Madhu and Narendra’s Excellent Adventure

As the evening dawned on yet another hectic week in New Delhi, the city’s residents were in for a surprise. After the last few days spent getting a small dose of the unbearable summer that we are heading towards, a bout of torrential rain was followed by a small, relief giving hailstorm. Praise the weather lords, spring was finally here! The sweet smell of spring was perhaps most on the minds of the overworked employees of News X. The channel’s staple program of a guy sitting on a plastic chair reading out things from yesterday’s newspaper was being pre-empted for an interview with India’s current Prime Ministerial frontrunner and future eternal President, Narendra Modi. Finally, someone other than their mothers would be watching the channel.

Eternal spring was also blooming in the heart of insane asylum outpatient and the person conducting the News X interview, Madhu Kishwar. Finally, the world would get to see the Narendra Modi she saw. Not the tough but brilliant administrator the world had come to appreciate. But the man behind the man. The kind, gentle soul who wouldn’t even dream of ever hurting a fly. Unless the fly had anti-national thoughts or wore a skull-cap because then HE WOULD LITERALLY ANNIHILATE THAT FLY INTO OBLIVION. NO ONE MESSES WITH INDIA. NOT ON NARENDRA MODI’S WATCH. Through her work, people would get to see what she saw everyday. That the man is pure magic. That he had the ability to turn everything into gold. Especially the fortunes of those of us who worship him. And anyone who didn’t see that was probably a sad victim of a SONIA GANDHI LED CONSPIRACY.

* * *

Last Saturday, as the breathless social media updates from various News X anchors informed us, we were going to witness the greatest television event of the century. For the first time in his capacity as the BJP’s Prime Ministerial candidate, Narendra Modi would allow someone to ask him anything! Actually, not anything. Just things he likes to talk about! And not someone, but the President of his fan club, Madhu Kishwar. Sure, that seemed suspicious to the layman’s eye. But as Madhu’s twitter feed informed us, this would be Modi at his most candid.

So everyone who managed to find News X on their set top box tuned in. It was right between the channel that told you what shows other channels are broadcasting and the channel that exclusively showed advertisements for anti-acne medicine. And as promised, we learned a lot of things about the greatest thing to happen to this country since the first movie that had songs in it. Not only does he like to use red ink, but he once gave a presentation to Atal Behari Vajpyee. Anyone looking to vote for a person who uses red pens and likes giving powerpoint presentations to powerful people, he’s your guy! 

There were other interesting things we learned about him too. Apparently, Modi was a total Rahul Gandhi when he was deputed by the party to save Gujarat from the imposing weight of the Keshubhai Patel administration. He didn’t even know which side of the file was up! He was so embarrassed that everyone called him ‘Sahib,’ that he still hasn’t told them to stop even though it’s been twelve years.

Now, some cynics will say that calling this farce an interview was like calling Pramod Muthalik a feminist. They will ask why even though there are so many voices present in Madhu Kishwar’s head, none of them showed up to ask Modi a question. They will wonder why a news channel would present such a piece of blatant propaganda as an in-depth interview.

I, for one, was shocked that a person in a news organization fudged the truth to get a lot of people to tune in to their broadcast. And, I’ll have these critics know, that the propaganda wasn’t blatant. If you ask all those who worship Mr. Modi, they will tell you that it was the best interview they have seen on Indian teevee, matched only by the Indira Gandhi video profile presented by Sanjay Gandhi for Doordarshan during the emergency years.

Though I will agree that it wasn’t really an interview. This was the first part in Madhu Kishwar’s 6,999 part seminal, probable Pulitzer prize winning series, All In with Narendra Modi. And for the record, Madhu did ask Dr. Modi a question. She asked him how badly he was hurt when the media unfairly blamed him for a preventable event that happened in his state under his watch in 2002.

We also learned that a lot of muslim groups supported Modi’s first election to the assembly in that same year. It wasn’t mentioned why he would need to specifically highlight their support, but I guess to find out we will have to watch the rest of the series! (Can’t wait for the episode in which Modi tells his kids how he met their mother!) During the post-interview panel discussion with Ms. Kishwar, she specified again that some of Modi’s best supporters are muslim. I know that some people would call this vote-bank politics, but please note that it’s vote bank politics only if Sonia Gandhi does it. Modi simply isn’t into all that shit, okay?

Now, there are some vested interests who accuse Modi of not facing tough questions. That is another lie! Modi faces tough questions everyday from someone who knows him the most: himself. He looks into the mirror every night before going to bed, and asks himself whether he did something to help someone that day. And he goes to bed only if the answer is a resounding yes. And I’ll have you know, he has never had to answer in the negative. Do you think any of his opponents have such a well thought out, fool-proof, unbiased system in place?

I don’t think so.

* * *

Madhu closed the browser window and switched off her 486 desktop computer. She couldn’t handle all the negativity that was being spewed at her on twitter. Why wouldn’t all the paid congress agents leave her alone? She saw a shadow outside the window. She ran quickly to see who it was but they had already made their escape. Maybe it was just the moonlight playing its tricks on her. Maybe Sonia Gandhi had even paid off the moon. That woman was everywhere. If she could make a jumbo 777 jet disappear, what chance did a small, lonely activist have? Should she call the police? No, they don’t take her complaints seriously anymore. They probably have been given instructions from above to ignore her anyway. She checked to see if her gun was still safely resting under her pillow. She tried to calm herself but the worry kept bubbling into her mind. NO! She wasn’t going to give in to the anti-nationals. Not when she was this close to seeing her dreams fulfilled. There was only one thing that would calm her. She took out her phone and dialled his number. He would know what to do.

