ‘settlement rather than appeasement’ has become more distant now.
Our history is deliberately distorted through cherry-picking and misinterpretations. There was a counter force and push was building up to swing the pendulum in other direction; that of Hindus all great and good, Muslim all bad. This push of the pendulum in itself is no good thing; but it was putting pressure on the historians to correct their deliberate anti-Hindu stance. Now it will stop, and history writing will create two narratives; antagonistic to each other, both cherry-picked and both wrong. Since a proper truth-based settlement between Hindus and Muslims will become impossible the historical injustices and mandir-masjid issues will intensify.
Pakistan will become belligerent again and terrorism in Kashmir may increase again. Our ‘public intellectuals’ will of course call it ‘resistance’, give it cover fire. They will intensify their campaign world over to justify terrorism. Similarly, Khalistan movement in India and abroad may intensify. The half-finished job of eradicating Naxalite problem may not be completed. Kuki terrorism is already supported by the ‘public intellectual’, it may intensify.
BJP could hardy do anything to stop infiltration of Bangladeshi Muslims and Rohingyas, now it will become even more difficult. Demography in border districts will change, and we are likely to see more fools like Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury in many more places.
Because of appeasement nothing concrete will be done on Uniform Civil Code, serious problems of Waqf Act and general aggressiveness of Muslims. Citizenship Amendment Act will not be properly implemented; and National Citizenship Register will be abandoned completely. The ‘public intellectuals’ protect these things as minority protection. The Muslim intelligentsia who may recognise these problems will keep mum as usual because of political correctness and fear of their own community. Speaking of the ills of Islam, Quran and Muhammad will invite more intensified sar tan se juda slogans and acts. Hindus who mention these problems will be called communal with greater vehemence.
No independent body to manage Hindu temples will be created; they will remain in the control of the governments and their land will keep diminishing. On the other hand, the encroachment efforts of Waqf Board will be protected by the governments and are likely to intensify.
Propylitization from Missionaries will intensify and any resistance to it will be called atrocities on Christians.
Our institutions of judiciary, law enforcement, investigation agencies and education were never free and fully autonomous in last 75 years. Earlier leftists and congress controlled them. In last ten years BJP tried to control them. Now the coalition will control them. They cannot be set free by the government alone. You need individuals with spine and intellect to manage them. This commodity is in short supply in our country.
Our education system was always an ineffective system of indoctrination. Autonomous rational thinking was never its strong point. It was always ideologically tilted endeavour. It will continue producing people with confused thinking, somewhat inefficiently though, but enough to give the reigns of our democracy in the hands of “demagogues who have within their reach today unprecedentedly powerful media of mass communication and propaganda”.
Sorry for this pessimistic write up. Readers might think that I was hoping for BJP to remove all these ills. I know that it comes out like this in this short writeup. But no, my hope was that BJP’s push in the opposite direction with equal vehemence and on many issues perhaps equally wrong, will act as a stimulation for more rational thinking for the general public as well as for ideologically blinded so-called liberals. Now that push has become very weak, thus the faulty narrative, wrong definition of secularism, minority appeasement, anti-Hindu biases et all will go as usual.
I would like to reiterate that my care for Indian civilisation and Hindu-dharma is not at all motivated by any religious considerations. Rather, I believe that democracy, open society, secularism, equal citizenship rights to all; etc. all depend on the strength of Indian culture and Hindu-dharma in this country. Weaken or dismantle this and democracy will extinguish like a lamp which has burnt all its oil.

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This entry was posted on Thursday, June 6th, 2024 at 10:15 am and is filed under Pratyutpann-Mati. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.