Being Political 201.1: It is not about ‘who will screw us more’.

I was recently forwarded Rahul Ram’s song on the upcoming elections on a number of WA groups and then saw it shared on the Facebook by many friends. The audience at the  Aisi taisi Democracy show where he sings this song is in splits at the song’s refrain ‘fir aaya hai time to choose, who will screw us more.’  I don’t know Rahul Ram personally but I know some people who claim he is their friend. I don’t know Rahul Ram’s politics but the song "Chunav ka Mahina" I think is very naïve, to say the least. The crowd that claps and laps up this song in the oft forwarded video seems to agree with Rahul Ram’s basic contention that this election is a choice between two sets of scamsters and a horde of pretenders who want to be Prime Minister.

I don’t think it is so simple, at least this time. It is not a choice between the lesser of the two evils – a preening breast beating Chowkidar or an assertive Pappu who is being supported by a sister who people believe is a throwback to the times of their grandmother. This time the choice is not between scamsters or even between economic models or who cleaned up Bharat more effectively. It is also very difficult to make out what is true and what is not. Fake news has become the staple of social media and WhatsApp warriors and Facebook fanatics from both sides are ever ready to forward any piece of information that seems to buttress their party or show the other in poor light. Earlier I thought that the BJP media cell was more adept at spinning tales. However recently I was forwarded a cartoon purporting to be a cover from the well-known TIME magazine showing our PM suckling a pliant media. I found it odd that the TIME magazine had taken the trouble to do something so specific to the Indian situation and not hagiographic. And then I found that this was a remake of a cartoon which lampooned the relationship between the GOP (Republican party) and the press in the US and had been printed a while ago. Clearly someone other than the BJP media cell was behind this and it seems that the Congress is quickly playing catch up and the media cells are now spin twins.

So, if this election is not about economic models and the data that we see all around about triumphs and failures cannot be believed then what does a voter like you or me do to make up their minds? This is where Rahul Ram could have helped and this song really doesn’t. The song is a cynical take on Indian democracy, which would have been appropriate at any other point in time but not now. This election is not a time when the cynic can take a step back and sneer at the mockery of democracy that is election time in India. It is not a time when anyone who has any iota of faith in pluralism can afford to sit back in cynicism. What is at stake in this election is the pluralism that has been the hallmark of the idea of ‘India’ or ‘Bharat’ or ‘Hindustan’ since the time anyone can imagine. We have a history of such rich diversity that it is difficult to find a comparable situation anywhere in the world. We have more languages and scripts than Europe which is a continent. We have a diversity of ethnicities which has been enriched by centuries of cultural integration. Political India inherited this ‘hybrid’ vigour and created a constitutional framework of equality which can keep alive this rich cultural tradition.

Unfortunately, our current ruling party the BJP and its mentor the RSS does not value this rich diversity that is India. Their anxiety lies in this diversity which they would like to change into a ‘Hindu’ mono-culture. We don’t need to look far either in time or in space to see the devastation that can be caused by mono-cultures which soon degenerate into cultures of hate.   

The choice thus is not between two scamsters but between promoters of a hateful monoculture and others who have many warts and drawback but are not a regimented hate machine. I know I am a hybrid individual. I was born in one place, educated at another, worked in many places. My ancestral village was in a place which now is another country. My great grandfathers converted as Brahmo’s and I do not believe in God. Both my parents were Bengali speakers but I am more conversant in English and can handle Hindi better than I can do in my ‘mother tongue’. I love Indian food from all regions of the country and love non-vegetarian food more than vegetarian. I make a beeline to eateries serving beef in the few states that it is legally available I would find it difficult to survive with this diversity in a BJP imagined ‘Hindu’ India.

For me this election is about keeping the freedom to be diverse alive. It is an election to keep pluralism alive. If we want this plural-hybrid-multicultural reality of India to survive there is no place for the cynicism about who will ‘screw us more’.