Slouching Towards New Delhi

(A condensed version of this article first appeared in the Sunday Guardian)

You know election time is neigh when roads start getting rebuilt, potholes begin to be temporarily covered again and even some government employees begin to show up for ‘work.’ Sure, most of them still don’t do anything, but, remember, it’s the thought that counts! As always, any election in Delhi garners national attention. Not only because it is conveniently located in the same city as the main office of most of our major news organizations, it’s also supposed to provide an indication of which party and their supporters will be more smug while we head to the general election. However, this time there was even more attention paid to the election because instead of the usual two mediocre alternatives, the people of Delhi had three despicable candidates to choose from. Three cheers for democracy!  

As the votes are counted this week and Delhi’s new liaison to the central government to continuously ask for more money is selected, let us not forget the mind numbing and melodramatic campaign that got us here.

Fighting for another record term is our first candidate, the current incumbent and the only senior citizen in Delhi to actually have access to various government services, Sheila Dikshit. She spent most of the campaign being offended at anyone who had the temerity to suggest that she didn’t put her best foot forward each and every day she has been in office. For the past decade and a half, her first and last thought has been to wonder how she can make the life of the citizens of her city-state better. And she was ready to debate anyone who dared to suggest that she made any mistakes. Anyone! At an independent public forum! Of course, she couldn’t do that during the elections. She did not have any time! Why would anyone want to see leaders of different political parties debate each other during an election, anyway? What purpose does it serve? None, as far as she is concerned. She just wants to spend all her time with the people of the city. The people she thinks about every minute of her life. They’re her only concern.

That is why she spent the last two weeks of the campaign pretending to be a really humble person. Nothing to see here! Just your friendly neighbourhood grandmother fighting an election! What sort of monster doesn’t vote for their grandmother? She even admitted to making a couple of mistakes. Like the BRT corridor. She gave into popular sentiment and finally admitted her disappointment with what she once claimed to be her signature achievement. She promised to start dismantling it the minute she was elected to her fourth term. Look, if you’re only focusing on her mistakes then you must have a secret agenda of your own. Why not focus on all the positive changes? Look at all the flyovers! Also, the large number of public facilities for all those people who get stuck in traffic while traversing the road between those flyovers. No one even mentions the abundance of electricity! Also, the number of hospitals for all those who get a heart attack after looking at their electricity bills. Vote for the Congress and give us a chance to solve all the problems we created!

The story of the BJP’s campaign is the story of how one deserving candidate was cheated of his rightful place as his party’s chief ministerial nominee. This man was none other than Vijay Goel. Not only is he an obedient worker, he is also a renowned activist. He has spent the past few decades quietly building the party in the city, waiting for his turn. Sure, he is alleged to have made some money and is possibly the only person in Delhi who is less popular than Shiela Dikshit, but everyone knows elections are not popularity contests. You don’t need people to like you to get them to vote for you. Especially not in India, where people vote for candidates they despise at regular intervals. You just have to make them realize that your opponent is the worst person in the world. This was his time to shine, dammit! But they took his dream and gave it to an unknown person like Harsh Vardan. What sort of name is that, anyway? What is he, a character from a Karan Johar movie? Now, Vijay, that’s a name. It literally means victory! VICTORY!

Anyway, it didn’t matter much because the only candidate for every election the BJP runs in for the next few months is Narendra Modi. He was what traders in Delhi call the “all-in-all” of the BJP’s election campaign. The candidate, the chief campaigner and every item in the manifesto. Just don’t ask him any questions. Real patriots don’t want such a great leader to actually specify policy positions. Get your legitimate concerns off my lawn!  Vote for the BJP, because all you need is Narendra Modi!

Almost all of us have that that weird uncle who will show up at your family function and try to be ultra-helpful for no discernible reason. He will admonish the catering staff for being lazy, stand with the family to welcome the guests and will force you to let him do all the inevitable last minute errands. But, instead of helping, he ends up making the catering staff more rude, creeps out the guests who have no idea who this strange man repeatedly asking them to have dinner is and cannot finish any errand because he has no idea where anything is. Well, Arvind Kejriwal’s fledging political outfit, the AAP, is Delhi’s weird uncle. They’re here for you, no matter what you want. Just don’t leave without having dinner!

Throughout the campaign, they promised to change the world, one resident welfare association at a time. Nothing could dampen their enthusiasm! Neither empty threats from the government nor fake stings from shady news organizations. They didn’t even flinch when India’s only living leprechaun, Anna Hazare, tried to rain in on their parade. They promised to give the people whatever they wanted. Their manifesto read like a suggestion box in a high school that accepts anonymous submissions. To them, there are no bad ideas. Five day weekends? You got it! Can you pass a law that makes it so that we don’t have to pay for anything we don’t like? On it! Can you put CCTVs all over the city whose sole purpose is to monitor other CCTVs? What an idea, sirjee!  Your wish is their command. Vote for the AAP, because we don’t think you’re crazy!

Now please excuse me while I mock viewers of reality shows for having a really shitty list of contestants to vote for.

The Revolving Doors of Indian Politics

(This first appeared in the Sunday Guardian)

It was late in the night. The year was 1998. The setting was a teevee studio in a remote corner of New Delhi. The participants in the discussion were then ‘senior Congress leader’ Sharad Pawar, bearded trampoline Prannoy Roy and a whole litany of non-Prannoy Roys, none of whom had fled the nest yet. As the votes came in, initial projections told us that – as expected – no party or coalition had a clear majority. As per its senior leader in the studio, the Congress was still intent on keeping the BJP out of power. When asked by one of the non-Prannoys how they would manage that, Pawar said that they would try to kiss and make up with the United Front. This shocked the non-Prannoy, who spent the next hour expressing his shock that the Congress was ready to prop up the same government that it had withdrawn support from twice in the last one year. It was ready to return to the status quo after foistering an expensive mid-term poll on the taxpayers. A political party playing politics! When did that start happening, the non-Prannoy wondered out loud.

This same naiveté was on display recently when we were informed that voter disenfranchisement enthusiast, Subramanian Swamy, was merging his one man party with the BJP. Because if there is one thing that the BJP needs, it’s another megalomaniac bigot who desperately wants to be Prime Minister. While scary music played over a montage of Swamy meeting and posing with various BJP leaders, questions were raised about how this came about. Wasn’t this the same guy who until a few years ago was the mortal enemy of one of the BJP’s tallest leaders? Didn’t he engineer the downfall of the first NDA government? All the Prannoys and non-Prannoys were shocked! Even though anyone who wasn’t in a coma would have seen this coming, the people whose job is to know things were dumbfounded.

Mortal enemies becoming best friends or best friends becoming mortal enemies is something that happens very often in Indian politics. As one irritating non-Prannoy never fails to remind us, a week is a long time in Indian politics. That is why our politicians’ favourite parlour game is ‘Six Degrees of Ajit Singh.’ The current civil aviation and the human embodiment of everything that is wrong with Indian politics has been in more parties than Suhel Seth at New Year’s eve. Almost every party or politician has been in an alliance with him at some stage in the past few decades. It’s sort of a rite of passage in Indian politics! Everybody has a mind-numbing, terrible, Ajit Singh anecdote. 

Political parties usually discover how horrible their former ally is as soon as they end their alliance. Like when the Trinamool Congress found out that the UPA is corrupt the day after they withdrew support. Or the current exchange of rhetoric between the BJP and the JD(U). Suddenly, the JD(U) finds the BJP communal and the BJP finds the JD(U) incompetent! You know what they say, keep your friends close for seventeen years and have no compunction in taking support from your enemies. Mulayam Singh Yadav never fails to remind people that the Congress party is a parasite on the Indian polity whose only purpose is its own sustenance. Yet, the Samajwadi Party is always the one to pull the UPA out of its self-made rubble. After the last general election, a humbled Mayawati declared her party’s support for the UPA, a year after trying to topple it to make herself the Prime Minister. Since our political parties don’t really have an ideology, they have no qualms in aligning with whoever gives them the best deal. 

Most of our politicians would like you to forget about the past. Smriti Irani once threatened to go on a ‘fast unto death’ if Modi didn’t resign but now she is one of his trusted lieutenants. Najma Heputulla found the BJP ‘politically acceptable’ and ‘totally secular’ when she figured the Congress wouldn’t be nominating her for another term in the Rajya Sabha. Buta Singh has been a minister in both Congress-led and BJP-led governments, but would like you to most remember him for being “Rajiv Gandhi’s #2,” according to whichever lowly intern was paid to edit his wikipedia page.

However, since August is now ‘Anna Hazare awareness month,’ it’s fitting that this week’s award for the most hilarious incident of hypocrisy goes to the un-caped anti-corruption crusader. Hazare, known hater of western ideas is now heading on an American junket. He is scheduled to ring the bell at the NASDAQ stock exchange. Apparently, the best way to fight corruption is letting yourself be used as a prop at the ground zero of crony capitalism. Looks like all that fasting made Ralegan Siddhi’s worst nightmare quite irony deficient.

As he felt the wheels of the plane touching the ground, Anna Hazare took off his ‘gandhi topi’ and put it in his bag. He wouldn’t need it for the next few days. Finally, he was going to be able to fulfil his childhood dream. He never imagined that he could ever travel to America. So he pretended to hate it. Now that he was here, he could live his life. Be himself, without being judged for it. All he wants to do is get a drink, find a nice lady to dance with and then take her to his hotel room. For how long has he denied himself these simple pleasures just because he was expected to? All that ends today! He could do anything here! And he wouldn’t need to explain his actions to anyone. “Whatever happens in America, stays in America,” he happily mumbled to himself. He felt his heart would burst with joy. Which was new to him, because since 1942, the only emotion he’d allowed himself to feel was acute misery. Seems like Christmas was going to be a little early this year.

Death at a Funeral

(This first appeared in the Sunday Guardian)

You know what is the worst part of hearing that someone you know has been visited by the grim reaper? No, not the part where someone you know has stopped existing forever; that’s something you deal with much later. The worst part is the realization that now you have to attend their funeral. 

If the funeral is for someone you shared an emotional connection with, then you’re probably too zoned out to notice what’s going around you. However, if the person being mourned is an acquaintance you didn’t meet often, like a ‘facebook friend’, you become a party to the farce that most funerals are. All our rituals are useless and horrible anyway. People do things they imagine would help the dead wherever they are, but it only helps them feel better about the situation. The dead don’t care what you do after they’re gone! They’re not coming back.

Firstly, the deceased is suddenly turned into a saint. Even if it is that old fascist relative who not only judged you for wearing jeans but also blamed you for putting a scratch on their precious Ming vase.  And despite the fact that everyone who has spent their life bashing them is relieved that the object of their disdain is finally visiting the big gulag in the sky, they still have to find something nice to say. He was a creature of routine! She really believed in old fashion values! At least he died doing what he loved; sucking the innocence out of young children.

Secondly, a lot of the people who populate these shindigs are kind of terrible human beings. They are not there because they feel any sadness or remorse over the passing of the deceased. They’re there because it’s a social obligation. Because they imagine that if they don’t show up and pretend to mourn, people are going to hold it against them and won’t show up when their own time comes. If I wanted to see people put up a false show of emotion while also trying very hard to look forlorn, I’d watch an episode of KBC.

Then there is the compulsive Indian need to put food into people. We’ve been programmed to be so social that even during a funeral we have to take care of people who are supposed to be comforting us. When you go over to give your condolences and mumble empty platitudes that offer no real solace whatsoever, members of that family will cry and force you stay for lunch. You feel like shaking them and telling them that you just lost a family member! Mourn, for cripes sake! Stop asking me if I have eaten. Instead, you nod and awkwardly agree to do whatever they say, because you know on the inside they’re thinking: here, have some lunch. A single serving contains vegetables, salt, tears, despair, and a compelling feeling of running away somewhere, anywhere, just to get away from all these expressions of artificial grief and phony concern that I have to endure for no logical reason.

We even take this with us wherever we go. For example, after the horrific shooting at a Gurdwara in Wisconsin last year, while family members waited outside with a smattering of friends, relatives, police personnel and journalists, some of them got together and were serving food and beverages to all the people who were waiting. I’m so worried about my family still trapped inside, but here, have a bran muffin.

According to most of our traditions and religious customs, the official mourning period ends after the deceased’s family has fed a few hundred of their closest friends and relatives one last time. But people don’t get the memo! They still keep coming over or calling you on the phone. And everyone wants to know what happened! So you keep reliving your trauma each time you need to answer that question. By the time the last vestiges of ‘well wishers’ are done darkening your doorstep, you start wishing that you were the one who died instead of the lucky bastard who escaped this daily dose of fresh hell.

A common reaction to hearing of someone’s demise can be summed up as it could have been me! Death, even if it happens to someone we barely know, reminds us of how thin the thread of life really is and despite what our favourite self-help guru says, we’re not really in control.

Hey, at least we don’t have to attend our own funeral.

Sophie’s Democracy

(This first appeared in the Sunday Guardian)

A cheer erupted among the faithful as one of his minions gave the speech nominating him. He didn’t know which minion it was, though. He had so many of them that all their faces were just a blur to him. The cheers became deafening as he took to the podium. No one would fault you for thinking that he had moves like Jagger. He looked around at the hundreds of subservient eyes watching him with hope and mild trepidation. He scanned the podium. His mother smiled at him and nodded. The Prime Minister gave him the look of gratefulness that he usually reserves only for American Presidents. The country’s favourite man-child smirked on the inside. You might as well call him Buddha from now on because at that precise moment he finally understood why he was ‘The One.’

No one could stop him now.  .

* * *

Unless you’ve been living under a rock or haven’t recently run into that irritating person in your life who cannot stop talking about politics, you’d know that armageddon the general elections are nigh. They’re officially scheduled to take place next year but the news media would like them to happen right now so that they can regurgitate all their clichés (People only vote their cast and not cast their vote! A week is a long time in Indian politics! The voters are quite smart even though they keep voting for assholes!)  and make some money (Would you like the positive coverage package or the no news is good news package?). The UPA doesn’t even want to think about the election because it’s tired of running one of the most corrupt, undemocratic and clueless government in the country’s history and all it wants to do is lie down and close its eyes for a minute. The BJP believes that it has already won the election and the vote is just a formality and despite plenty of evidence to the contrary its going to do a better job than the UPA, ‘god promise.’ And the people can’t wait to invest their hopes and dreams in yet another government that will be worse than its predecessors so that they can vote them out too.

Even though most political parties have been preparing since last year (‘To govern’ refers to distributing freebies to your base, doesn’t it?), the campaign began in earnest this year when the Congress officially crowned its reigning prince as the Next Big Saviour and set him up for spectacular failure and/or mild success, while the various factions of the BJP were busy negotiating with each other to decide upon the most impotent and least harmful person who wouldn’t ruffle any feathers or do anything that his job entails so that they could make him President of their party.

The elections are going to give us such a stark choice. One of the parties consists of a bunch of unelectable regional satraps whose lust for power is only matched by their subservience to their favourite family and who would willingly elect a monkey if they were directed to do so by their dear leader. The other is a cauldron of Prime Ministerial ambitions bursting at the seams and barely held together by its members’ increasingly fleeting loyalty to a bunch of religious octogenarians who still wear shorts to work. Here’s a pro tip: If none of the political parties in your country hold elections to fill their leadership positions, then their commitment to 'democracy’ might not be as strong as they want you believe.

Let’s face it. The next election is going to be a contest between Rahul Gandhi and Narendra Modi. The Gandhi political machine meets the Modi juggernaut. The public image both of them have constructed for themselves over the past few years are going to battle each other in an election campaign that will make you want to curl up in a fetal position and cry softly into a pillow.

Rahul Gandhi is neither this salt-of-the-earth politician who pretends to be obsessed with uplifting the downtrodden nor is he a ‘youth icon’ who wants to change the very system from which he draws his power. He will never be the ‘man of the people,’ no matter how many choreographed visits to homes in rural villages or ‘spontaneous’ train rides he goes on.  The speech he gave at his coronation didn’t seem to come from a man whose family has been pretty much running the country since independence (except for a few commercial breaks in between). It was more like a speech given by a naive, sanctimonious character in a movie who ascends to power and then proceeds to lecture the villainous establishment on the advantages of virtue.

Narendra Modi likes to present himself as a larger-than-life leader with the ability to appear everywhere via hologram allowing himself to solve every problem in the country simultaneously. The false back-story he pretends is part of his non-existent folksy charm is that he’s a simple man who reluctantly took on the task of leading the state government - because he was a good soldier of his party - and then proceeded to make the state the economic powerhouse it is today. Who even cares that he is a vindictive megalomaniac possessing disdain for democratic norms who won’t let anyone stand in the way of his ultimate goal because development, development and development?

So that’s your choice, India. It’s either going to be a nincompoop scion who will get played more times than an air guitar at a Brayan Adams concert or a polished propagandist who has successfully papered over his machiavellian rise to glory. And even though both of them want to be Prime Minister real bad, they’ll act as if they’re only taking up the position in the ‘service for the country’ because the first rule of a Prime Ministerial campaign is that you don’t talk about your Prime Ministerial campaign. In fact, they’re going to act like they’re doing us a favour! How noble! We are indeed quite lucky to have such leaders who would scuttle their personal ambition for the welfare of others and become the second most powerful person in the country.

The most powerful being, of course, the host of Times Newshour.

* * *

Meanwhile, somewhere in Gandhinagar, a smug, bearded man sat alone in his house watching teevee. He saw this pip of a boy giving a speech. They think this young whippersnapper can take him? This is going to be easier than he thought. Normally, the bearded man didn’t allow himself to feel any emotion, but today, he let half a smile appear on his face. This was a special moment in his life and he would always cherish it, even though he was sharing it with no one else but the cold wind coming in from the open window. Today was the first day of the rest of his glorious life.

No one could stop him now.

Hell is Other People

(This first appeared in the Sunday Guardian)

Whenever a horrific incident imbibes itself in the consciousness of the people of our country, there are various stages of grief we go through together. Now, these are not based on any trenchant analysis by renowned mental health professionals. Instead, these are based on our values, our ancient culture, and the wisdom that has been passed on from generation to generation since the Indus civilization.

First comes shock. We feel this when we first hear of the incident. We wonder what kind of animals would do such a thing. We are taken aback by the fact that such people live and breathe among us. We can’t really believe that this happened! Despite there being plenty of proof and a large number of incidents documented in the past. Yet we imagine that this is the first time a deer distracted by the headlights got run over by a car. Wait, the snowball turned into an avalanche? Did not see that coming!

We feel guilty that we didn’t do anything to make sure such incidents didn’t happen. We kick ourselves for suffering injustice silently; for being those monkeys made out of stone and not hearing, seeing or saying anything. But the thing that we find most scary is the thought that this could happen to us too. That makes us angry. We get angry at everything and everybody. And we want revenge! We want heads to roll and bodies to pile up. No time to stop and consider how we contribute to an environment which leads to such an event. We want scapegoats and we want them now!

While the people are angry, the government is in denial. They did nothing wrong. They were all doing their job. In fact, according to them, they did an excellent job. And no, they’re not showing any cowardice by getting the police to suppress dissent using British Raj era tactics. They just retreated into their guarded palaces because they wanted to give the people some space. They aren’t holding onto to power within an inch of their life or anything. And refusing to meet people because of the misbelief that they aren’t going to vote for you anyway is not hubris. Neither is comparing people asking for justice for a fellow citizen with terrorists wanting to overthrow the state. And the advisory issued to news channels covering the protest, was as harmless as advice from a friend. No one was threatening anyone with dire consequences. Whatever gave you the idea!

Of course, it doesn’t take long for any discussion to devolve into a partisan food fight. Everyone stews in their righteousness, because they sincerely believe that this is just another event which happened because people don’t listen to them. Just another example of why the world is screwed up because of the other guy. If only more people would listen to us! You also can’t just be sad and upset about something by itself. You have to retroactively be upset about all the events that took place in the past. And simultaneously be upset about whatever is going to happen in the future.

Then we become mired in farce. Politicians want to make symbolic gestures towards the dearly departed. News channels want you to never forget until the next big story comes along.  And the rest of us just want to go back to our busy lives after someone assures us that we will be able to meander through the rest of our days in peace. Why don’t you just leave us alone, troubles of the world?

* * *

Life in India can make you quite cynical. When you see democracy being sold in packages of various sizes everyday, it’s quite hard to believe that words like “freedom,” “rule of law,” or “justice” mean anything.  Yet, there seemed something different about the current protests. When it started, it was a spontaneous expression of anger. It didn’t have the cold, calculative machiavellian organization of pasts protest. Nor were the protestors made up of the rent-a-mobs used by most political parties. They were outraged citizens who weren’t dead inside like the rest of us and still thought that they could change the world. They were also naive and so blinded by anger that they were not even sure of what they were protesting. They were in dire need of a civics lesson and those among them wanting to do unspeakable things to the accused should probably see a shrink.

We were trying to have a national discussion about things we need to do to make the country better for its female populace but we got caught in the same trap we always do. We lost our way somewhere between chemical castrations and mentally dented presidential scions.

Let’s hope it’s not too late to find our way back.

All Hail the Common Man

(This first appeared in the Sunday Guardian)

One of the major myths of our country’s popular culture is about the power of the common man. The belief that if one day the common man decides to finally rise and take on the system, nothing would stand in his way. The system, hitherto unresponsive, would suddenly start bending for him. Judges would remember their oath to uphold the rule of law. Lawyers would remember their responsibilities as an officer of the court. The police would suddenly start protecting the very people they were bullying till about a day ago. And all the corrupt political leaders would be left stranded at the mercy of the benevolent mob.

We’ve seen this narrative used in countless movies, novels and teevee shows. That’s what passes for ‘social justice’ in this country. One solitary person taking on some of the major evils that prevail in society and winning. However, the ‘winning’ part of the story never happens in real life. Though, not for want of trying! There have been many people who have promised to take one for the team and be the David to all the Goliaths. Alas, they become a Goliath themselves or die trying.

The latest representative of this narrative and the country’s new false hero is one Arvind Kejriwal. He’s spent the past two years crafting a narrative for himself as a crusader against corruption. First behind the scenes, using an old man with ancient ideas as his prop, then dumping the old man when he became a nuisance and becoming the face of the movement himself. He then turned the fledging movement into a political party, pretending to do it for the sake of the people even though this was his plan all along. He spent the last few weeks repackaging information already available in the public domain as a ‘new exposé’ against members of the establishment, thus earning himself the badge of a crusader in the eyes of the uninformed. This week, he finally officially launched his political party, naming it after the common man. Just like the most oppressive republics have the word ‘democratic’ in their official name, the main concern of party of the common man is the self-aggrandisement of its convenor.

In fact, having a duplicitous name is not the only idea Kejriwal has stolen from oppressive regimes. His propaganda skills were on display when he took to twitter to complain about being placed under a media blackout. Unless they never sent me the memo changing the meaning of the word “blackout” to ‘having huge visibility,’ this was simply not true. Not only was Kejriwal giving one-on-one interviews on prime-time, but every major news channel had a report about his party on their main broadcasts. Why was the media-politics nexus victimising Arvind Kejriwal by putting him on teevee everyday?

Another myth Kejriwal perpetuates is that there is no ‘common man’ in Parliament. The truth is that a lot of our politicians come from very ‘humble beginnings.’ Mulayam Singh Yadav used to be a wrestler in a small town in UP. Sushil Kumar Shinde used to be a bailiff in a Solapur sessions court. Manmohan Singh used to be a professor at Delhi University. And yet, they (and others like them) couldn’t help but be tempted by the trappings of power. Our politicians are not some special species born and bred in secret and suddenly appointed to lord over us as if it were their birthright. People vote for them because they identify with them. We believe that if we elect someone just like us to be the captain, the ship will always run in the right direction.

Kejriwal’s version of political reform is to delegate all important decisions to informal village panchayats and local resident welfare associations. Because according to him, that’s where the wisdom lies. People should be able to choose which law they want to follow or not. Or as members of the Khap Panchayat put it “What is a law and why is it trying to marry my daughter?” Will not the most corrupt & vile people inhabit these ‘noble’ bodies? Will they not suffer from the same problems as the Lok & Vidhan Sabhas? Also, in a country where a random sample of five people wouldn’t be able to decide upon what to order for lunch, Kejriwal wants to consult everyone on important foreign policy decisions. Too many cooks never spoiled the broth, apparently.

Even the economic policies advocated by the Kejriwal politburo are based on magical thinking. They want the prices of commodities to be fixed by ‘the people.’ Let consumers decide what they want to pay for goods & services. Just put a tip-jar outside your shop and watch the money roll in because if there is one thing people in India like to do, it’s paying for things they want to purchase! 

If the common man is a superhero, then reality is his kryptonite.

No privacy please, we’re Indian

(This first appeared in the Sunday Guardian)

On a brave January morning in the fifty-fifth year of the last century, the Democratic Peoples Republic of Poschim Bongo witnessed a miracle that would change its future forever. The clouds parted, the birds lined up in the sky as if practicing for a parade and the guy who plays the background music during such occasions put on some Rabindra sangeet. The stork responsible for delivering Bengali babies punched in his card and began to start making his deliveries. When he reached his workstation, he saw that the first baby he was to deliver was giving a fiery speech to the other babies around her who were crying and peeing in appreciation. He tried to get the baby to stop talking so that he could get on with his day but the baby threatened to go on a cerelac-strike until the conditions in the baby producing machines were not improved. After 26 hours of hard negotiations, the stork was finally able to deliver the baby. While the Gods watched this journey live on GodTube, they all nodded in agreement that this baby was one day going to lead her people onto the light. Then they all went back to their day job playing supporting characters in Rajnikanth movies.

Flash-forward to 2012. The fiery baby has now turned into the chief minister of Poschim Bongo. You can recognize her thanks to her old-school tantrums. Some things never change! This week she committed the most egregious crime in the history of the world; she tried to punish someone for posting stuff to the internet. How dare she! Didn’t our politicians get the memo? You can lie, cheat, steal, rape, pilour our taxes, bend the rules for your own personal benefit, but don’t you dare try to take away our ability to make semi-amusing jokes about you or we’ll treat you the same way the United Nations Security Council treats rogue countries who repeatedly violate international law: send you a strongly worded letter requesting you to stop.

Governments in this country have always tried to censor its citizens under one lousy pretext or another. They passed a draconian act making themselves kings of the internet, even though they did not need a new law to stifle dissent. Whether it is through tax raids or humiliating enforcement directorate ‘interrogations’ or using their stooges in the media to brand someone ‘anti-national’ to negate their criticism, they love making examples of people who ‘cross the line’ so that others self-censor themselves. However, their old methods of censorship are useless on the internet. Even if they manage to get something removed from a particular website, it will pop-up at a dozen other websites. Just like you can’t keep an alcoholic away from his drink no matter how many ‘dry-days’ you announce, you cannot keep information hidden on the internet from those who seek it.

Since they can’t get rid of the content, they do the next best thing. Punish the person who posted or shared it. And like with everything else they don’t understand, they try to ban it. The commitment of our government and government departments to make things difficult for legitimate users of things never falters. Simplicity is for countries with a weak digestive system. Tough countries complicate everything beyond recognition. If you like it then you can’t put a ring on it. A few people have a drinking problem? Raise the permissible age limit to get a drink to a number so high that it only makes sense to a person too drunk on power. Some people are using paypal and other online payment services to cheat on their taxes? Ban paypal. Are service providers refusing to share information about every user citing privacy concerns? Threaten to terminate their services until they budge. Privacy in India is treated with the same contempt that is usually reserved for an uninvited dinner guest who likes to share details of his bowel moments while everybody else is eating.

And if they can’t find any real reason to censor something, then they can go back using their most faithful excuse. National security. Those two words are a pre-emptive strike against every question. Sorry buddy, we need access to all your emails, text messages, tweets, facebook status updates and details about every second you spend on the internet. What do you mean your privacy is important to you? National security, boss. What are you, some kind of communist? Or a terrorist supporting liberal hippie? Privacy is for important people whose drivers accidentally record them in compromising positions. Not for schmucks like you.

Now please excuse me while I politely deal with this nice police officer at my front door who wants to know why I was using ‘private browsing’ between 4 and 5 am last Friday.

See you next week.

I hope.

Totally non-corrupt government appoints completely honest minister

Self-proclaimed beacon of democracy and good governance, the UPA government, has added to it’s august ranks another great patriot who puts country first.

Rashtriya Lok Dal (RLD) chief Ajit Singh was today sworn in as a Union Cabinet minister.

LOLWUT?

Is this the same Ajit Singh who has made deals with more politicians than Bhanwari Devi and been in more parties than Suhel Seth during New Year’s eve?

This will be the fourth time that Mr Singh will be sworn in as a member of the Union Cabinet. The 72-year-old Mr Singh has had one earlier association with the Congress at the Centre, as the Union Food Minister in 1995-96 when P V Narasimha Rao was the Prime Minister. He was part of the United Front government headed by VP Singh and was the Union Industries Minister in 1991-1992. He was the Union Agriculture Minister between 2001 and 2004 after he joined the National Democratic Alliance government headed by Atal Behari Vajpayee.

Not to forget his ‘alliances’ with both the SP and BSP.

One would say that it’s another dick move from the incompetent cesspool of stupidity that is the UPA government and trying to assuage  allegations of corruption by hiring the man who is the human representation of all that is wrong with politics in this country is one of the dumbest things in the history of mankind, but, one shouldn’t say these things because national nanny and adult class monitor Kapil Sibal is listening. (Those eyebrows are like antennas!)

Let’s give them the benefit of the doubt for a second. Maybe they’ve hired Ajit Singh for his expertise?

Stop laughing.

He is an IIT graduate after all! Some of them are good at things other than writing crappy campus novels.

Mr Singh's inclusion in the UPA is significant in that it comes ahead of the crucial Uttar Pradesh elections due in a few months. His party, the RLD, has a significant base in the western part of the state. He is likely to get the Civil Aviation portfolio.

Uh-oh. Right. Okay. Nothing to see here.

As they say, if you want something to go away you should severely indulge in it. The UPA is going to fight corruption with . . . more corruption!
Strategery ftw!

Now excuse me while I go back to drinking profusely so that I can quit one day.

 

[via NDTV & NDTV]

Adventures in Real India: Visiting the Wagah Border

Ever since Dear Leader Rahul Gandhi said something about there being two India’s, I’ve always been wondered about the second India. Was he talking metaphysically? Was he going all Philip K Dick on us and talking about an India which exists in a parallel universe, where the grass is green and even the boys are pretty? Nobody had answers to these questions. So, to solve this huge mystery, I put on my cap, stuffed a few clothes into a backpack, got into the car and started driving to an unknown destination. (Not really. I don’t wear caps, my trip was pre-planned and I took a plane. And had to pay for extra luggage. But, hey, the truth doesn’t always sound romantic).

So there I was, in the heart of Real India, (I don’t really know what is really the heart of Real India. Only Generalissimo Gandhi knows that. But this is usually how one begins such pieces, so bear with me.), Amritsar. I hadn’t been to Punjab before. but coming from Delhi, I thought I could handle Punjab. I thought I knew everything there was to know about Punjab. Butter chicken, bhangra music and Harbhajan Singh. What else is there to know? But no, there is so much more to Punjab. There is also Butter Nan, Meethi Lassi and Harbhajan Mann. I was accompanied on the trip by a Mallu friend from Bangalore. Who, for the record, couldn’t stop complaining. You know how those Madrasis are. (Yes, yes, we get it. Everyone in North India is rude and doesn’t understand rules and regulations. Pfft! Rules and regulations are for people who cannot beat other people up and buy their way out of jail!). I guess this is why the Aryans must have driven all the Madrasis down South in ancient times. Because of the constant whining! Sheesh!

Anyway, what’s with the food in Amritsar? I had lunch one day and wasn’t hungry for the next whole week. I thought Italian food was heavy, but it’s got nothing on Amritsari food. Seriously, if there is a solution to world hunger, I’m pretty sure it lies in Amritsar.

While I was in Amritsar, I was also scheduled to go to the Wagah Border. I wasn’t particularly interested in going there because patriotism bores me. If I wanted to hear people lose their shit over a worthless cause, I’d watch a match featuring the Indian cricket team. I said I would go, but only if we could get the good seats. Not the nosebleed seats with the rest of them. I was ready to embrace real India and everything, provided I didn’t have to come into contact with it’s inhabitants. I didn’t want to try too many things at the same time, like a small town resident visiting a mall in a big city for the first time.

However, my socialist Madrasi friend was feeling let down. Since he is a unpretentious prick man of the people, he wanted to sit among the nosebleed seats. (Abeyaar, what do they feed you down South? Do they grate the communist manifesto into your dosas? Leave the communism to the Bengalis. That’s all they’ve got anyway. The thing is, if we can’t use money to decide the importance of people, the whole world will be thrown into chaos!)

So we get ready and head towards the border. The drive is a good one. The scenery was decent, but I was expecting something more Yash Rajesque. The government should look into that. Well, even though it could not hold up to the production values of a Yash Raj movie, I was quite enjoying the scenery. Until my driver/handler (Oh yes! I had a handler. SUCK ON THAT, POOR PEOPLE!) told me that some of it was Pakistan. Now I am as tolerant as the next person, but suddenly the grass on the Pakistani side started looking evil and gave off bad vibes. Like it wanted to assassinate me or something. Typical!

When we reached our destination, we were allowed to take our car a kilometre or two closer to the border than the riffraff general public (Obligatory #LikeABoss). But I had to still make the supreme patriotic sacrifice and had to walk a little. Whilst we entered through the VVIP entrance, we found out that our seats had already been taken up. Apparently, some asshole minister showed up with extra members of his asshole contingent. Can you believe how entitled these people are? They think they can just waltz in with their power and government contacts and expect to be given special treatment. What kind of a sociopath does that?

To the delight of my pinko commie friend, we were then led to the semi-nosebleed section. I tried to protest, but the loud music drowned out  everything I said, just like when the sage old family senior at a Punjabi wedding tries to convince all the dancing members of the groom’s party to stop dancing and come inside the wedding hall and is drowned out by the sound of the band. Finally, the Yash Raj fantasy was coming true! People were dancing, without any reason whatsoever! However, the dancing was like an episode of Glee, if Glee were choreographed by a blind guy with no legs who is also mute and cannot move his hands.

 

For a moment, I was lost in the fanfare. About three hundred people who didn’t know each other were “dancing” next to each other, while another ten thousand other were singing along. We sat there looking at people doing what can only be described as moving their bodies in a weird fashion, while they played every bollywood song even remotely related to patriotism. I think they use the same set of songs at concerts for NRI’s. It seemed strange for someone like me to see all these people, most of whom don’t know each other (I’m assuming. Unless of course, they were all part of a small punjabi wedding party), enjoying the moment together. It was like their differences didn’t exist and just being at the same place at the same time was enough reason to bond. This usually only happens during college fests in Delhi or at an Osho commune.

Suddenly, they played Jai Ho and my bubble burst. Of course this song got the most applause. Of course even the white people jumped in to dance with the natives. Apparently, along with the cellular network, even irony did not exist here because nobody else seemed bothered that the song of a British movie got the biggest pop at the India-Pakistan border. I could imagine the G4 freedom fighters, Gandhi, Nehru, Patel & Bose looking down from freedom fighter heaven, shaking their head and going “We did all that for these assholes?”

Anyway, unbeknownst to me, the ceremony was about to get even more ridiculous. The dancing was followed by shouting. The MC of the event made it clear that we could only shout positive slogans, as part of the new confidence building measures. But that didn’t stop him from pointing us to VIOLENTLY VOMIT OUR SLOGANS in the general direction of Pakistan.

I only briefly looked at the Pakistani side, but it had a look of sadness and despair. Kind of like a metaphor for the whole country. The men and women were sitting separately. When their MC was encouraging them to VIOLENTLY VOMIT SLOGANS in the general direction of India, he didn’t sound like he believed those slogans himself.  It was really transparent that they were written by a quixotic Pakistani government bureaucrat who was serving in the army during the 1971 war. And really, those slogans were even sadder than the whole atmosphere in that place. That’s because during partition, all the best slogans representing the independence movement were taken by India. Wow, whoever our lawyer was during that time, he was one crafty sumbitch! Not only did we get the best of everything, we stuck them with Balochistan! I bet the hardest part must have been trying to make them believe that we actually wanted to keep the Frontier provinces. Jinnah was such a n00b! Governor General Smoking Skull got pwned by Prime Minister Horny McEdwinaPants!

Before all the shouting commences, they play the battle cry theme song from the Mahabharatha teevee program (I’m guessing Daft Punk wasn’t available?), because nothing signifies futile battles like the Mahabharatha. So first, the crowd shouts, then some of the soldiers pull a Shankar Mahadevan and shout the word “OH” for a really long time without taking a breather. Then the crowd applauds them and shouts some more slogans. Then some of the soldiers march towards the gate, while making their feet walk like an Egyptian. Which the crowd applauds and this continues for a while.

All the shouting and applauding presents us with really strange moments.. Like there was this group berating those of us who were mute spectators to the festivities for our lack of patriotism. They were obviously from Bombay. Then there was this group which kept shouting Inquialab Zindabad. Because, really why the fuck not? It’s been sixty three years since the British left, but, whatever, JUST IN CASE THEY LEFT SOMEONE BEHIND! Better safe than sorry!

Then, after what it seems like forever, they take down the flag, and fold it in the prim and propah gay military technique and take it to for safekeeping in the flag(?) house until it’s put back up on the flag pole again at daybreak.

And then everybody gets up to go. But first, only the white people are allowed to leave. That rule must be there to remind everybody how it must have been like before the country got independence. I almost shouted “SIMON GO BACK!”.

Damn, patriotism can be so infectious!